Title: Six take-aways from the Census Bureau’s voting report | Pew Research Center
Headings: Six take-aways from the Census Bureau’s voting report
Six take-aways from the Census Bureau’s voting report
Content: By 2020 this share will rise to 37.2%, and by 2060 it will be 54.8%, according to Census Bureau projections. If the racial voting patterns from the 2012 election persist, the electoral playing field for future Republican presidential candidates will become increasingly difficult. ( GOP candidate Mitt Romney received just 17% of the non-white vote.) Lastly, a methodological note: The gap between the voter turnout reported by the Census Bureau and the actual national vote tallied by election officials widened in 2012. According to the Census Bureau’s 2012 Current Population Survey November Supplement on Voting and Registration, an estimated 133 million U.S. citizens voted in 2012. That estimate is higher—by 4 million votes—than the national tally of 129 million votes cast for president. The gap in reported votes and the actual vote tally is the widest since 2000 (when the gap was 5.4 million votes) and marks the first widening of the gap since 1984. The Census Bureau’s November supplement to the CPS is the most comprehensive data source available for examining the demographic composition of the electorate in federal elections, but it relies on a post-election self-reporting by survey respondents. Because of what is sometimes described as “social desirability bias” some survey respondents may say they voted when in fact they did not.