Analysis of Kansas Advance Ballots for Primary Election
Analysis of Kansas Advance Ballots for Primary Election
Nearly 270,000 ballots cast. Many Democrat men stay home for "Value them Both"
Updated July 2024:
The subtitle line above that “Many Democrat men stay home” was not accurate. There is an imbalance in the Kansas Democratic Party with 105,00 more women than men. There are many more female Democrats than male Democrats in all age intervals. The Democratic men that “stayed home” in 2022 did not exist because of the huge gender imbalance in the Kansas Democratic Party.
Analysis of the Advance Ballot turnout will give clues about the success of the Value Them Both constitutional amendment ballot question in Kansas. Perhaps the “both” in this story is not only the mother and child, but also both a child’s mother and father.
A friend sent me the files that can be purchased from Kansas Secretary of State that document the Advance Ballots sent and returned, as well as those casting ballots in person before the election. In theory, the files I obtained were from the last day of Advance Ballot reporting (July 31) before the actual count tonight.
The files show 120,720 Advance Ballots sent, 72,478 returned (which means 48,242 could be returned), and 195,704 cast in person. The total advance ballots cast shown in these files was 268,182. Records for a few ballots have some problem data, so plots below only show 268,173.
These numbers are consistent with slightly updated values today from the Kansas Secretary of State.
The analysis below looks at a breakdown by county, gender, and political party for those voting in person and those who were sent and returned a ballot.
I show “upset” plots below — here “upset” has nothing to do with elections. Rather, an “upset” plot is a way to show commonality among sets, which is often better when looking at multiple sets. See Visualizing Intersecting Sets.
Kansas Statewide
The statewide Advance Ballot results show Democrat women are the dominate demographic, followed by Republican women and Republican men. All plots below show Democrat men lagging in Advance Ballot turnout.
The horizontal bars are various sets, while the vertical bars are unique combinations of these original sets. The numbers next to bars show the exact numbers.
The first vertical bar shows black circles for the combination: Democrat, Female and Voted. The height of the bar shows 70,744 are in this combination.
The second vertical bar shows Republican Females cast 66,705 advance ballots.
The fourth vertical bar is curious. The advance turnout for Democrat Males lags behind Democrat Females and both Republican Males and Females.
Here is a summary of the first six vertical bars:
How will ballot party correlate with the final results?
Breakdown by County
This Excel file shows Advance Ballot numbers for each of the 105 counties in Kansas:
The next section will show upset plots for the five counties with the highest advance ballot turnout.
Top 5 Advance Ballot Counties
Johnson County (Overland Park, Lenexa, Olathe)
Johnson County (42% of state advance ballots): Democrat Females have best turnout, but many Democrat Males did not show up.
Sedgwick County (Wichita)
Sedgwick County (18% of state advance ballots): Unlike the state totals and Johnson County, Republican Female turnout is better than Democrat Females in Sedgwick County. Many Democrat Males did not show up.
Douglas County (Lawrence)
Douglas County advance ballot counts (6% of state total) were larger than Shawnee or Wyandotte Counties, which are larger counties.
Lawrence with the liberal University of Kansas had a large Democratic turnout. Democrats, Female and Male, outperform Republicans, but Democrat Males lag Democrat Females considerably.
Shawnee (Topeka)
Shawnee County (5% of state total): Democrat Females have best turnout, but many Democrat Males did not show up.
Wyandotte (Kansas City, Kansas)
Wyandotte County (3% of state total ): Similar turnout to Douglas County, but with lower numbers.
Rest of the Kansas
Rest of Kansas (Excluding JO, SG, DG, SN, WY counties) (26% of state total): Republicans have twice as many Advance Ballots as Democrats. Democrat Males lag.
Election Results Tonight
Let’s see how well these early Advance Ballot results hold up in the final results as reported by the Kansas Secretary of State.
Update 2022-08-03 1430
Here’s a map of the results by county from the Kansas Secretary of State:
A comparison of advance ballots to all ballots will be possible when ballot history is available in about a month.