05.16.08
Oregon Delegate Predictions (Updated)
Posted in Oregon, analysis, presidential primary forecast tagged barack obama, delegate majority, delegates, democratic primary, Hillary Clinton, Oregon at 7:45 pm by Elliot
With the primary season winding down, and only 5 contests remaining, we’re finally reaching the end of the primary season and May 20 is the last day where more than 100 delegates are at stake in a single day. Now, most reasonable people (sorry Jerome and Alegre, this doesn’t include you) realize that Obama is the presumptive nominee and a lot of this is just a matter of going through the motions, but that doesn’t mean that I can’t look at the remaining races.
By the way: I’ll be posting my Kentucky delegate projection either Sunday or Monday (by the way, since the other authors of this site don’t necessarily agree with my own posted projections, these are only my projections)
Now, I understand that the geniuses at ARG are predicting a really close race for Oregon, but one lesson which is universally taught over and over and over again is that ARG is a crappy pollster which, on occasion, gets lucky. If you don’t believe me, take a look at South Carolina, Iowa, Connecticut, and Wisconsin (where within two days, the numbers moved by a miraculous 16 points). Oregon is going to go pretty strongly for Obama. Remember, the only polls that can get away with being outliers are the ones from good pollsters, if ARG is going against the grain, it probably means that they’re wrong and everyone else is right.
Anyways, let’s get to the nitty-gritty:
CD-01
Delegates at Stake: 7 (Obama 4, Clinton 3)
District Profile
District Analysis: This district contains the southwest part of Portland, plus the Northwest corner bordering Washington State. This is a very good district for Obama; well educated, affluent, disproportionately male, and young. The only thing that will stop Obama from hitting more than 60% here is that relatively high Latino vote. Although Obama isn’t likely to get 64.3% here for a 5-2 split, it is possible, and if Obama is having a very good day state-wide, it could very well happen.
CD-02
Delegates at stake: 5 (Clinton 3, Obama 2)
District Profile
District Analysis: This district seems like one which should be fairly strong for Clinton (older, less educated, less affluent, and with a reasonably high number of Latinos (which is why I’m giving this district to Clinton), but I’m also aware that, on top of the fact this district is surrounded by states and districts which Obama won pretty handily (rural Nevada, Idaho, Washington State, and Northern California), SUSA’s polling shows Obama beating Clinton by 18 points in what they call “the rest of Oregon” (which I take to mean the southeastern and eastern part of the state). In addition, PocketNines (who is second only to Poblano as far as numbers are concerned) seems to believe that Obama is likely to win this district. I admit, it’s very possible that I’m wrong here, but I’m erring on the side of caution and saying that Clinton will win.
Update: Update: I understand that people think I’m being overly cautious with this district, and I understand why you think that, but I checked out a district which is reasonably similar to this one (WI-01) Obama only won that district by about 5 points, and that district was better educated, more affluent, younger, and had fewer Latinos. It’s not that Obama can’t win this district, it’s that I believe that Clinton is more likely to win here.
CD-03
Delegates at stake: 9 (Obama 5, Clinton 4)
District Profile
District Analysis: This is Northwest Portland and also contains a few small towns. Alright, Obama should be expected to win pretty handily here, but, once again, SUSA showed Obama only winning by 9 points in Portland. While I believe that Obama will easily get the 5-4 split, it’s going to be a bit of a climb to get the 6-3 split, still it’s not outside the realm of possibilities (and I will say that if it happens, it means that Obama will likely be getting a good 18%+ margin statewide.
CD-04
Delegates at stake: 7 (Clinton 4, Obama 3) (Obama 4, Clinton 3)
District Profile
District Analysis: Alright, even though this district is represented by Obama-supporter Peter DeFazio (who decided not to run against Gordon Smith for Senate which annoys me to no end, but that’s for another day) this is still a district which is probably more favorable to Clinton than to Obama. I’m giving the district to Clinton, but I don’t discount Obama’s ability to win the district himself.
Update: Ok, ok, I get the point, Eugene is here, that does change the equation, so I’ll give this district to Obama.
CD-05
Delegates at stake: 6 (Obama 4, Clinton 2)
District Profile
District Analysis: At first I thought that this would be a delegate tie (with Obama winning a majority), but I actually think that Obama can pull off the 58.35% of the vote here to get 4 delegates. This district is pretty well educated, is relatively young (especially compared to CD-02 and CD-05).
Subtotal: Obama 18, Clinton 16 Obama 19, Clinton 15
At-Large: Obama 7, Clinton 5
PLEOs: Obama 3, Clinton 3
Total Delegates: Obama 28, Clinton 24 Obama 29, Clinton 23
Popular Vote: Obama 55.4%, Clinton 44.6%
By the way, big shout out to Al Giordano of The Field for adding us to his blog-roll. I know that some Field Hands already read our site, but to those who aren’t, welcome to Election Inspection, I hope you enjoy the site.
Update: I’ve changed my projection for CD-04 and added some extra analysis for CD-02. Thanks to the commentators on Daily Kos for your imput.
latina for obama said,
May 16, 2008 at 9:41 pm
thanks for the prediction Elliot. Do you think there is any chance that the spread will be higher?
Elliot said,
May 16, 2008 at 9:50 pm
I’m probably being pessimistic, there’s a decent chance that Obama wins CD-02, 6-3 in CD-03, and win CD-04. If that happens, there’s also a decent chance at Obama winning 4-2 and 8-4 delegates statewide (basically, Obama getting over 58.35% of the vote). Obama could, hypothetically, get a 33-19 split.
Mark said,
May 17, 2008 at 3:18 am
OR poll average of the last 5, without repeaters (ARG, PPP, Portland Tribune, SUSA, Rasmussen):
Obama: 52.6%
Clinton: 40.2%
Undecided/Other: 7.2%
Margin: Obama: +12.4%
Assuming that the undecideds go with the same trend and adding the usual 2% snap-back effect for the person in the lead, then, if the primary were held tomorrow and all the votes had arrived, the prediction would be, based purely on statistics:
Obama: 58.6%
Clinton: 41.4%
Margin: Obama +17.2
His margin average of 12.2 is 4.2 HIGHER than it was in April. He has improved over April.
ARG has had funny, whacked out numbers the entire season. Forget ARG.
And using this model, I missed PA by only 0.4% and NC by 0.08%.
And I think a 29-23 split is more probable.
But as usual, outstanding analysis!
xstryker said,
May 17, 2008 at 10:20 am
I’m with you Mark, whereas I was the pessimistic one for IN/NC, I think Elliot’s underplaying it a bit this go-round. Oregon should go for Obama much the way Wisconsin did, which would make your 17.2% guess pretty on-target. My call is 15% right now, but I’m waiting for Monday’s polls. Sadly, Zogby has abandoned us here, so we’re not getting weekend tracking (useful for trending purposes at least).
ikl said,
May 17, 2008 at 9:19 pm
Unless SurveyUSA is off on the internals on all of their polls, Obama should run better in CDs 2 and 4 (what they call “outside of Portland”) than CDs 1, 3, and 5 (what they call “Portland”).
I also don’t think that WI CDs and OR CDs compare very precisely – those states aren’t terribly similar. Northern CA would be a better place to look for similar districts in a primary state, I would think.
ikl said,
May 17, 2008 at 10:32 pm
Um, the symbol was unintentional.
Kentucky Delegate Projection (Clinton +17) « Election Inspection said,
May 19, 2008 at 12:01 pm
[...] Posted in Kentucky, Presidential Primaries, analysis, presidential primary forecast tagged barack obama, delegates, democratic presidential primary, Hillary Clinton, Kentucky at 12:01 pm by Elliot Oregon Delegate Projection here [...]
Rick said,
May 19, 2008 at 6:23 pm
Oregon CD4: Not only home to Eugene and the University of Oregon, but also home to most of Corvvallis and Oregon State University. Obama would need 64.3% to get the 5-2 split but I don’t think outside the realm of possibility at all.
Oregon CD3: Obama needs 61.1% of the vote to get the 6-3 split in Portland. Most brew pubs, ergo more progressives per capita of any district in the state, contains the greatest concentation of AA vote although not exactly substantial in lily white Oregon, if it goes 5-4, probably a really bad sign.
Oregon CD-5: This is funny. My first thoughts on this district is this is the one Hillary may break even or actually win. I guess I am focusing on Salem (a bit less well off than other areas in the valley, major hispanic center south of Portland) and the most Republican counties in the valley. Could be offset by the educated Lake Oswego and West Linn voters but doubt 4-2. But if it does break that way, it will be a big night for Obama.
Kentucky: Love the analysis but just how many poor, rural, uneducated white districts can there be in one state? Ay chihuahua.
Thanks for your hard work. I enjoy the analysis.