Obama takes traditional GOP strongholds in Iowa

Font Size:

By Ed Tibbetts | Wednesday, November 5, 2008 10:07 PM CST | () comments

Barack Obama’s sweeping victory Tuesday transformed Iowa’s presidential map, spreading blue ink from Democratic strongholds in eastern Iowa to central and western counties President Bush claimed four years ago.

Obama won Iowa’s seven electoral votes with 816,495 votes, or 54 percent, according to unofficial results. John McCain got 676,001 votes, or 45 percent.

Obama’s 141,000-vote victory is a remarkable turnaround from the past two election cycles when the winners were chosen by a combined 14,000 votes.

A total of 1.5 million Iowans turned out Tuesday.

Obama’s win, while by a smaller margin than what had turned up in pre-election opinion polls, was impressive for the breadth of his popularity in even some traditionally Republican areas.

Obama won six counties in the western Iowa 5th Congressional District.

The Democratic areas of eastern Iowa were uniformly behind him, too, often in large numbers.

Overall, he won 53 of Iowa’s 99 counties Tuesday, 22 counties more than Kerry did four years ago.

Even in the areas he lost in western and southern Iowa, Obama shaved the margins Bush built up beating John Kerry in 2004.

“I was surprised that Barack ran as strong as he did in the central and western part of the state,” said Dave Nagle, former chairman of the state Democratic Party.

As he did in the caucuses, Obama, a first-term senator from Illinois, ran up impressive margins in most of the state’s urban centers.

He won 56 percent of the vote in Polk and Dubuque counties and 60 percent in the counties surrounding Cedar Rapids and Mason City. In Johnson County, he won an astounding 70 percent of the vote.

In Scott County, Obama won 57 percent, far better than Kerry did four years ago.

Obama’s campaign had opened up 50 offices in the state and worked to push into Republican rural areas as well as bulk up its eastern Iowa base. It was successful in many of those places.

Obama’s wins in such counties as Carroll and Crawford in west-central Iowa are especially notable.

Four years ago, Bush won the counties with 55 percent of the vote in each. This time, they swung Democratic. He also narrowed the margin in Dallas County, in the suburban Des Moines metro area.

Part of the explanation for the turnaround in some of the western rural areas may be changing demographics. Since 2000, the Hispanic population has grown in the state, especially some of these rural areas.

Eric Woolson, who was the communications chief in Iowa for Bush in 2004, said Republicans need to court this constituency.

“We have a lot of new voters who have come in,” Woolson said.

Perhaps more importantly, Obama’s campaign aimed to court rural voters by emphasizing differences with McCain on farm issues. McCain opposes ethanol subsidies.

Steve Grubbs, a Davenport-based Republican consultant, chalked up Obama’s success to organization in some of these areas rather than a philosophical change, however.

“He had a stronger ground game than McCain, and that kind of thing can make a difference,” Grubbs said.

Meanwhile, exit polls said the economy was the big issue in Iowa. Six in 10 Iowa voters said the economy was the most important issue to them, and Obama beat McCain with these voters.

Many Iowans, especially those living on their investments, have watched retirement accounts dwindle in recent weeks.

Nagle said that likely explains Obama’s sweep of several demographic groups in the state.

“That wasn’t surprising given what’s happening economically,” he said.

Fifty-six percent of independents went for Obama, as did 55 percent of women, 61 percent of voters between 18 and 29 and 53 percent of white women, according to an exit poll conducted for The Associated Press and other major news outlets.

McCain narrowly won voters between 30 and 44 years of age and was even with Obama among people 65 and older.

Obama won by 10 points with people between 45 and 64 years of age.

Dave Roederer, McCain’s Iowa chairman, also said it was hard to overcome the economic headwinds.

“In all honesty, that economic meltdown was just something we couldn’t overcome,” he said.

Economy may have been the top issue, but the ability to bring about change was the most important trait in a candidate, according to Iowa respondents to the poll. Thirty-five percent of Iowa voters cited it, and Obama won 9 out of 10 of these voters.

How they voted

Here’s how each Quad-City area county voted in the presidential election, by percent:

IOWA

County (McCain) Obama

Cedar (44.4%) 54.0%

Clinton (37.7) 60.7

Jackson (37.3) 61.8

Louisa (47.2) 51.4

Muscatine (41.5) 57.0

Scott (42.2) 56.6

Statewide (44.5) 53.7

ILLINOIS

County (McCain) Obama

Henry (45.3) 53.0

Mercer (43.2) 55.1

Rock Island (36.9) 61.5

Whiteside (40.3) 57.8

Statewide (37) 62

Ed Tibbetts can be contacted at (563) 383-2327 or etibbetts@qctimes.com.