2004G

2004 November General Election Turnout Rates

Last updated: 12/28/2011

The preferred turnout rates are those calculated with the voting-eligible population as the denominator. The voting-eligible population (VEP) represents an estimate of persons eligible to vote regardless of voter registration status in an election and is constructed by modifying the voting-age population (VAP), by components reported in the right-most columns (scroll right in the spreadsheet).

The preferred turnout rate numerator is the Total Ballots Counted, which is all ballots election officials counted. Not all jurisdictions report total ballots counted, so a second-best numerator is Highest Office, which in a presidential election year is the total votes for all presidential candidates including write-ins (where reported), and in a non-presidential election may be the vote for the highest turnout statewide office (typically governor) or if no statewide election was held, the sum of the congressional elections. Total ballots counted includes blank and otherwise invalid votes for the highest office. Some states may report a statistic they call total ballots cast, but is actually vote for highest office.

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Notes:

Turnout data are culled from state election websites. The demoninator data reflect the July 1, 2004 and 2005 voting-age population estimates (2010 intercensal adjustments) interpolated to Nov. 2004, non-citizen estimates are interpolated from 2000 Census and the 2006 American Community Survey interpolated to Nov. 2004, the year end-year 2004 DOJ prison report and the end-year 2004 DOJ probation and parole report. The overseas eligible estimate is recently updated with data provided by the Federal Voting Assistance Program.