About 8.9 million people, above 49 percent of California’s registered voters, are estimated to have turned out for the state’s presidential primary election this week, according to early projections by state officials.
The figures are considered preliminary because 2.4 million ballots out of the 8.6 million still must be certified, said California Secretary of State Alex Padilla. At a postelection forum on Thursday in Sacramento, Padilla said the final turnout number won’t be known for several days.
The 49 percent turnout is higher than California’s 31.1 percent turnout in the primary 2012, when President Barack Obama was running uncontested for the Democratic nomination and California Republicans chose Mitt Romney.
But it is lower than the historic 57.7 percent turnout in 2008, when California Democrats chose Hillary Clinton over Obama and Republicans picked John McCain. The 2008 Democratic primary in California was on Feb. 5 of that year, or Super Tuesday. This year, it was at the tail end of the primary calendar. The respected Field Poll, before Tuesday’s election, had forecast turnout this year of 8 million, or 44.7 percent of the state’s 17.9 million registered voters.

Source: Arab News