"Didn't I shake your hand last Friday?" President Obama stretches to meet with every last Democrat in NoVa during one of his two stops at George Mason University last month.
(Carolyn Kaster - AP)
There was a lot of chatter this year about Northern Virginia's crucial role in the election, and now that the numbers are in, we know this: It certainly made all the difference in who won Virginia, if not the country, for the second straight presidential election.
Mitt Romney won the Rest of Virginia by almost 94,000 votes on election night. But in the four counties and five cities that make up the State of NoVa, Obama beat Romney by almost 210,000 votes. That provided Obama's nearly 116,000-vote margin of victory in Virginia.
This occurred despite 75,000 fewer people voting in Fairfax County this year than 2008 (a 14.6 percent drop), and Romney far outperforming John McCain in RoVa (the Rest of Va.). McCain only won RoVa by 1,500 votes in 2008, compared to Romney's 93,943 margin. But NoVa cast 27 percent of the votes in the state, and Obama won more than 60 percent of that bloc for the second time.
Statewide, Obama won Virginia by 115,907. But he won by 232,317 in 2008. That's a drop of more than 116,000 votes. Republicans flipped Montgomery County, Va., and Virginia Beach this year. But the 602,501 Democratic votes in NoVa, combined with blue enclaves around Charlottesville, Richmond and Norfolk, overwhelmed the all-red Rest of Va.
Also, in previously unreleased Virginia exit poll findings from The Post, we learn that statewide voters identifying themselves as Democrats outnumber Republicans by six or seven percentage points in presidential election years, but Republicans have the upper hand in the off-year governor elections. And the number of voters identifying themselves as liberal was up to 24 percent, compared to 31 percent conservative, but that ratio was 17 to 38 just eight years ago..
More NoVa numbers and more from The Post poll of Virginia voters after the jump:
Within our standard NoVa boundary of Alexandria-Arlington-Fairfax-Loudoun-Prince William we include Fairfax City, Falls Church City, Manassas City and Manassas Park. That's nine jurisdictions in Northern Virginia, all nine of which went for Obama. The closest was Loudoun, with 51.6 percent for Obama, a two percent gain for Republicans over 2008.
Mitt Romney at George Mason on Nov. 5. Both campaigns spent plenty of time in Northern Virginia, but the size of its Democratic vote overwhelmed the Republican majorities in the rest of the state.
(MANDEL NGAN - AFP/GETTY IMAGES)
But two interesting things happened on Tuesday night: While the turnout in RoVa was up about 1.5 percent, in NoVa it was down about 2.8 percent, mostly because of Fairfax. More than 29,000 fewer people voted in NoVa in 2012 than 2008, for the two major candidates.
Second interesting fact: Obama got roughly 50,000 fewer votes in Fairfax County this year than in 2008. But Romney got 27,000 fewer votes than McCain in 2008, so Romney stayed at 39 percent while Obama polled 59.3 percent of Virginia's biggest voter cache. Romney lost NoVa by almost 210,000 votes, though that's better than the 232,000 vote margin for McCain in 2008
Here's how NoVa voted this year, with 2008 in parentheses:
Alexandria: O -- 52,434, 71.4% (50,473); R - 20,205, 27.5% (19,181)
Arlington: O - 81,178, 69.2% (78,994); R - 34,433, 29.4% (29,876)
Fairfax Co: O - 260,835, 59.3% (310,350); R - 173,876, 39.5% (200,994)
Fairfax City: O - 6,636, 57.3% (6,571); R - 4,762, 41.1% (4,686)
Falls Church: O - 5,006, 69.1% (4,695); R - 2,141, 29.6% (1,970)
Loudoun: O - 81,900, 51.6% (74,607); R - 74,794, 47.1% (63,328)
Manassas: O - 8,478, 55.9% (7,518); R - 6,463, 42.6% (5,975)
Manassas Park: O - 2,873, 62.1% (2,463); R - 1,696, 36.7% (1,634)
Prince William: O - 103,161, 57.4% (93,386); R - 74,371, 41.4% (67,589)
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NoVa: O - 602,501, 60.5% (629,066); R - 392,651, 39.5% (395,233)
RoVa: O - 1,303,024, 48.3% (1,329,304); R - 1,396,967, 51.7% (1,330,820)
All Of Va.: O - 1,905,525, 51.6% (1,958,370); R - 1,789,618, 48.4% (1,726,053)
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Here are some notes from Post pollster Peyton Craighill on Virginia voters statewide:
Party - The partisan composition of Virginia looks very similar to 2008; 39-32-29 Dem-Rep-Ind. That +7 Dem advantage is actually one point wider than in 2008. The party split looks nothing like the 2009 governor race (-4 Dem). The number of independents increased from 27 to 29 percent of the electorate and they went to Romney by 11 points, 54-43 Romney-Obama. That's one of the biggest swings from 2008 when Obama was about even among independents, 49-48 Obama-McCain. But in 2012 Obama maximized his vote among Democrats, going from an 84-point victory margin in 2008 to 88 points. That was enough to ensure victory.
Ideology - The number of voters identifying as liberal increased to 24 percent, the most we've seen in any Virginia exit polls. They are still outnumbered by conservatives at 31 percent. But the ideological composition of the state is swinging sharply. In 2004 the composition was 17-45-38 liberal-moderate-conservative. That swung to 24-45-31. And the growing numbers of liberals are now backing Obama by a much larger margin than in the past. In 2004 for example, John Kerry had a 66 point margin over George W. Bush among liberals. Obama's liberal margin is now 86 points, better than in any race going back to 1996.
Education - Obama's support slipped among voters without a college degree, from a positive 54-45 margin over McCain in 2008 to about even at 49-50 with Romney. White non-college voters are especially weak for Obama, going from a big 34 point deficit in 2008 to an even bigger 44 point deficit. (Obama continues to do well with college graduates.)
Economic outlook - Virginia voters are a little less gloomy than voters nationally about the economy. In Virginia 69 percent rate the economy as not so good or poor. It reaches 77 percent nationally. Either way that is a lot of economic discontent, but those who are most unhappy - 27 percent who said "poor" - went to Romney by 92-6. Among those who say the economy is just "not so good" broke about evenly between Obama and Romeny, 48-51. Among the 30 percent who have positive ratings of the economy went 90-9 for Obama. For Romney to win, he had to do better among those who were more marginally discontent.
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