New Haven released the official city returns from Tuesday’s gubernatorial election at 3:50 p.m. Wednesday — and the numbers told a different story from what politicians and pundits across the state have been saying.
The returns (posted above) showed that Democratic Gov. Dannell Malloy captured 23,183 votes in the city Tuesday, or 86.5 percent, against Republican Tom Foley, who collected 3,441 votes, or 13 percent. (Independent Joe Visconti picked up 119 votes, or .44 percent.)
Malloy beat Foley here by 19,692 votes.
Click here for an easier-to-read pdf version of the results.
Four years ago New Haven produced an 18,613-vote margin for Malloy in his first race against Foley.
So that means Malloy increased his total number of New Haven votes by 885 this time around, and his victory margin by 1,079. Foley saw his vote total drop by 194.
You wouldn’t know that by what politicians and the press have been saying on Wednesday.
Here’s what Foley himself wrote in his concession letter Wednesday: “We did significantly better in our cities than in 2010. Net vote counts in Bridgeport increased 1,634, New Haven 1,098, and Hartford 591.”
Similarly, the Hartford Courant showed Malloy’s New Haven vote total dropping in its own chart and analysis. Other media echoed the narrative: Malloy’s support dipped in the cities.
Paul Bass Photo
That’s apparently because they were comparing the total 2010 vote — including both votes cast at polling-station machines as well as absentee ballots — with only the machine tally for 2014. Absentee votes hadn’t been tallied and reported until the 3:50 p.m. release Wednesday. Also, a new state law allowed people to register and vote on the same day (aka “election day registration,” or “EDR”). That added more votes, most of them cast for Malloy, be tallied before the official results were released on Wednesday afternoon. (Pictured: Some of the hundreds who waited on line for up to two hours to take advantage of EDR Tuesday in New Haven City Hall.)
Malloy and party leaders had been aiming to increase his New Haven victory margin to 20,000 this year; they came close. Click here for a story about how New Haven’s state-leading get-out-the-vote operation did the work at the grassroots on Election Day.
Foley claimed in a brief swing through New Haven Sunday that he planned to contest Malloy for votes in the city, dispatching ward workers on Election Day, for instance. In fact, his operation was invisible in New Haven on election; even in wards that occasionally produce some Republican votes, no Foley palm-carders were in evidence, let alone workers bring voters to the polls.
Reader alert: New Haven redraw its ward boundaries between the 2010 and 2014 elections. That makes it harder to draw meaningful ward-by-ward comparisons between the two elections’ results.
At 4 p.m., the city registrar of voters office reported that it had still not completed the official counts for other Tuesday races.