Blacks, whites split in La. Democratic primary
McCain struggles among far right
Black votes for Barack Obama outpaced white support for Hillary Rodham Clinton in Louisiana's racially split primary Saturday, exit polls found. John McCain struggled among very conservative voters who turned out in big numbers for Mike Huckabee in their first head-to-head GOP matchup, and McCain couldn't make up the difference among more moderate Republicans.
Blacks were half the Democratic primary electorate and Obama racked up some of his biggest numbers yet among them -- 86 percent, according to the exit polls for The Associated Press and television networks.
(AP)
Most other Democratic voters were white, and Clinton won them by 58 percent to 30 percent, a fairly typical showing for the New York senator this primary season.
Continuing a pattern seen in other Southern states, Obama won about three in 10 white men and did no better among white women. Outside the South, Obama has tended to win far more votes from white men than white women, who have been one of Clinton's strongest groups in nearly every primary so far.
Despite the voting patterns, three in four Democratic primary-goers said race wasn't a factor in their vote and about as many said that about the candidates' sex.
But among whites who said race was an issue in their vote, just 12 percent voted for Obama, who seeks to become the nation's first black president. By comparison, he got 36 percent of whites who said race wasn't important, and blacks voted for him in equal proportions regardless of whether they said race was important to their vote.
Claudette Arceneaux, 50, whose family is both black and white, voted for Obama and said she's been a fan since his ''stunning'' keynote at the 2004 Democratic convention in Boston.
Neither race nor sex was important to her vote Saturday, she said, but it will be important if Clinton wins the nomination -- and not in a positive way. ''If she won now, we'll have another Republican in the White House. I think there are more sexists out there than racists,'' Arceneaux said.
But she added: ''It's history-making either way, isn't it? It's still something to be incredibly proud of. In our lifetimes. In our lifetimes.''
Gregory Espinal, a 29-year-old Hispanic barber, said he voted for Clinton because of ''her influence on politics while her husband was in charge. I knew she was probably a person who thinks far in the future, strategically.''
Obama won all income categories and voters under age 65, expanding his base from most previous primaries, when he had been strongest among the youngest and wealthiest voters. Obama also won among college graduates.
There was little difference in Louisiana in how votes split for Obama and Clinton among moderates and voters farther left.
A huge ideological divide remained in the Republican primary, however.
Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney dropped out of the race last week after McCain amassed an all but insurmountable lead for Republican convention delegates in Super Tuesday contests. But questions remain about the Arizona senator's ability to energize the GOP's conservative base, and on Saturday it appeared most of Romney's most conservative support had gravitated to Huckabee.
Forty-four percent of Louisiana GOP primary voters called themselves very conservative, a higher proportion than in any GOP contest this season except the Iowa caucuses, which Huckabee won. Very conservative voters favored Huckabee over McCain on Saturday by 54 percent to 30 percent. Without competition from Romney, Huckabee had his best showing to date among the very conservative, with the exception of his home state of Arkansas on Tuesday.
McCain did 10 points better among very conservative voters than he's done on average in primaries to date, but Huckabee doubled his typical past support among that group. As in earlier contests, Huckabee, a former Baptist minister, was the strong favorite of white evangelicals -- half the GOP electorate in Louisiana.
McCain and Huckabee split those who called themselves somewhat conservative. McCain won the 20 percent who were moderates 55 percent to 28 percent. The remaining one in 10 GOP voters called themselves liberal and McCain won 65 percent of them.
Huckabee ate into one typically strong McCain group -- those who say the most important candidate quality is that he ''says what he believes.'' One in five voters said that was the top quality, and Huckabee got 47 percent of them to 41 percent for McCain.
Huckabee was even stronger among the 51 percent who said it was most important that a candidate shares their values. McCain won more than eight in 10 of the 17 percent whose top quality was the candidate's experience and the 10 percent who cited electability.
The results were from samples of 1,183 Democratic primary voters and 681 Republican primary voters conducted by Edison Media Research and Mitofsky International in 30 precincts across Louisiana on Saturday. Results were subject to a sampling error margin of plus or minus 4 percentage points for the Democratic primary and 6 points for the Republican.