Arizona Secretary of State Ken Bennett (R) released new January 2011 voter registration figures today, and - for the first time - the number of registered independents (aka "others", including "party not designated", "independents" and other minor parties) exceeds the number of people registered as Democrats.
And, while Bennett's news release trumpets that notable factoid, at the bottom comes a quote that adds some perspective: Bennett thinks that the number of "others" may also outnumber registered Republicans by the end of next year, too.
"We may very well see the number of registered independents eclipse the number of Republicans around the time of the 2012 election."
Here are the big-picture numbers, in a nutshell:
Republicans: 1,142,605, or 35.80%
Others: 1,010,725, or 31.66%
Democrats: 1,008,689, or 31.60%
Libertarians: 24,880, or 0.78%
Green: 5,040, or 0.16%
TOTAL: 3,191,939
The smaller-picture numbers are going to be extra important, as the Redistricting Commission will be using them when they begin their work in a few months. Accordingly, here is the link to the numbers by County, Congressional District, and state Legislative District. The report also shows the inactive voters in each of these categories and sub-categories.
One other note of interest: Pima and Santa Cruz counties are the only two counties that showed a dip in the number of registered voters between the General Election registration cutoff (October) and January 1. This may be the result of removing outdated names off of the registration rolls, fewer new registrations than the other counties, less population increase, or a combination thereof.
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1,142,605
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