Election 2008: What’s At Stake?

We’ve looked at the Asian vote and the Latino vote as important demographics. Neither of these groups is monolithic, and immigrants of different national origins voted differently.

But exit polls show that non-white voters, taken as a group, are increasingly powerful. Their overwhelming support for Obama helped the Democrat overcome a 12 point deficit among whites, and without them he would not be our president-elect today.

The CNN exit poll broken down by ethnicity shows that non-whites made up about 27 percent of the electorate. Asian voters went for Obama 62 percent to 35 percent. Latinos broke for the Democrat at about the same rate, while 95 percent of African-Americans voted for Obama.

The take-away-for Republicans: a party that is nearly all white, as we saw at the St. Paul convention, probably won’t thrive. If the GOP hopes to survive in a multicultural America, it might want to start shopping for a bigger tent.