More In Politics Counts

by Dante Chinni, blogs.wsj.com
October 26th 2012 1:00 PM

Dante Chinni is the writer of Politics Counts , which runs every Friday. Mr. Chinni is the editor of Patchwork Nation, which examines different types of communities across the U.S. 

As the presidential race has narrowed to become a dead heat, one state in particular has risen to the top of the most important battlegrounds: Ohio. Both campaigns see it as the linchpin to securing 270 electoral votes and both candidates and their surrogates are racking up the frequent flier miles to the Buckeye State.

As we have noted in this space before, Ohio is a complicated terrain, with different regions holding different kinds of voters – it is big cities and suburbs, college hubs and small towns. It's difficult to get a handle on, which is one reason why is always seems to be a battleground. In the last five presidential elections, its vote has gone with the Democratic candidate three times and the Republican twice – and always, with the winner.

But when you look closely at the state, there may be five counties that are particularly worth watching: three in the corridor between Cleveland and Toledo (Wood, Ottawa and Sandusky), one in the state's middle (Tuscawaras) and one in its southwestern corner (Hamilton).

If Ohio is to be the center of the political universe for the next few weeks, those five counties will offer an important indicator of the it is spinning on Nov. 6. Set in different parts of the state, those five counties might be seen as Ohio's bellwethers for different reasons, but taken together the vote in them will tell us a lot.

Wood, Ottawa and Sandusky Counties

 Like the other counties listed here, it's not that these three control the fate of Ohio – the total population in them is only about 225,000 – but rather that the vote in them in indicative of larger trends in the state with key demographic groups. Wood and Ottawa have sided with the winner in every presidential election since 1992 and Sandusky, which borders them, has done so in four of the five campaigns.

Largely stationed along the Ohio Turnpike, east of Toledo, these three counties have a lot of older white residents. That can swing the vote in them toward the GOP. But they also hold a lot of jobs – and retirees – connected to automobile manufacturing and to auto unions. That may make them a challenge for Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney in 2012, as his now infamously headlined opinion piece "Let Detroit Go Bankrupt" is surely know here.

When the Democratic candidate wins these three counties there is usually a solid blue line in the population center across the top of the state along Lake Erie Ohio from Toledo to Cleveland. The map shows how often Democrats have won each of the counties in Ohio in presidential elections since 1992 – the darker the blue, the more often they have won.

Tuscarawas County

 Sitting just below the blue northeast corner of Ohio, Tuscarawas is what one might call a gateway county – residing at a part of the state where the most union-heavy, industrial region starts to give way to its more rural, Appalachian south. And that gateway position may be why, like Ottawa and Wood counties, it has gone with the winner in every presidential election since 1992.

The map here shows the counties that have gone Republican in presidential elections since 1992 – the darker the red, the more often the GOP has won.

Tuscarawas is not wealthy, but it not poor either – the median household income is only about $41,000. And while it has more evangelical adherents than many of Ohio's northern counties, about 16% of its population, it has fewer evangelicals than many of the counties that sit near it and below it. Plus it has a small university presence in a satellite campus of Kent State. In other words, it has small parts of the pieces that make the semi-rural parts of Ohio so complicated and winning it may be a sign that the state in a larger sense is falling to President Obama or Mr. Romney.

Hamilton County

 Hamilton's past record in presidential elections does not suggest it is worth watching. It has only sided with Democrats once in the last five presidential races, in 2008. But the home of Cincinnati is worth watching on Election Day – and in the days leading up to it – for a different reason, what it may say about Ohio's African American vote.

Ohio is general does not have a large black population – only about 12% – but Hamilton is much higher, almost 26%. And over the past three presidential elections, the vote in Hamilton has trended Democratic as the county's African-American population has grown.

In 2000, Republican George W. Bush won Hamilton by about 11 percentage points. In 2004, Mr. Bush won it by about 6 points. In 2008, Mr. Obama won it by 7 points. And in that time, the overall population of Hamilton has shrunk by about 45,000 people, but the African American population has grown by about 7,000.

If Mr. Obama wins Hamilton again on Nov. 6, it likely means he is getting good turnout from African American voters. That will not only help him in Hamilton, but should also help him run up his margins in counties like Cuyahoga, Franklin and Lucas, which also have larger African American populations.

These five counties aren't sure bets. It's possible a candidate could win one or two and still lose the state. But if Mr. Obama or Mr. Romney will all of them, odds are very good that they will win Ohio – and according to the prognosticators this week, the presidency.

Original Page: http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2012/10/26/politics-counts-spotlight-on-5-ohio-counties/

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