-
Jan 27, 2008 1:21 pm US/Eastern
-
Digg |
Facebook |
E-mail
|
Print
Bill Clinton Affected S.C. Race Marginally
WASHINGTON (CBS) ―
For all the sharp-elbowed campaigning he did for his wife in South Carolina, Bill Clinton couldn't keep voters from abandoning her in the state's Democratic presidential primary, according to exit polls.
Barack Obama's win Saturday was the most one-sided drubbing he has delivered to Hillary Rodham Clinton thus far. It came despite several days of campaigning by the former president, who played the role of aggressive attacker in a state with large numbers of blacks, with whom he has long been highly popular.
In exit polls of voters conducted for The Associated Press and the television networks, almost six in 10 Democrats said Bill Clinton's campaigning had played an important role in deciding their vote. Yet these voters still preferred Obama over Hillary Clinton by 48 percent to 37 percent, with another 15 percent supporting former North Carolina Sen. John Edwards.
In other words, of those voters who said Bill Clinton affected their decision, nearly two out of three didn't choose his spouse.
Since Hillary Clinton lost to Obama by an overall 2-to-1 margin in South Carolina, she clearly did better among people who said her husband's campaigning affected their decision. But she still lost with that group, numbers that seem to indicate a dismissal of the former president's efforts.
A closer look at the figures along racial lines is instructive because race was a major factor in South Carolina.
The Clinton and Obama campaigns each accused the other of fanning racial flames, and at one appearance Bill Clinton said he'd been told his wife would not win because the candidates were getting votes "because of their race or gender."
In the end Obama, the Illinois senator whose father was Kenyan and his mother white, won nearly eight in 10 black votes and about one-fourth of whites'. Blacks made up 55 percent of the day's overall vote.
Slightly more than half of white voters said Bill Clinton's efforts affected their decision. Among that group, about half picked Hillary Clinton - a good showing, but not overwhelming. Edwards, the other white candidate, got one-third of those votes, and Obama got about one-fifth.
Bill Clinton was once seen as a big asset for his wife's campaign, especially among Democrats, noted CBSNews.com's Vaughn Ververs. After the thrashing Hillary Clinton took in South Carolina, the former president may find himself in the doghouse, if not the bullpen.
It was one phrase that began the racial ball rolling. When Bill Clinton referred to Obama's claims of consistent opposition to the war in Iraq as "the biggest fairy tale that I have ever seen," many blacks heard more than policy criticism. They heard a dismissive attack on the first black with a real chance of winning the White House. They heard echoes of racial battles of the past. And they heard it from someone who was supposed to be on their side.
About the same share of blacks, or 59 percent, said Bill Clinton had an impact on their choice. Seven in 10 of them backed Obama, while about one-fourth opted for Hillary Clinton.
Another way of trying to gauge Bill Clinton's impact is looking at when people decided whom to support. Some of his highest profile appearances and comments came during the campaign's final week, and 31 percent of voters overall said that is when they chose their candidate.
In that group of late deciders, 20 percent picked Hillary Clinton, 27 percent Edwards and 52 percent Obama. For those deciding during the final three days or even the last day, the percentages were roughly the same.
That means people who made up their minds just before voting didn't pick candidates dramatically differently than the earliest deciders. If anything, they were slightly less likely to pick Clinton than later deciders were.
Among whites who decided in the last week, half went to Edwards - maybe reflecting last Monday's debate in which Obama and Hillary Clinton exchanged harsh personal swipes and Edwards sought to play the role of the campaign's wise grown-up. Eight in 10 late-deciding blacks supported Obama.
The poll was conducted for AP and the television networks by Edison Media Research and Mitofsky International as Democratic voters exited 35 sites in South Carolina. It involved interviews with 1,905 Democratic primary voters, and had a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 3 percentage points.
(© 2008 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.)