Very preliminary data from polling sites with heavily gay populations in several Super Tuesday states suggests most gay voters supported Barack Obama over Hillary Clinton in the Democratic primaries. That contrasts with voting in last month's primary in Florida, where voters in Key West and South Beach favored Clinton. And it contrasts with the findings of exit polls in California and New York, commissioned by MSNBC and other major news outlets, which found gay voters overwhelmingly supporting Clinton.
Early data from specific precincts is limited and unofficial, but in seven heavily gay voting sites in three Massachusetts cities, 58 percent supported Obama and 42 percent supported Clinton. In Chicago's heavily gay 44th Ward, 67 percent supported Obama and 31 percent supported Clinton.
Elections officials did not return a reporter's calls for data from Manhattan's or West Hollywood's heavily gay voting sites. Officials in San Francisco said precinct-level data—even very preliminary information—will not be available for several days. Results from those areas could very well change the picture overall concerning the LGBT voting trends.
But where details could be found, voters in Boston's five heavily gay precincts favored Obama 56 percent to 44 percent. That support was slightly stronger than found in overall Boston voters, who preferred Obama by a slightly weaker percentage—53 percent to Clinton's 45 percent.
In Northampton, Mass., which is known to have a heavily lesbian population, 60 percent of voters supported Obama, compared to 40 percent for Clinton.
The exception in Massachusetts was in the resort town of Provincetown. There, 54 percent of voters supported Clinton, compared to 46 percent for Obama.
The state of Massachusetts overall went for Clinton, 56 percent to Obama's 41 percent.
Boston's gay newspaper, Bay Windows, refused to endorse any of the top Democrats, saying that, 'On LGBT issues alone, there's nothing that makes [ the ] frontrunners stand out enough to merit your money, much less the endorsement of this newspaper.'
In San Francisco, results for specific precincts—even preliminary results—were unavailable. But unofficial results for the entire city give Obama the edge with 52 percent of the vote, compared to Clinton's 44 percent.
But in California overall, Clinton won the primary, 52 percent to Obama's 42 percent.
In Manhattan overall, Clinton prevailed 54 percent to 44 percent, according to the New York Times.
These Feb. 5 early voting results in gay neighborhoods stand in some contrast to voting in previous primaries. In South Beach Miami's heavily gay 33139 zipcode, 61 percent of voters supported Clinton. In Key West, 51 percent supported Clinton, roughly mirroring the Florida results in the Democratic primary.
And, according to MSNBC, exit polls of voters in California and New York suggest 'gay, lesbian, and bisexual' voters favored Clinton by 63 percent to Obama's 29 percent in California. That differed significantly from voters who did not identify as gay; those voters supported Clinton 52 percent to Obama's 42 percent in California. In New York, 59 percent of 'gay, lesbian and bisexual' voters backed Clinton, compared to 36 percent for Obama. In New York, unlike in California, the difference between gay and non-gay voters was minimal: 58 percent of non-gay voters backed Clinton and 40 percent supported Obama.
The exit polls found four percent of California voters and seven percent of New York voters identified as 'gay, lesbian, or bisexual.'
The Republican primaries in Massachusetts and Chicago Feb. 5 showed voters in heavily gay areas backed John McCain over Mitt Romney—by a two-to-one margin. Those results roughly tracked the results in South Beach and Key West last month.
McCain's success overall with Republicans has sounded alarms among the party's most right-wing leaders, who are warning they cannot and will not support the senator from Arizona. Chief among their gripes are his refusal to support a federal constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage.
Despite anti-gay, right-wing activist James Dobson of Focus on the Family saying Tuesday that he could never support McCain for president, most Republicans voting Tuesday did. That was good news for gays because it added to the growing evidence that the radical right wing of the Republican party is apparently on the wane.
Dobson said he expects this November's elections will offer him 'the worst choices for president in my lifetime.'
'I certainly can't vote for Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama based on their virulently anti-family policy positions,' said Dobson, adding that he probably won't vote at all.
Right-wing conservative leader Richard Viguerie echoed the comments concerning McCain, telling the Christian Newswire this week that McCain should 'stop the bleeding' of the party's conservatives over such issues as gay marriage.
A poll taken of 1,249 adults nationwide just four days before Super Tuesday voting found that only 2 percent of adults indicated that 'morals/family values' would be their 'single most important issue' in choosing a presidential candidate. The poll was conducted by the Washington Post and ABC News.
© Lisa Keen. All rights reserved.
