Arizona Election Results

As predicted, Arizona went overwhelmingly to McCain with over one million votes to give him 54 percent. Obama pulled 45 percent with 870,883 votes. Of the counties that Obama won, he won them with a large margin:

Coconino county: Obama, 57 percent. McCain, 41 percent.
Apache county: Obama, 63 percent. McCain, 34 percent.
Pima county: Obama, 52 percent, McCain, 46 percent. (Tuscon is in Pima county)
Santa Cruz county: Obama, 65 percent. McCain, 34 percent.

The same pattern occured in counties that went to McCain:

Graham county: McCain, 70 percent. Obama, 29 percent.
Mohave county: McCain, 65 percent. Obama, 33 percent.
Maricopa county: McCain, 55 percent. Obama, 44 percent. (Phoenix is in Maricopa county)

As other states had record turnout in both early and election-day voting, Arizona's numbers fell short of the expected record. The Arizona Secretary of State estimated that 64 percent of the state's three million registered voters actually cast their ballots. In 2004 77 percent of registered voters made it to the polls. The relatively low voter turn out (in comparison to the rest of the country) in Arizona could be the reason why McCain swept the state.

More than 200,000 provisional ballots have yet to be counted, but these would not be enough to swing the state for Obama.

So why did McCain take Arizona? First of all, McCain is a veteran of the Senate. Arizonans have elected him cycle after cycle. Secondly, Arizonans lean Republican and have traditinally been a culture of independent, ranching westerners. They see themselves in McCain and support him for it. Lastly, and perhaps most importantly, McCain hails from Arizona and the right-leaning culture of the state would not abandon their son. Even though McCain ran a scattered campaign of day-to-day tactics, Arizonans responded to him as though he were a member of their families, which essentially he is.

Arizona and California both put gay marriage on the ballots this year and both states voted to amend their constitutions to ban same-sex marriage, or rather they defined marriage as only between a man and a woman.

On the same ballot, Arizonans voted for another amendment to the state constitution which probits state institutions from discriminating based upon sex, gender, age, race, color or ethnicity when hiring employees. The amendment did not include any non-discrimination based on sexuality or sexual preference.

McCain has returned to his home to finish the rest of his term. There is the chance that he can return to the Senate and rise again as a leader in the Republican party as John Edwards did, but there is a greater chance that the tattered and defeated Republican party will turn on him as a scapegoat.