UPDATE #6: Now up to 71% of the vote and Christie leads 49.8 to 43.9 or about 105,000 votes.
Based on these figures Corzine now needs an edge of 14.41% among the remaining 29% of the vote. If you assume those voters casts the same 6.25% of their votes for the other candidates that leaves 93.75% of the vote.
So Corzine would need about 54% of the tremaining vote.
Obviously nothing is impossible and Hudson county remains stuck at 57% of the vote counted. Plus we do have the absentees to consider. But at the same time we’ve got a 5.9% margin to overcome and that is hard even in New Jersey.
UPDATE #5: 65% of the vote in with Christie leading by 50-44. This is a popular vote margin of about 100,000 votes.
We still have no movement in Hudson county but with 57% of the vote in Corzine has a 27,000 vote lead so assuming he really pulls out votes in the remaining areas he could get 35,000 votes there. That puts Christie ahead by 65,000 votes or roughly 2.5% of the total vote.
So in theory Corzine could pull ahead if he gets a huge margin in the absentees
Right now he’d need an advantage of 8.46% in the remaining votes.
UPDATE #4: We have 58% of the vote in and Christie leads 50.4-43.5.
Since we’ve got figures in from Union county I thought I’d do one more Democratic vs Republican county analysis
In 2005 the three Democratic Counties (Union, Hudson and Essex) had a margin of about 175,000 votes for Corzine. This year they are headed for about 125,000. A net loss of 50,000.
In 2005 the two Republican Counties (Monmouth and Ocean) gave the GOP nominee a margin of about 40,000 votes. This year they are heading for as much as 140,000 or a net gain of 100,000.
So right there you have a shift of 150,000 votes away from Corzine.
Based on 58% of the vote being in Corzine would need a 9.44% edge over Christie in the remaining counties. One caveat though is that Hudson county has been stuck at 57% of the vote in for some time now which leads to speculation of what is going on there. This county is voting 68-27 for Corzine.
We also have lots of absentee votes to consider.
UPDATE #3: Now we are at 44% of the vote in and Christie leads 49-44 over Corzine
We now have results from Union County, which gave Corzine an 27,000 vote lead last time we have a 7,000 vote Corzine lead with 68% of the vote in.
I’ll shift to statewide anaysis from now on. Based on the current margins Corzine would have to beat Christie by 4.11% with the remaning half of the state. Since we have big returns in from the heavy Democratic counties this could be tough, but certainly not impossible
UPDATE #2: Now up to 28% of the vote in and Christie leads with 50% to 44% for Corzine.
Looking at the four big counties again things have improved for Corzine but are still not pretty
Essex and Hudson headed now for turnout of around 290,000 with a Corzine edge of 110,000
Ocean and Monmouth headed for turnout of around 400,000 with a Christie edge of 145,000
Net Christie edge of 35,000 versus a Corzine edge over his 2005 opponent of 50,000.
UPDATE #1: We’ve got about 15% of the vote in and it’s 52-42 for Christie over Corzine.
We have returns from two big Democratic counties (Essex and Hudson) and two big GOP counties (Ocean and Monmouth).
In 2005 the total turnout in Essex and Hudson was about 300,000 and Corzine led by about 150,000 votes.
This year the current returns show turnout headed for about 250,000 in the two counties and a Corzine lead of roughly 90,000.
In 2005 the total turnout in Ocean and Monmouth was about 370,000 and Corzine trailed by about 40,000 votes.
This year turnout is headed for about the same 370,000 but Corzine is headed for a deficit of 90,000 votes.
Combining the four counties we see Corzine led by 50,000 votes in 2005 but could trail by 50,000 this time around.
Of course we have no guarantee the numbers will hold up, we could see a burst of turnout in the Democratic counties or a slump in the GOP ones but this is a bad trend for Corzine.
As a note the four counties totaled about 40% of the overall vote in 2005
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Polls just closing, expect this to be a long night and possibly a rerun of Minnesota Senate with long recounts. Very early returns (less than 1%) show Christie ahead 50-42-7.
However one interesting figure out of Hudson County (Jersey City) could bode poorly for Corzine. In 2005 there was a turnout of about 115,000 votes and Corzine won by 53 points for a net margin of 61,000 votes. This time turnout is closer to 95,000 with a margin of 43 points or a net margin of 41,000. A loss of 20,000
By contrast in Monmouth County the turnout in 2005 was roughly 195,000 and Corzine lost by 8 points or a net deficit of 15,000. This year the turnout seems headed for 170,000 votes and Corzine is losing by 40 points or a net deficit of 68,000 votes. A loss of 53,000 votes.
This means in 2005 Corzine came out of the two counties with a lead of 46,000 votes while this time he is potentially trailing by 27,000.
Still very early and never count out a Democrat in New Jersey.