In Alabama Senate race between Doug Jones and Roy Moore, will black voters show up?

[yallerdawg]

Source: al.com, by John Sharp

Political observers believe that black voter turnout in deep red Alabama is crucial to Democrat Doug Jones' chances of defeating Republican Roy Moore in the general election. Moore is leading almost all polls in recent weeks, with an advantage ranging anywhere from 6 to 8 percent, and even higher.

The number of Republican voters who showed up during the Aug. 22 primary compared to Democrats illustrated the stark difference: Republicans had approximately 418,000 votes cast during the GOP primary, with Moore as the top vote-getter at 162,570. The entire Democratic field generated only 154,581 votes.

Nationally, the black voter turnout rate declined for the first time in 20 years in a presidential election. It fell to 59.6 percent in last November after reaching a record-high of 66.6 percent in 2012 when President Barack Obama was up for re-election. The 7-percentage-point decline from the previous presidential election is the largest on record for blacks.

"When you have a candidate like Roy Moore who is an existential threat to progress in Alabama and to the health and well-being of voters in the Black Belt and to folks in Decatur (and elsewhere), we believe voters will exercise their self-preservation instincts," said Jones' campaign manager Wade Perry. "He's bad for Alabama."

Read it all at: http://www.al.com/news/mobile/index.ssf/2017/11/in_alabama_senate_race_between.html#incart_river_home