What will voter turnout look like in Arizona in 2024? It could be lower than 2020

Arizona is home to more than 4.3 million voters who are eligible to participate in this year’s general election, according to the secretary of state’s latest published voter registration figures.

How many of those registered will actually cast a ballot?

The Arizona Republic estimates that about 77% of those eligible — roughly 3,370,000 people — might turn out, perhaps a few percentage points fewer than in the last presidential election in 2020.

Reporters on the Republic’s data team have spent the past several months working with Christopher Weber, director of The Arizona Voter Project at the University of Arizona, to model turnout for the presidential election. Weber holds a doctorate in political science and has a background in statistics.

With Weber’s guidance, reporters used a combination of five approaches — from the simple to the complex — to generate projections, then averaged across them to estimate turnout. The data powering the Republic's models come from the Arizona Secretary of State's Office and from L2, a research company that combines state voter registration data with demographic information on registered voters across the nation.

Republic, political consultants' estimates fall in same range

At 77%, the Republic’s turnout estimate falls within or a few percentage points above the ranges that some of the state’s political consultants are projecting.

Paul Bentz, senior vice president for research at the Arizona political consulting firm HighGround, said he’s estimating between 76% and 78% turnout.

In 2020, turnout was the highest that it’s been in the 21st century across the nation and in Arizona, where a whopping 80% of eligible voters turned out.

“I look at the last few presidential elections, and recognize that the lowest it’s been in recent years was 74%,” Bentz said.  “So … somewhere between 74 and 80 percent is likely what we’re looking at. Assuming an increase in Republican enthusiasm over the first time Trump ran, and seeing that we’re seeing more Republicans willing to return early ballots … it leads me to believe that we expect higher than the first Trump election, but maybe not as high as the ... match between Biden and Trump.”

Track the votes Who's ahead in Arizona's biggest county in early ballot returns? Track the votes

Sam Almy, a data strategist for Uplift Campaigns, forecasts that turnout will land around 75%, with an upper range of 77%. His estimate is based on comparing the share of early ballots returned in the past two presidential cycles with the share returned thus far in the current one.

Ballot initiatives on hot-button topics — like Proposition 207 on legalizing recreational marijuana, which voters passed in 2020, or this year’s much-anticipated Proposition 139 on abortion — won't heavily impact voter turnout, Almy said.

“There's a small percentage of the electorate that's voting exclusively for 139,” Almy said. “But at the same time, it's not going to swing [turnout], you know, 10-15%.”

Presidential races in Arizona have come down to slim margins before. President Joe Biden clinched victory in the state four years ago by 10,457 votes — less than 1% of the total number of ballots cast.

Democratic strategist Stacy Pearson said she believes abortion is a motivating factor for Democrats and older people to cast a ballot. Her models put turnout closer to what it was in 2016: about 74% or 75%, she said.

“The sense of urgency is less today than it was in 2020, so I think it's reverted back to a 2016 level, with one notable exception — which is abortion,” Pearson said. “This election is back to issues that have decided voter participation for 200 years: taxes, economy, security. ‘20 and ‘22 were the anomalies, because of COVID.”

'Some of this is absolute random human behavior'

Ultimately, while data and information from previous elections can help people understand what voting in Arizona might look like this year, the Republic’s estimate — and those of the consultants we spoke with — remain projections.

None tells us how many voters actually will cast a ballot in this year’s general election.

“There are two tools I use on a daily basis: One is sophisticated modeling based on a decade of voter behavior, and the other is my magic 8-ball,” Pearson said. She keeps the ball in her office, consulting it about whether she’s looking at things correctly. “Some of this is science, and some of this is absolute random human behavior.”

Readers can view The Republic’s turnout estimate, along with live-updating vote counts and further information on how we did it, on azcentral.com Nov. 5.

This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Voter turnout in Arizona could be lower than 2020, projections say