Democracy Corps Poll: Obama Consolidates Democratic Youth Vote

Democracy Corps has released the latest edition in their "Youth for the Win" young voter polls: The Rising Wave Among Young People. The poll tracks youth involvement and measures youth support for the two candidates. Most of the information deals with McCain and the continued collapse of the Republican brand among young people. I'll have a separate post on that later today. Right now I want to focus on Democracy Corps' findings re: Senator Obama.

Democracy Corps notes that Senator Obama is expanding his lead over McCain among young voters and even exceeding the levels of youth support Democrats enjoyed during the 2006 wave elections. Significantly, he is also quickly consolidating the Democratic base and pulling in most of Clinton's core youth support:

Barack Obama now holds a 60 to 33 percent lead over John McCain with young people in this country. Among young voters most likely to vote, this lead jumps to 66 – 33 percent. Historically, these margins exceed Kerry’s showing in 2004 (54 – 45 percent) and echo the young people’s revolt against the Republican Congress in 2006 (60 – 38 percent). In claiming the nomination, Obama managed to consolidate Democrats and improve his showing among voting blocs that, at the national level, often preferred Hillary Clinton.

In an incredibly short amount of time, Obama has made double digit gains among unmarried women and Hispanics, and his favorability ratings have seen similar jumps. Democracy Corps notes that he still has ground to gain among young, married white women and "older" (24 - 29) white women, but beyond that he is quickly approaching the ceiling in terms of consolidating Democratic youth support. After that, any gains among young voters will be made among independents or Republicans dissatisfied with McCain (a growing group, as we'll see later).

So much for the divided Democratic Party.