Mitt Romney won New York’s presidential primary Tuesday without much difficulty. Romney won 62.4% of the vote statewide. Ron Paul finished second, picking up 15.7%. Newt Gingrich finished third, with 12.9% and Rick Santorum picked up 9% of the vote, despite dropping out of the race earlier this month.
In Onondaga County, Romney beat Ron Paul by more than 40 points. Oswego County had one of the closer races in the state, with Romney winning by only 22 points. (Check this map from the New York Times for other results from around the state.)
Newt Gingrich fared slightly better in the western part of the state. Gingrich appeared at a campaign event last week with former gubernatorial candidate Carl Paladino. Both Gingrich and Ron Paul made stops in New York ahead of yesterday’s primary. Romney did not make an appearance in New York prior to the primary.
Voter Turnout
Voter turnout was expected to be low, especially with Santorum out of the race. Combined with the fact that this is the first of three primariesto be held in New York this year, turnout in most areas around the state was less than 10%.
According to theState Board of Elections, there were 85,374 active registered republicans in Onondaga County, as of April of 2012. In Tuesday’s primary, only 6402 votes were cast, a turnout of 7.4%. In Oswego County, only 5.4% of registered republicans voted. Turnout was even worse in Jefferson County at only 4.9%.
Statewide, only 153,482 of the state’s more than 2.6 million republicans voted in the primary. That’s a statewide voter turnout of 5.7%. In the last republican presidential primary 4 years ago, more than 640,000 votes were cast. A voter turnout of more than 24%.
