As Pa. deadline passes, Democratic registration at all-time high

Thousands of new voter applications flooded election offices around the state yesterday, with the number of Democratic voters already at an all-time record as Pennsylvania's registration deadline expired at midnight.

Final numbers won't be known until the end of the month, after county election officials have processed all the applications.

But registered Democrats in Pennsylvania already outnumber Republicans by an unprecedented 1.17 million voters - considered bad news for presidential candidate John McCain and everyone below him on the Republican ticket.

"For the past 15 years, from the early 1990s until last year, there were about half a million more Democrats in the state than Republicans. Since late last year, that number has doubled," said Philadelphia political consultant Neil Oxman, who normally works for Democrats. "It's a real statement about voters and how angry they are with the Bush administration."

"This is obviously a great advantage to the Democrats," said Bill Green, a Republican consultant based in Pittsburgh. "You've got an unpopular president, an economy going to hell and a war. . . . The challenge [for Democratic candidates] is getting these people out to vote."

Statewide, there were nearly 4.4 million registered Democrats as of yesterday afternoon, just over 3.2 million Republicans, 563,861 members of other parties and 431,161 independents.

In Philadelphia, what used to be a 5-to-1 Democratic registration edge as recently as last November, is now nearly a 6-to-1 Democratic margin. City election officials reported yesterday a total of 852,718 Democrats, 144,963 Republicans, 87,619 in other parties and 4,938 independents.

The numbers may still rise significantly before the Nov. 4 election as registrations are processed. Philadelphia's voter registration administrator, Bob Lee, said the city would process any new registrations delivered by midnight last night, or arriving by mail with postmarks of Oct. 6 or earlier. He predicted another 40,000 Philadelphia registrations by the end of the week.

When the state last voted in a presidential election in 2004, there were 3,985,000 registered Democrats and 3.4 million Republicans, a 580,000 margin for the Democrats. On Election Day, Democrat John Kerry outpolled President Bush by 144,248 votes.

By last November, the number of registered Democrats had declined slightly, to just under 3.9 million. But the Democratic primary contest between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton pushed Democratic registration to 4.2 million, and it has continued climbing since the April 22 primary. *