No ‘Bradley Effect’ for Obama

By Ben Trott

A while back, before the election, I put together a couple of posts (here and here) on the so-called ‘Bradley Effect’ where voters falsely claim to pollsters that they will vote (or in some exit polls, have voted) for a Black candidate. There was considerably speculation as to whether Obama’s candidacy would be effected, leading him to underperform that which was being widely projected. An Associated Press article posted to Yahoo! News today reported, however, that nothing of the kind was observed during Tuesday’s presidential election.

The article cites a large number of polls that predicted the election’s outcome with great accuracy. This is, however, by no means to say that ‘race’ was not a factor in the election, simply that voters do not lie about it as much anymore. The article explains that White voters cast their ballot for McCain over Obama by 12%, and 95% of Black voters went for Obama. 7% of White voters admitted ‘race’ was a factor, and twice as many of them voted for McCain as for Obama.