Obama Wins!

By Ben Trott

Barack Obama was, last night, elected 44th President of the United States. At a little past 2pm Eastern Time today, CNN were reporting that he had received 63,359,706 votes and counting. That makes 52% of the popular vote and secures him 349 electoral college votes. 270 were necessary for a win. His victory, then, was a substantial one.

To see a breakdown of how each state voted, take a look at CNN’s interactive map. The Huffington Post’s political editor has also put together a very interesting piece on voting demographics. It contains some very unsurprising statistics (Obama performed extraordinarily well amongst young voters and Black voters), as well as some more surprising ones. Most striking, perhaps, is that he outperformed John Kerry in 2004 in attracting White voters; and McCain in every income category – and most powerfully (with 73% to 25%) amongst ‘very poor families’ earning less than $15,000 a year. The source used for the Huffington Post’s article is an MSNBC exit poll which is also well worth having a look at here.

Over the next few days, I’ll be posting links to a selection of articles - and perhaps commissioning one or two pieces - on the potential meaning of Obama’s victory.