Speaker Nunez: GOP Vote-by-Mail Lagging

Part Three of our continuing series on absentee voters: At a small rally this morning for state Treasurer Phil Angelides, Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez (D-Los Angeles) said Republicans are turning in far fewer absentee ballots than Democrats had expected.

The numbers from county registrars, he said, show 44% percent of returned vote-by-mail ballots are coming from the GOP, compared to 41% for Democrats. Normally, he said, Republicans would have a higher percentage of absentee ballots coming in. He said 11.5% are from independent voters, and about 3% are from other parties.

Republicans have launched an aggressive absentee voter program to take back some of the advantage they had enjoyed for decades among the vote-by-mail crowd. But now Democrats are voting absentee in similar numbers to Republicans. "It's good news for us in terms of the number of ballots submitted," Nunez said.

Today is the final day to mail ballots to county registrars, or absentee voters can drop their packet at any polling station on election day. County elections officials are reporting only about 27% of absentee voters had mailed in their ballots as of late Thursday afternoon — far less than expected.

It may not make much of a difference for Angelides, given the high number of Democrats and independents who told pollsters they are voting for Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger. But it could be a signal that down-ballot candidates in tight races might do better. Or, in the final days, the ballots could rush in from Republicans. Stay tuned.

This morning, Nunez and Angelides rode a Sacramento light rail train together, stopping outside a government building to greet a few dozen supporters, mostly unionized state workers. Nunez told the crowd: "Everybody is listening to the polls. The polls are not reflective of the people who have the ability to get to the polls." On the other side of the Capitol, First Lady Laura Bush was preparing to leave the Hyatt hotel, where she stayed after attending events for Reps. John Doolittle and Richard Pombo.

After the train ride, Angelides chatted with people on the street, walked through a La Bou restaurant, and then stood outside again with supporters in the gloomy, rain-theatening weather. He reminded them to attend a barbecue on Monday night at a plumber's union hall. He spotted me standing nearby and said to the crowd, laughing, "This is a reporter. Get him!"

UPDATE: Political and corporate consultant Rob Stutzman, a Republican, writes in: "Past absentee returns are not an applicable benchmark to this election. More and more voters are using absentee ballots, possibly as much as 50% of all votes cast this year, so of course Republicans' proportional advantage will shrink this year. That means historical GOP proportional disadvantage shrinks on election day. It's just shifting behavior of how citizens vote. The speaker should be concerned that absentees are being returned at a slow pace possibly signalling a miserable turnout on Tuesday. That could leave a couple of his incumbents more vulnerable than he'd like."

(Photos: Robert Salladay / LAT)