The results of a survey of American Jews surely came as good news for the Bush administration. The survey, conducted among a sample of American Jews by Luntz Research, showed overwhelming support for President Bush, with nearly 80 percent backing his policies. In fact, in a hypothetical rematch of the 2000 presidential race — a race in which Bush received approximately 20 percent of the Jewish vote — Bush now outpolls Gore 42 percent to 39 percent among Jews.
True, with Bush enjoying an overall approval rating close to 90 percent, there are few, if any, demographic cohorts in America who don’t overwhelmingly support the president. But the impact of even a minor shift in Jewish support toward Bush will not only greatly enhance his own chances for re-election, it will also greatly improve the prospects for his party’s control of Congress.
The political muscle of Jews in America is a function of both financial wherewithal and electoral strength.
The first of these needs little elaboration. Despite their small numbers, the relative affluence of Jews has long made them powerful players in American politics. While the great majority of Jews have traditionally voted for the Democrats and have long been generous contributors to that party, some of the Republican Party’s biggest financial donors have been Jews. Republicans realize that Bush’s strong standing among Jews will help fill the campaign coffers of a party facing a critical election next year that will determine who controls a now evenly divided Congress.
Yet conventional wisdom notwithstanding, the influence of the Jews in U.S. politics is as much about feet as it is wallets. Though Jews account for less than 3 percent of the American population, their national political clout is a result of three factors: America’s peculiar Electoral College, a highly concentrated Jewish vote and a disproportionate Jewish turnout.
As those following the 2000 elections will not soon forget, the American presidency is won by garnering a majority of votes in the Electoral College. With few exceptions, votes in the Electoral College are apportioned according to a winner-take-all format, with the candidate who receives the largest share of the vote in an individual state receiving all of that state’s electoral votes.
With nearly all the Jewish population residing in only a handful of states — New York, Florida, California, Pennsylvania, Connecticut, New Jersey, Ohio and Illinois — the Jews have a much larger voice in determining who will be president than would be the case without the Electoral College.
That voice is further magnified because Jews are more likely to vote. In elections with only a 50 percent voter turnout, an 80 percent turnout rate among Jews can greatly affect the outcome.
The combined effect of these three factors is that a 3 percent U.S. Jewish population can account for a much larger share of the population in individual states and an even greater share of the voters within that state on Election Day. Indeed, in some states Jewish voters account for nearly 20 percent of the votes cast.
In close presidential elections, like the one America had in 2000, the Jewish vote could be decisive. True, Bush won the election while winning only 20 percent of the Jewish vote, but had he not doubled the share of the Jewish vote received by his father in his 1992 defeat to Bill Clinton, he would not be commander-in-chief today.
By shoring up his support in Florida and becoming more competitive in Pennsylvania — a state whose former governor, Tom Ridge, he shrewdly placed in charge of homeland security — Bush knows that a significant increase in his share of the Jewish vote will virtually ensure his re-election.
Moreover, the Republicans realize that by drawing Jewish voters away from the Democrats (as opposed to simply increasing turnout among traditional Republican constituencies), they are getting two for the price of one — one less vote for the Democrats, one more vote for Republicans.
Even a 10 percent shift in the Jewish vote to Republicans would be more than enough to swing Senate races in states with large Jewish populations, much less in local congressional races in districts with an even greater concentration of Jews.
If the focus of American Jews continues to stay away from domestic affairs, where their views have traditionally been closer to those of the Democratic Party, then the Republicans may very well ride the president’s coattails to a big victory in the mid-term elections next November, setting the stage for a decisive victory for Bush in 2004. That election could mark a critical turning point in the relationship of American Jews to the Republican Party. Starting with Franklin D. Roosevelt’s presidency, the Democrats have enjoyed a near monopoly on the Jewish vote. Ronald Reagan, who won an estimated 40 percent of the Jewish vote in his 1984 race against Walter Mondale, proved that a Republican president could break that monopoly. Bush looks like he, too, will break that monopoly — only this time, the break may be permanent.