How Was Turnout In Ohio?

Tuesday night was a big one for the 2016 presidential election cycle, with some absolutely massive contests going down in Ohio and Florida, as well as in Illinois, Missouri, and North Carolina. And the results will surely have a big impact on the shape of the race going forward — the night was chock-full of big wins for respective party frontrunners Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton, with Clinton running the table. And, of course, turnout looms as large as ever: how many people voted in the Ohio primary?

It's been fascinating to track how many people have turned out to vote in the Democratic and Republican races so far, especially since there have been starkly different numbers (and consequently, narratives) on each side. For the Republicans, it's largely been all about sky-high levels of turnout, ostensibly bolstered by the swaths of Republicans, and indeed independents and defecting Democrats, who've been inflamed (one way or the other) by the Trump candidacy.

And on the Democratic side, it's been more about a drop in turnout since 2008 — not terribly shocking given the seismic and highly charged nature of that race, between an inevitable-seeming Clinton and the soaring underdog Obama, but it's still something that's probably provoked at least a little teeth-gnashing among party officials. So, how did things look in the Buckeye State?

The numbers are at long last final, with 100 percent of precincts reporting. And, at this point unsurprisingly, the same trends that have played out in the primaries to this point continued on Tuesday: Democratic turnout is way down, with more than 1,000,000 fewer votes cast than in 2008, while the GOP's total exceeds 2012's number by more than 800,000.

In total, according to The New York Times' primary tracker, 1,202,163 votes were cast in the Democratic primary, and on the Republican side, no less than 2,043,043. It's worth noting that Ohio is an open primary, however — meaning that Democrats and Republicans can choose which side's primary to vote in, and may thus vote strategically if they so desire.

It's also worth noting that the Democrats probably won't have to worry about their turnout if the general election looks like, well, what it seems like it's going to — with Donald Trump going up against Hillary Clinton, you can bet that a whole lot of people on both sides are going to be motivated to turn out to vote. But in the Buckeye State on Tuesday, it was still more of the same old story.