President Joe Biden won the Democratic convention in Burlington County today without opposition, but in a contest where the electorate where local Democratic party leaders, the undervote for the top of the ticket was noticeable.
County committee members cast 271 votes for U.S. Senate candidates and 269 for candidates for the U.S. House of Representatives, but Biden received 237 votes – roughly twelve percent less.
Typically, the most votes are cast for the office at the top of the ticket.
“Heavily contested primary races drew more attention than one that was uncontested,” said Micah Rasmussen, the director of the Rebovich Institute of New Jersey Politics at Rider University. “That said, it would be wise for party leaders to consider the open conventions as free focus groups on the opinions of rank-and-file Democrats in New Jersey.”
Rep. Dean Phillips, a three-term congressman from Minnesota who is challenging Biden for the Democratic nomination, was not included on the Burlington ballot.
When Gov. Jon Corzine sought re-election in 2009, he received 77% in the Democratic primary against three unknown challengers with no money or political organization. The refusal of nearly one-in-four Democratic primary voters to vote for him was a harbinger of his weakness among some members of his own party in a general election against Republican Chris Christie.