Think the election was close? They say demographics is destiny. But could Romney changed the demographics and altered destiny? Maybe if ORCA hadn't failed Romney would have been able to get more of his voters out and won. Or maybe if the voter suppression efforts had only be a bit more aggressive? Or maybe if True-the-Vote had only been able to challenge a few mor minorities at the polls?

Find out if it's true! Using demographic data from exit polls, this page allows you to quickly model changes in the demographics of the voters to see how easy or hard it would be to flip the election! (Spoiler: it's a lot harder than you think...)

Pick any of the sections below; you can drag the sliders around, change the turn out in the election, and see what happens!

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Men voted for Romney 52% of the time. Women voted for Obama 55% of the time. Could Romney have altered the balance of the votes? If so, how many more men or fewer women would have been needed to change the outcome? Drag the sliders to zero-to-doube voters in either category:

Change in male voters: 0

Change in women voters: 0

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People making under $50,000 a year voted 60% of the time for Obama, while those making between $50K and $100K voted 52% of the time for Romney and those over $100K voted 54% of the time for Romney. How big a shift in income demographics would have been needed to win the race for Romney? Drag the sliders to zero-to-doube voters in any category:

Change in Lower Income Voters (0-$50,000): 0

Change in Middle Income Voters ($50,000-$100,000): 0

Change in Upper Income Voters ($100,000 and up): 0

Reset Sliders

Whites voted more often for Romney (59%), while minorities voted heavily for Obama (71% to 93%). Change the racial make up of the polls to see what happens. Drag the sliders to zero-to-double the voters in any category:

Change in white voters: 0

Change in african-american voters: 0

Change in latino voters: 0

Change in asian voters: 0

Change in other voters: 0

Reset Sliders

People 44 and under cast more votes for Obama, while voters 45 and over cast more votes for Romney. Could a buffy-the-vampire-slayer marathon on cable TV have distracted enough younger voters to let the old folks put Romney in the white house? Drag the sliders to zero-to-double the voters in any age group to see how it affects the vote totals:

Change in voters 18-29: 0

Change in voters 30-44: 0

Change in voters 45-64: 0

Change in voters 65 or over: 0

Reset Sliders