Revised exit polling data increased Hillary Clinton’s margin of victory among Jewish voters in Pennsylvania.
The updated exit polling figures released Wednesday showed Clinton with 62 percent of the vote among Jewish Democrats in Tuesday’s primary and U.S. Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) with 38 percent. The adjustment to the numbers used by news organizations also increased the percentage of Jews voting in the primary to 8 from 7.
The original numbers had the New York senator defeating Obama among Jews 57 percent to 43 percent.
Sources familiar with exit polling procedures told JTA that polling analysts corrected their data for suburban Philadelphia, where most of the state’s Jewish population resides. Given the relatively small sample size of the Jewish electorate, the adjustment resulted in an additional 5 percentage points for Clinton.
Based on the earlier data, JTA had reported that Obama had fared better among Jews than whites overall. The updated data indicate that Obama fared essentially the same among Jewish and white voters, winning 37 percent from the latter group; slightly worse among Catholics (30 percent to 70 percent for Clinton); and slightly better among Protestants (45 percent to Clinton’s 55 percent).
