Republican turnout high for Tuesday's primary

DES MOINES --Turnout of for Tuesday's primary was the highest for Republicans since 1994, the party says, and far ahead of the turnout for Democrats, according to unofficial preliminary numbers.

The Iowa Secretary of State's office says roughly 227,000 Iowa Republicans went to the polls on Tuesday, where voters weighed in on a three-way race for governor. In that race, former governor Terry Branstad beat out Bob Vander Plaats and Rod Roberts.

On Tuesday, close to 68,000 Democrats turned out across the state for the primary election that included a three-way U.S. Senate race. Democrat Roxanne Conlin won that contest handily, earning 78 percent of the vote to beat Tom Fiegen and Bob Krause.

Tuesday's vote totals will are expected to increase slightly as absentee ballots are received and provisional ballots are counted.

Kyle Jensson, elections manager for Black Hawk County, said Republicans turned out in high numbers there, although she didn't know yet how many voters switched parties to vote in the primary. Voters are allowed to switch parties at the polls on Election Day.

Of registered Republicans in Black Hawk County, 31 percent voted, compared to 7.8 percent of registered Democrats.

That trend was similar in Polk County as well.

“It was real low for Democrats, and real high for Republicans,” Polk County Auditor Jamie Fitzgerald said of turnout.

Fitzgerald said a significant number of voters there switched parties on Election Day, mostly from no party to Republican in order to vote in GOP primary.

Republican turnout statewide Tuesday was more than the 199,000 GOP voters who voted in a three-way gubernatorial primary in 2002 won by Doug Gross, according to the secretary of state's office.

But this year's Republican primary was nowhere close to the more than 312,000 voters who turned out for the GOP gubernatorial primary in 1994 when Branstad, then a sitting governor, battled it out with challenger Fred Grandy.