FAIRMONT — Like bank robber Willie Sutton, who reportedly said he robbed banks because that’s where the money is, national political candidates make stops where they can reach the most voters.

If the Democratic presidential nominating race continues past May 6 and primaries in Indiana and North Carolina, look for Sens. Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama to make appearances in the southern half of the state, say political experts.

North Central West Virginia is also likely to host one or both candidates before the May 13 state primary, they said.

Political consultants Michael Plante and Curtis Wilkerson cite voter registration records. Official registration figures were issued Friday by Secretary of State Betty Ireland’s elections division office.

Plante and Wilkerson are not working for Clinton or Obama.

The Charleston-Huntington area is the prime focus for Democratic candidates in a statewide race, they said.

They also said:

• The excitement of having a contested presidential primary for the first time since 1960 will boost turnout.

• Opening the Democratic primary to independent or “no party” voters as they are classified by the state adds an interesting twist — not only in the presidential nominating race but in statewide contested races for the state Supreme Court and in contested legislative and county courthouse races.

“West Virginia is in a position that it hasn’t been since the Kennedy primary campaign in 1960,” said Plante. A political consultant since 1988, he has worked in the state since 1992. His firm, Plante & Associates in Charleston, has worked on campaigns in 44 states.

While the state only has about 1.8 million people and five electoral college votes, Clinton and Obama are scrambling for every bit of the popular vote and every delegate to the party’s August convention in Denver, he said.

The state party will have 39 delegates, including 11 superdelegates, to the convention. A total of 28 will be decided by the primary (seven at-large and three “party leaders and public elected officials” will be selected based on the election results).

“To the extent that we have an urban area, it’s the Charleston-Huntington corridor,” Plante said.

“In the typical Democratic statewide race, you will see about 40 percent of the Democratic vote coming from that area,” he said.

The area bounded by Beckley and the southern coalfields, plus Bluefield and Oak Hill, supplies about 17.5 percent of the Democratic vote.

North Central West Virginia, from Morgantown to Weston, also produces about 17.5 percent, Plante said. The remaining 25 percent comes from the panhandles and Ohio River counties.

While 26 of the state’s 55 counties have 10,000 or more registered Democrats, only a dozen have more than 18,000, according to the official primary figures.

The dozen big counties are (totals and county seats): Kanawha, Charleston, 71,943 Democrats; Cabell, Huntington, 30,993; Raleigh, Beckley, 30,503; Marion, Fairmont, 27,034; Monongalia, Morgantown, 26,648; Harrison, Clarksburg, 25,393; Berkeley, Martinsburg, 23,103; Logan, Logan, 23,055; Wood, Parkersburg, 21,920; Mercer, Princeton, 20,395; Wayne, Wayne, 18,362; and Fayette, Fayetteville, 18,319. Marion, Fayette and Logan are among nine counties that have consistently voted for the Democratic presidential nominee since 1980 when Ronald Reagan beat Jimmy Carter.

The dozen counties have a total of 337,688 Democrats, or about 51 percent of the state’s 665,234 Democrats.

Democrats make up 56.21 percent of the state’s 1.183 million voters. That’s nearly a 2-1 margin over Republicans. The GOP has 347,760 voters or 29.38 percent. The Democratic 2-1 edge has been slipping since 1996, according to official registration totals.

The last time Democrats enjoyed a 2-1 margin over Republicans was at the general election in 2002 (Democrats then had 641,442 voters or 60.46 percent to the GOP’s 309,280 or 29.15 percent).

But the percentage of independents has climbed from 6.83 percent in the 1996 general election to 13.2 percent for this primary.

The possible impact of independent voters — there are 156,199 registered for the primary — can be seen in the Democratic “Big 12” counties.

Kanawha alone has 18,986 independents. The results for the other 11 counties are: Cabell, 7,523; Raleigh, 6,693; Marion, 4,378; Monongalia, 8,645; Harrison, 5,587; Berkeley, 14,384; Logan, 1,225; Wood, 8,485; Mercer, 4,872; Wayne, 2,023; and Fayette, 2,805.

Wilkerson, president of Orion Strategies, also based in Charleston, said the independents “are one of the great unknowns.” His firm specializes in public relations and political consulting.

The excitement in the historic race between the first credible female and black candidates has boosted turnout in “just about every primary state” so far, he said.

“In South Carolina, the vote for Sen. Obama alone outnumbered the total votes cast in the Republican primary — and South Carolina is a Republican state,” he said.

Professor Robert Rupp, a political science and history professor at West Virginia Wesleyan College in Buckhannon, said he welcomes the state’s chance to play an influential role in the Democratic presidential race.

“It will only be for about a week,” he said. Clinton and Obama will also be looking ahead to Kentucky (60 delegates) and Oregon (65 delegates) on May 20, he said.

Tracking where — and how often — they will stop in the state is a clue to their overall strategy, Rupp said.

“You hunt where the ducks are,” he said.

E-mail Bill Byrd at bbyrd@timeswv.com