Category Archives: General Election Forecast

The Midterms — Preview (Part 3)

By tmess2 | Published November 2, 2022

By the time that polls close in Arkansas at 7:30 p.m. Central ST, we should be starting to get votes from the early states, but most of the key races will still be classified as “too early to call.”  Arkansas has become so red over the past two decades that none of the races are likely to be close.  The big races will be the ballot issue.  From the right is a proposition to require supermajorities for propositions in future elections and a provision enshrining a version of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act in the Arkansas Constitution.  As we have seen at the federal level, this Free Exercise Clause on steroids will cause significant problems in Arkansas as everything will become somebody’s religious belief.  Arkansas will also vote on legalizing marijuana.

At 8:00 p.m. CST, polls will close in the remaining parts of Kansas, Michigan, South Dakota, and Texas (with those races covered in Part 2 of the preview).    Polls will close for the entire state in Arizona, Colorado, Iowa, Louisiana, Minnesota, Nebraska, New Mexico, New York, Wisconsin, and Wyoming.

Arizona will feature several key races.  At the state office level, Governor, Attorney General, and Secretary of State are all open seats.  The Republicans have nominated Trumpist candidates for these positions who refuse to commit to recognizing the election results in 2024.   Particularly for governor, they have nominated a media celebrity who is not qualified.  But these races are currently too close to call.  For Senate, the Republicans have also nominated an extremist.  It looks like Senator Mark Kelly will hold onto the seat, but the seat is probably the third most likely pickup for the Republicans after Nevada and Georgia.   If the Republicans have a good night, that seat could flip. Continue Reading...

Also posted in Elections, House of Representatives, Senate | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on The Midterms — Preview (Part 3)

The Midterms — Preview (Part 2)

By tmess2 | Published October 30, 2022

The first states with polls to close are mostly in the Eastern Time Zone.  In the early states, we have two governor’s races (Georgia and Florida), four Senate races (Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, and Ohio), and seven House seats (1 in North Carolina, 3 in Ohio, and 3 in Virginia) that could be close.  There are also several seats that are likely to flip solely because of the new maps (4 flipping red in Florida, 1 flipping red in Georgia, and 2 flipping blue in North Carolina).

But the big closing time is 7 p.m. Central ST.  The remaining polls will close in Florida, and most of the polls will close in Kansas, Michigan, South Dakota, and Texas.  And all of the polls will close in Alabama (except for a very small portion that closed an hour earlier), Connecticut, Delaware, D.C., Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Mississippi, Missouri, New Hampshire, New Jersey, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, and Tennessee.  In short, when added to the states that close before 7 p.m., the polls will be closed in roughly half of the country by 7:01 p.m. (Of course, polls closed merely means that individuals need to be in line to vote at 7 p.m.  Because there are typically people in line to vote, voting might actually continue in some urban precincts for a very long time after 7 p.m. which will delay counting in those areas.)

Starting with Alabama, there are no races that are likely to be close at the state or federal level.  If the Supreme Court follows the Voting Rights Act, Democrats will probably pick up an additional seat in 2024, but the current maps which a district court correctly held violated the Voting Rights Act is in place for the 2022 election, and the 6-1 Republican advantage will remain in place for the next Congress.  There are a lot of propositions on the ballot in Alabama, the most significant of which requires changes to election law to be adopted at least six months prior to a general election. Continue Reading...

Also posted in Elections, House of Representatives, Senate | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on The Midterms — Preview (Part 2)

The Fall Campaign

By tmess2 | Published September 4, 2022

Traditionally, Labor Day Weekend was seen as the start of the Fall campaign (at least by the media).  If that was ever true, it no longer is.  With cable and websites like Facebook and Youtube, there are a lot of relatively inexpensive way to get advertisements out during July and August.  If a campaign waits unti September to begin its ad campaign, the other side has already defined the race.

But, by this point in the cycle, we are down to the last handful of primaries, and the national committees and big PACS are already looking to decide where they are going to be spending the big bucks in late September and early October.  (As the change in the mechanism for advertising has obliterated Labor Day as the start of the fall campaign, the change in voting habits (with a significant percentage casting early votes or mail-in ballots) has also altered when the big final push begins.  While, in a close race, last minute news and ads can make a difference, it is just as important to get as many votes locked in as early as possible so that the last-minute spending can be focused on a tiny number of votes.

But that is the inside baseball stuff of campaigns.  The purpose of this post is to set the stage for the next eight weeks.  For the past two years, Democrats have had the frustration of a very narrow margin in the House of Representatives and a dead-even Senate.  Because Nancy Pelosi may be one of the all-time great Speakers, Democrats have been mostly able to pass things in the House.  The Senate, however, has been very, very difficult.  The filibuster rules has limited the Democrats to passing anything significant via the reconciliation process.  Even the reconciliation process requires keeping the entire Democratic caucus together which has proven difficult as a single member can insist on changes to any proposal.  And the  lack of a majority has also prevented any changes to the filibuster rule (again due to the ability a single Democrat to veto any proposed change). Continue Reading...

Also posted in Elections | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on The Fall Campaign

Missouri Senate Primary 2022

By tmess2 | Published June 26, 2022

We are about five weeks out from the August 2 primary in Missouri.  With Roy Blunt deciding that it is time to move on, there are multiple candidates in both party’s primary.  While Missouri has been gradually moving to the right, there is a chance that Democrats could pull out a win, but a lot depends on what happens on August 2.

To some degree, the Republican primary in Missouri is an echo of what we have seen in Ohio and Pennsylvania.  With a large number of candidates and no clear favorite, we are looking at the potential for a very close race which in turn means that Donald Trump could very easily impact the result by putting his thumb on the scale (as opposed to the recent primary in Alabama where Trump had little noticeable impact on the race when he first endorsed Mo Brooks, less impact when he rescinded that endorsement, and no impact when he decided to endorse Kate Britt at the last second to get a cheap win for his endorsement scorecard).

There are twenty-one people running for the Republican nomination.  For the purposes of the Trump endorsement race, there are three groups of candidates:  the field, the chase pack, and the lead pack.  The field consists of fifteen candidates with no state-wide name recognition and no significant resources.  Each of these candidates would be lucky to get 2-3% of the vote.  But each vote for the field is a vote that is not going to the top six candidates. Continue Reading...

Also posted in Senate | Tagged , , | Comments Off on Missouri Senate Primary 2022

The 2022 Elections: Revenge of the Trumpists

By tmess2 | Published May 1, 2022

We are on the eve of the start of the first big segment of the primary season for the 2022 election.  Texas had its primary back in March, but primary season really starts this Tuesday with primaries in Ohio and and Indiana.

Including the Texas run-off, there are primaries or run=offs set for every week between now and June 28 other than the week of Memorial Day.  During that period, a grand total of thirty states will have primaries or run-offs (with some having both).  There is normally a longer breaker between the Spring primaries and the late Summer/early fall round of primaries.  But due to postponed election dates, Maryland will have its primary in mid-July and North Carolina will have its run-off on July 5 or July 26, depending on the offices which require a run-off.  Phase two of the primary season begins on August 2 and runs through September 13.

Mid-term elections are tough for the party in power.   The public always want the big problems solved instantly.  And big problems are typically years in the making and will require years to solve.  Making things worse, the party that wins an election always tries to pass what their primary voters want (which is not the same as what general election voters want) but ends up with in-fighting between the various factions of the party.  It has been a long time since any party has won by a big enough margin to be able to pass legislation despite those differences. Continue Reading...

Also posted in Elections, House of Representatives, Senate | Tagged , , , | Comments Off on The 2022 Elections: Revenge of the Trumpists

Election Night Preview — Part 6 (Aftermath)

By tmess2 | Published November 1, 2020

This election may go down in history for being very, very bizarre.  Or it may lead to some necessary changes in state election law.  If Tuesday is a good night for the Democrats and Joe Biden, there will not be much to fight about starting Wednesday.  Likewise, a lot depends on what is still outstanding and remaining to be counted.  As we have noted previously, some states allow absentee ballots to be received after election day and some will not start counting the absentee ballots that have been received until election day.  The folks at 538 have done a summary of what states are likely to have almost all of the ballots counted by the end of election night and what states will still have many ballots to count.

Current polling suggests that Democrats are more likely to vote by mail and Republicans to vote in person.  As such, there are likely to be dramatic shifts in the vote as different types of ballots are counted.  This shift will matter in some of the states that will count almost all of their votes on election night, but it will matter more in the states that will be counting a significant number of votes after election night.

What happens after election night depends on where things stand at the end of the evening.  If Trump can hold some of his marginal states (Florida, Georgia, Iowa, and North Carolina), the race will come down to some late counting states.  On the other hand, if Trump is trailing in these states (and Arizona and Ohio) at the end of election day, the race is over. Continue Reading...

Also posted in 2020 General Election | Tagged , , | Comments Off on Election Night Preview — Part 6 (Aftermath)

Election Night Preview — Part 5 (11 PM EST to Sunrise)

By tmess2 | Published October 31, 2020

Recent elections have been so close that between the inability to call states and the large number of electoral votes on the West Coast, the news media has been unable to call the presidential election before 11 PM EST.

Before going into the states that will be closing at 11 p.m. or later, some words about the process of projecting a winner.  Each network has a team that makes the decision on when to project.   For all intents and purposes, this team is in a sealed room with no knowledge about what the talking heads or saying or whether other networks have made a projection.   There are lots of data that these teams look at: 1) election day exit polls; 2) early vote exit polls; 3) polls of those who voted by mail; 4) the reported early vote; 4) how many mail-in ballots remain to be counted; 5) “key” precincts (key in the sense that the team knows the typical vote in those precincts and can judge the swing in those precincts); 6) which precincts (and counties) have not yet reported.  Basically, while the margin of error in exit polls makes it difficult to call a close (52-48) race based on exit polls, you can call a landslide (60-40) based on exit polls.  For those in which exit polls show a close race, you need enough votes to make a call.  And if the early results are consistent with a close race, you can’t make a call into the outstanding vote is too small to realistically swing the race (i.e. the remaining precincts are in areas that favor candidate X who is ahead or candidate Y would need 95% of the remaining vote and has been getting 80% of the vote in similar precincts).  One fact that could hinder making projections and lead to a state being uncalled on election night is a large number of uncounted absentee ballots (due to a state not being able to count before election day) or a large number of absentee ballots not yet returned in states that have a post-election day deadline for receipt of absentee ballots if postmarked by election day.

At 11 p.m., we will have partial closings in the remaining parts of Idaho, North Dakota, and Oregon.  Of these three states, most of the voters Idaho and North Dakota are in the part that closed at 10 p.m. EST.  However, in Oregon, most of the voters live in the Pacific time zone which will close at 11 p.m.  The entirety of the state also closes for California and Washington,  At midnight, the polls close in part of Alaska and in all of Hawaii.  Finally at 1:00 a.m., polls close in the remainder of Alaska. Continue Reading...

Also posted in 2020 General Election | Tagged , , , , | Comments Off on Election Night Preview — Part 5 (11 PM EST to Sunrise)

Election Night Preview — Part 4 (10 PM to 11 PM EST)

By tmess2 | Published October 30, 2020

It is very highly unlikely that we will have a projected winner when the clock strikes 10 on the east coast.  Mathematically, it’s possible as by 10:01 p.m. polls will officially be closed in states with 450 electoral votes.  But, practically speaking, it would take all of the toss-up states that have closed before then to have enough votes counted that the networks felt comfortable projecting them, and they would all have to go the same way.  Even in years like 2008, enough of the Democratic vote is in states in which polls close at 10 or 11 p.m. EST, that it would take flipping states like Texas and Georgia to have a shot at reaching 270 before 11 p.m.

Looking at 2016, the first battleground state — Ohio — was called at 10:36 p.m.  Depending on how things play out with mail-in ballots and early voting, some of the battleground states might get called faster, but others are likely to be called much later.

In this hour, we will have partial closures in Idaho, North Dakota, and Oregon.  In North Dakota and Idaho, the majority of the population is in the part of the state that closes.  As such, we will get a good idea about the state from the precincts that have closed.  On the other hand, only a tiny part of Oregon will close at 10 p.m. and all of the key races will have to wait another hour.   For North Dakota and Idaho, none of the races are expected to be particularly close.  So those contests should be called shortly after 11. Continue Reading...

Also posted in 2020 General Election | Tagged , , , , | Comments Off on Election Night Preview — Part 4 (10 PM to 11 PM EST)

Election Night Preview — Part 3 (9 PM to 10 PM EST)

By tmess2 | Published October 29, 2020

As we noted in the previous two posts, a key part of the night will be how fast votes are counted and, in particular, what share of early and mail-in votes are released on election night and how many mail-in votes are potentially still in the mail and eligible to be counted.   There is also the issue of how long the lines were — especially in urban precincts — which could delay the count of votes cast on election day.  At this point in time, we should have projections from Kentucky and Indiana and the bluer and redder states from the 7 PM EST hour.  The question during this hour is whether we start getting projections from some of the swingier states with 7 PM closing times like Florida and Georgia have been called, and, if so, in which direction.

During this hour, nine states will close across the entire state and the remainder of the polls will close in Kansas, Michigan, South Dakota, and Texas.  South Dakota is unlikely to be close for any race, and the majority of Kansas and Texas close at 8 PM  EST.  What to look for in Michigan, Texas, and Kansas is addressed in Part Two.  Besides these partial closures, we have full closures in Arizona, Colorado, Louisiana, Minnesota, Nebraska, New Mexico, and Wyoming.

Louisiana is a weird state in that there are no party primaries.  Everybody runs on the general election ballot, but it takes a majority to be elected.  While none of the races are expected to flip, there is always the chance that the sheer number of candidates on the ballot could result in a run-off.  Of course, some of these run-offs will feature two Republicans (or, in the one district that the Democrats hold, two Democrats).  Wyoming also features no close contests and should be an early call across the board. Continue Reading...

Also posted in 2020 General Election | Tagged , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on Election Night Preview — Part 3 (9 PM to 10 PM EST)

Election Night Preview — Part 2 (8 PM to 9 PM EST)

By tmess2 | Published October 28, 2020

As noted in the previous post, by 8 p.m. Eastern Standard Time, we should have a significant amount of precincts being reported in the two earliest states (Kentucky and Indiana) and should be starting to get some counties reporting votes in Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, Virginia, and Vermont.  During this hour, the counts in those states should be increasing.  By 9 p.m., we should be seeing either some projection in those states or an indication that the states are too close too call.  We may also be getting an indication in some of those states of how many absentee votes might remain to be counted (which could determine whether it will be possible to make any projection in those states on election night).

While it would be nice if we could get calls in a state like Virginia early in this hour, the bigger question as the hour goes will be the types of swings that we are seeing in these states.   Virginia in 2016 was a leading indicator as we were just not getting strong results compared to 2012.  So as this hour goes along and the networks start looking at the maps of the state, the key thing to pay attention to is how the numbers are comparing to 2016.  Even if the networks aren’t comfortable in calling a state yet, if the results are showing that Trump is underperforming in red parts of a state (i.e. rural counties) and Biden is overperforming in the suburbs, then that is a good sign for the rest of the evening as Trump only one by the slimmest of margins in 2016 and any erosion in his support could prove fatal.

This hour has the most states close.  You have partial closures in Florida (the rest of the state closed an hour earlier), Kansas, Michigan, South Dakota, and Texas.  While a significant part of South Dakota will close an hour later, the polls close for most of the population in Kansas, Michigan, and Texas at 8 p.m. Eastern.  In addition to these states, polls for the entire state close at 8 p.m. Eastern in Alabama, Connecticut, Delaware, D.C., Illinois, Maine, Mississippi, Missouri, New Hampshire, New Jersey, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, and Tennessee. Continue Reading...

Also posted in 2020 General Election | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on Election Night Preview — Part 2 (8 PM to 9 PM EST)