Japan 2021 Tokyo Metropolitan assembly elections (July) and Lower House Election Oct 31st

[xelas81]

Will the second round be held right after the first round and can MPs change their vote between rounds?

[jaichind]

Will the second round be held right after the first round and can MPs change their vote between rounds?

The runoff is held the same day.  MPs get to change their vote.  Because it is the same day runoff that is why there is no runoff vote for LDP party members.  In fact the rules are a bit more Kono friendly.  Back in 2012 the second round are MP vote only.  This time each prefecture would have a LDP party member vote (47 votes in all) based on which of the top two candidates won more votes in said prefecture in addition to the 382 MP.

This is system is mostly similar to the pre-2015 UK LAB leadership race.  Differences are

a) MP vote are anonymous unlike UK LAB MP vote.  This rule is Kono friendly.
b) There is no party member/affiliate re-vote in a runoff unlike the pre-2015 UK LAB leadership race rules.  This is clearly hostile to Kono.  Again the good news for Kono is that he will gain a net 35-40 LDP chapter electoral votes based on his expected lead over Kishida in the vast majority of prefecture.

[jaichind]

It seems pro-DPP Upper House MP 上田清司(Ueda Kiyoshi) from 埼玉(Saitama) will be forming a new Centrist party.  上田清司(Ueda Kiyoshi) who was in the LDP in the 1980s but turned rebel and joined DPJ in 2000s via being in Ozawa's NPF in the 1990s and was an anti-LDP governor of 埼玉(Saitama) until 2019.  He then entered the Upper House as an independent with DPP support. 

It seems several pro-CDP and pro-DPP independents mostly of the Centrist and Center-Right variety will be joining this new party.  4 Lower house independent incumbents  will most likely join.  3 of them are part of the anti-LDP electoral alliance anyway.  It is not clear at all why this new party is not just part of DPP since the main function is duplicative of DPP.  Most likely this new party will have an electoral alliance with CDP and DPP although most likely not with JCP.

It seems several MPs 上田清司(Ueda Kiyoshi) were targeting are mostly going to align or join CDP or DPP so this party idea is pretty much dead.

[jaichind]

Noted journalist 大濱崎 (Ohama Saki) google doc of announced LDP MP
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1syUoJ7PY7PXhluY1VF62aO7lKMzKl2-I6Xd2RxweyNA/edit#gid=0

Change from earlier this week

河野太郎(Kono Taro)                 82 (+2)
岸田文雄(Kishida Fumio)           97 (+6)
高市早苗(Takaichi Sanae)          68 (+2)
野田聖子(Noda Seiko)               21


Organized by faction



Out of 114 undecided

細田(Hosoda) faction: 36 - this will be split between Kishida and Takaichi
麻生(Asō) faction: 13 - this will be split between Kono and Kishida
Fromer 竹下(Takesh**ta) faction (Leader Takesh**ta just passed away): 19 - most likely 3 way split
二階(Nikai) faction: 19 - this will be split between Kono Takaichi Noda (this faction is anti-Kishida)
岸田(Kishida) faction: 2 - lean Kono, all loyal members would have declared Kishida
石破(Ishiba) faction: 5 -  lean Kishida and Takaichi - loyal members would have declared Kono
石原(Ishihara) faction: 4 - lean Kono
谷垣(Tanigaki) group: 6 - lean Kishida
Suga group: 7 -  lean Kishida and Takaichi - loyal members would have declared Kono
No facton: 5 - lean Kono

All things equal based on undeclared it seems Kishida will most likely finish ahead of Kono in the MP vote with Takaichi being third by some distance.  Kono has to hope for anonymous voting will net him a few more MP votes.

[jaichind]

https://news.yahoo.co.jp/articles/21d20345fdd7b14aa470fa0d26840663dd50365d

There are rumors that 二階(Nikai) faction which is anyone but Kishida is considering shifting all their MP vote to Takaichi  to try to push Kishida  to third and form a Kono vs Takaichi.  二階(Nikai) faction analysis has them convinced that if it is Kono vs Kishida in the second round Abe will move into action to ensure Kono's defeat and Kishida's victory.  This is unacceptable to  二階(Nikai) faction.  The way out, it seems, is that as long as they feel that Kono has enough support, especially from the LDP chapter vote, the  二階(Nikai) faction will shift all 47 votes which are (12 Kono, 8 Takaichi, 8 Nodo and 19 undecided) to Takaichi and as long as she does well enough on the LDP chapter vote she might push Kishida to third as long as Abe delivers more 細田(Hosoda) faction MPs toward  Takaichi.   If that were to take place then Kono might finish first  (perhaps majority) on the LDP chapter vote but come in third in the MP vote with  Kishida's support being the kingmaker for a Kono vs Takaichi second round.  Very interesting indeed as the spy vs spy battle heat up as the election date gets closer.

[jaichind]

The LDP chapter vote is all VBM.  The rate of ballots being returned is unusually low which had the LDP concerned.    A good part of the reason seems to be the lack of clarity how LDP elite consensus is going.  A good part of the LDP chapter vote does look too LDP elite consensus to them them who to vote for while another bloc tends to vote based on a charismatic personality.    This time around no such consensus seems to be forthcoming and the list of candidates does not seem to excite the base.  All things equal this is bad news for Kono since him being enthusiastically supported by the LDP base is part of his assets.  Unless there is a turnout surge in the next couple of days this does not seem to be playing out the way Kono wants.

[jaichind]

Mainichi estimate of MP vote in terms of percentage of 382 LDP MPs

河野太郎(Kono Taro)               around 25
岸田文雄(Kishida Fumio)         High 30s
高市早苗(Takaichi Sanae)        around 20
野田聖子(Noda Seiko)            single digit

They point out that many Upper House MPs have not decided and that this group of MP are very weak for Kono

河野太郎(Kono Taro)                Low 10s (teens)
岸田文雄(Kishida Fumio)          Low 40s
高市早苗(Takaichi Sanae)        High 20s
野田聖子(Noda Seiko)             around 10



Again this is not good for Kono nor Takaichi where Kishida seems to have a large lead with the MP which means Kono will clearly lose out in the second round and Takaichi has no chance of edging out  Kishida  for the second spot in the runoff.

[jaichind]

FNN poll of LDP supporters has Takaichi now beating out Kishida

河野太郎(Kono Taro)                 47
岸田文雄(Kishida Fumio)           18
高市早苗(Takaichi Sanae)          28
野田聖子(Noda Seiko)                 4

Which would mean Kishida could be in trouble of the 二階(Nikai) faction also then consolidate their MPs behind Takaichi to try to push Kishida to third.  Good news for him is this is LDP supporters and not party members.  The same poll which has a small subsample of LDP party members seems to have a 3 way tie between Kono Kishida and Takaichi with all the caveats of subsamples. 

[jaichind]

It seems that RS will join the CDP-SDP-JCP alliance and join in seat sharing talks.  RS leader 山本太郎(Yamamoto Tarō) is likely to run in a district seat as the alliance candidate.  It is said that he could run in 東京(Tokyo) which is his home base, or 神奈川(Kanagawa) where he could run again Suga, Kono or Koizumi Junior, or 大阪(Osaka) to push up the RS PR vote which is part of 近畿(Kinki) PR zone where RS has a chance to win a seat.  

In the meantime the CDP-JCP alliance talks on seat adjustments are going slowly.  By my calculation there are around 12 seats where JCP running is throwing away a winnable CDP seat.   There is one such seat for DPP but with DPP unlikely to formally join the Opposition alliance that seat is most likely lost unless there is an anti-LDP wave.  Also by my calculation RS running is throwing away 5 winnable CDP seats and RS standing down in them would make them winnable for CDP.  Even if there is a perfect CDP-SDP-JCP-RS alliance it is not like all these seats will flip but I suspect most of them will.

[jaichind]

Nikkei poll of LDP supporters

河野太郎(Kono Taro)                 51
岸田文雄(Kishida Fumio)           18
高市早苗(Takaichi Sanae)          19
野田聖子(Noda Seiko)                 2

Another bad LDP chapter vote poll for Kishida

[jaichind]

FNN poll of LDP supporters has Takaichi now beating out Kishida

河野太郎(Kono Taro)                 47
岸田文雄(Kishida Fumio)           18
高市早苗(Takaichi Sanae)          28
野田聖子(Noda Seiko)                 4

Which would mean Kishida could be in trouble of the 二階(Nikai) faction also then consolidate their MPs behind Takaichi to try to push Kishida to third.  Good news for him is this is LDP supporters and not party members.  The same poll which has a small subsample of LDP party members seems to have a 3 way tie between Kono Kishida and Takaichi with all the caveats of subsamples. 

Same poll also had breakout of LDP supporters by prefecture



Given that this is a very bad poll for Kishida one sees Kono ahead in 42 prefectures, tied with  Takaichi  in one prefecture,  Takaichi  ahead in 4 prefectures, and Kishida ahead in 2 prefectures.

So in a Kono-Kishida runoff the 47 prefecture vote would break 45-2 in Kono's favor versus something like 38-9 as would some more favorable polls for Kishida would imply.  If these were the results Kishida would have a hard time winning in the second round versus Kono not just because of the very weak position of his prefecture vote but the overall narrative of him winning him coming in a weak third in the LDP prefecture chaptor popular vote.

[jaichind]

JNN survey of LDP MPs has it at

河野太郎(Kono Taro)              ~120
岸田文雄(Kishida Fumio)        ~140
高市早苗(Takaichi Sanae)        ~75

Which is a pretty good result for Kishida given the large Kishida-Kono gap which sets him up for a second round victory.

It is interesting that LDP chapter vote survies are moving against Kishida while the LDP MP situation seems to be moving toward Kishida.

[jaichind]

Right wing and clearly pro-Abe and pro-Takaichi  Sankei Shimbun came out with a special 105 page magazine special about the LDP Prez race with a pro-Takaichi slant in a clear attempt to get as much votes as possible for Takaichi in the LDP chapter vote.   The title is “Abe and Takaichi are serious!”

[jaichind]

Yahoo's current projection

                                             MP       Chapter vote           Total
河野太郎(Kono Taro)               120             190                   310
岸田文雄(Kishida Fumio)         130               90                   220
高市早苗(Takaichi Sanae)        110               80                   190
野田聖子(Noda Seiko)               20               20                    40



Which leads to a Kono vs Kishida runoff

Yahoo assumes that all of Noda MP will vote Kono (mostly true), Kono will win the prefecture chapter vote (47-0) (clearly Kishida will win at least 2-3 if not more), and that all of Takaichi MP will vote Kishida (clearly not true but this bloc will clearly break for Kishida.)

河野太郎(Kono Taro)               187
岸田文雄(Kishida Fumio)         240


But the picture is clear.  Kishida will have the edge in the second round.

[jaichind]

Mayor election in 旭川市(Asahikawa) which is the second largest city in 北海道(Hokkaido) tomorrow. 
It is an open seat in a lean CDP city.  The retiring mayor is pro-Opposition.   This time it will be a LDP-KP-NPD-JRP vs CDP-DPP-SDP battle.  The CDP-DPP-SDP candidate is de facto supported by JCP.  The CDP-DPP-SDP candidate should win but old LDP splinter NDP and old DPJ ally is backing LDP as well as JRP so the vote share split between the two candidates would give a sense of the balance of power between LDP-KP and Opposition in 北海道(Hokkaido.)

[jaichind]

3 LDP supporter polls came out.  Seiron(正論) is a far right hawk magazine.  Results are pretty similar. Kono well ahead but below absolute majority and some distance between Kishida over Takaichi.  As long as Kishida can maintain an edge in the MP vote he is looking pretty good for the second round.

                                      Seiron           JX           Kyodo         NNN
河野太郎(Kono Taro)             46             40             47             44
岸田文雄(Kishida Fumio)       31             25             22              28
高市早苗(Takaichi Sanae)      18             19             16              21
野田聖子(Noda Seiko)            5　　          5　            3                7

[jaichind]

Mayor election in 旭川市(Asahikawa) which is the second largest city in 北海道(Hokkaido) tomorrow. 
It is an open seat in a lean CDP city.  The retiring mayor is pro-Opposition.   This time it will be a LDP-KP-NPD-JRP vs CDP-DPP-SDP battle.  The CDP-DPP-SDP candidate is de facto supported by JCP.  The CDP-DPP-SDP candidate should win but old LDP splinter NDP and old DPJ ally is backing LDP as well as JRP so the vote share split between the two candidates would give a sense of the balance of power between LDP-KP and Opposition in 北海道(Hokkaido.)

Voting ended.  NHK reports that the LDP-KP-NDP-JRP candidate has a significant edge over the CDP-DPP-SDP.  This is a blow for CDP since this is in a lean CDP city.  All things equal this will help Kishida in the LDP Prez race since it shows that LDP is in likely good electoral shape and there is no need to bring in Kono to push up the LDP vote.  Still these races are often about personality so one cannot overread the results.  Still the anti-LDP sentiment due to Suga clearly have dissipated a good deal.

[jaichind]

旭川市(Asahikawa) exit poll had by party ID

LDP        48
KP           3
JRP          1
DPP         1
CDP       24
JCP          5

Past exit polls in 旭川市(Asahikawa) by party ID seems to indicate that support for Center-Left Opposition and JCP seems to be similar to what it was last couple of cycles but LDP party ID have surged from high 30s to low 40s to 48.  This must be the effect of the LDP Prez race.

[jaichind]

旭川市(Asahikawa) mayor race all vote counted

LDP-KP-NDP-JRP      60%
CDP-DPP-SDP           40% (de facto JCP support)

I think the decisive factor was the NDP vote.

The 2015 and 2019 prefecture assembly vote share grouped by bloc were

2015
LDP-KP    46.17%
NPD         15.57%
DPJ+JCP  38.26%

2019
LDP-KP    45.31%
NPD        16.68%
DPJ+JCP  38.01%

The pro-NPD MLA elected in both 2015 and 2019 has since joined LDP.  NDP-JCP coming out to back the LDP-KP was decisive to shifted the NDP vote over to the LDP candidate even though in the past this bloc of voters are more likely to vote anti-LDP.  Of course what made it easier was LDP being in the news all the time due to LDP Prez race.

[jaichind]

Yomiuri count of LDP Prez race


                                             MP       Chapter vote           Total
河野太郎(Kono Taro)               103             177                   280
岸田文雄(Kishida Fumio)         127               94                   221
高市早苗(Takaichi Sanae)          82               86                   166
野田聖子(Noda Seiko)               21               25                    46
Undecided                              49



Looking pretty good for Kishida to win on the second round as long as the undecided MP do not break dramatically for Kono.

[jaichind]

What happens if Kishida wins?

Good question.  I have been thinking about this since this is a realistic possibility.  First if Kono leads LDP that is bad for JRP but good for DPP.  If Kishida leads LDP then it is bad for DPP but good for JRP.  In fact the LDP Leadership races is really JRP (Kono) vs DPP (Kishida) vs hardcore right LDP (Takaichi) vs CDP (Noda.)  Just shows how big of a tent the LDP big tent party is.

I think LDP seat count by leader would be

Suga 215-235
Kono 240-260
Kishida 230-250
Takaichi 215-275

I think the way Kono ran the campaign damaged his brand of being a different type of politician and the chances of him leading the LDP to a seat count of above 260 is mostly gone.  Kishida would run as a traditional LDP leader which should be good for at least 250 seats.  But it seems that if Kishida does win the LDP Prez race it would be in the runoff against a Kono that won the LDP chapter vote.  The sense that the fix was in for Kono would damage Kishida somewhat and limit the seats he can bring to the LDP to be more like 240.  Takaichi  would be a wildcard.  Her hard right views could trigger a anti-LDP turnout (remember that Abe was also hard right but his wife had a moderate image which blunted the anti-right vote surge.)  But her tell it like it is with no filters approach could also bring out marginal non-ideological voters and bring LDP to a large seat haul.  

The general election that would be the most fun would be if Takaichi leads the LDP and the most boring if Kishida leads the LDP.

週刊現代 (Shūkan Gendai) came out with their own analysis.  They have LDP seat by leader

Kono     240-260
Kishida  220-230




which looks pretty similar to my guess for Kono but more negative on Kishida than I am.  I assume they think there will be a bigger backlash than I would expect with Kishida winning a "fixed" second round.  I do thing there is a difference with Kishida winning on the second round with Kono winning a plurality vs majority on the LDP chapter vote on the first role.  The former will not create that much of a backlash but the latter could.  More importantly, if Takaichi MPs does swing toward Kishida on the second round they must believe they will do all right under Kishida.

[jaichind]

Schedule for 9/29 LDP Prez race

1PM -> MP voting starts
2:30PM -> MP voting results announced along with counted LDP chapter vote
If a run off is needed MP vote starts ASAP
3:40PM -> Winner of runoff is announced

[jaichind]

https://www.sankei.com/article/20210927-M2SVZY452RLTTFOXFUZVLDIYBE/

Big if true.  Kishida camp is saying that they would shift all their votes to Takaichi  in a possible Kono-Takaichi runoff.  They still exude confidence that Kishida will get into the second round but are making this decision as part of contingency planning.  I still think they are making it public as a signal to the Abe that they are all on the same page of being anti-Kono and he should be working to shift votes to Kishida in a very likely Kono-Kishida  second round.  The only way out for Kono is now to win something like 55% if not 60% of the LDP chapter vote to intimidate the LDP MPs in marginal districts to vote Kono on the secret ballot on the second round.

I was thinking how Kono went from being the favorite to now hoping for a Hail Mary to win.  I think his mistake was to take the support and endorsement of 石破茂(Ishiba Shigeru).  Ishiba is popular with the LDP mass base but is disliked by the various LDP kingpins, especially Abe.  When Ishiba dropped out of race Kono should have advised Ishiba not to endorse him but stay neutral.   Ishiba's support did not gain Kono that much more LDP chapter vote that Kono could not win by himself but drove a lot of influential LDP MPs against Kono. 

[jaichind]

LDP Prez election is today.  Prediction

                                            MP        LDP Chapter       Total
河野太郎(Kono Taro)               123              185               308
岸田文雄(Kishida Fumio)         143              100               243
高市早苗(Takaichi Sanae)          95               85                180
野田聖子(Noda Seiko)               21               12                  33

Leading to Kono-Kishida second round.  Only MPs vote second round and for the LDP chapter vote each of the 47 prefectures has one vote each which is the winner of the LDP chapter vote in the prefecture in the first round.

Abe-Takaichi de facto endorses Kishida while Noda de facto endorse Kono.  Most of the MP that voted Takaichi votes for Kishida leading to him winning.

                                            MP          LDP chapter      Total
河野太郎(Kono Taro)              166               40                206
岸田文雄(Kishida Fumio)        216                 7                223

[jaichind]

LDP Prez race has gone to a runoff 4 times in the past: 1956, 1960, 1972, and 2012. 2 out of those 4 times the second place finisher won (1956 and 2012.)  We are likely to see the third time this will take place.



What is interesting is that had the 2021 LDP Prez race runoff rules been in place (where in addition to the MPs voting there are 47 prefecture votes of 1 per prefecture, Ishiba would  have defeated Abe and Japanese political history since 2012 would have been re-written.