State Legislature Special Election Megathread v2

[Zaybay]

I was expected #thepersistence to tweet how they "got in the runoff with 30% of the vote" and how this showed how strong Reps are, but he didnt even mention it.

[Zaybay]

Wasnt surprised by the D underpreformance, the Ds also underpreformed in minority based seats in GA and FL. What did surprise me is how much they underpreformed, almost 25 points!

This can mean two things:
A. Hurd is likely to overpreform results, and Latino turnout will be rather weak in 2018

B. This means nothing, as its just the typical drop in turnout in minority based seats when its not election day

[Zaybay]

Wasnt surprised by the D underpreformance, the Ds also underpreformed in minority based seats in GA and FL. What did surprise me is how much they underpreformed, almost 25 points!

This can mean two things:
A. Hurd is likely to overpreform results, and Latino turnout will be rather weak in 2018

B. This means nothing, as its just the typical drop in turnout in minority based seats when its not election day

I don't know why they aren't turning out, given the rather...urgent situation emanating from the White House right now. 

I know right.

I dont know either. I mean, we have seen this before, in the FL state elections and the GA state elections, those not held on the primary date, but this drop is huge. Its probably a combination of both A and B, IMO.

Edit: Apparently, turnout overall was abysmal. Im going to try to find the numbers.

[Zaybay]

The evidence is mounting, and it ain't pretty:


1. TX-23 polls show Hurd easily winning and Latino turnout weak.
2. SD-19 special elections shows massive swings to Republicans in heavily Latino areas.
3. Polls/primaries in CA-21, CA-39, CA-25, FL-26, and FL-27 all show Democrats disastrously and devastatingly underperforming Hillary numbers - by a lot.
4. New Nevada polls show Democrats collapsing, Arizona Senate race has become very tight after Sinema seemed to have a clear lead for months.
5. Ted Cruz is surging in Texas.

The blue wave will be irrelevant in Hispanic heavy areas. Thus, I am changing my rating of the House from Lean D (where I have had it for about a month) to Lean R. Once sure pickups, like TX-23, CA-25, CA-39, and FL-27 look drastically different and democratic candidates are even struggling in sunbelt districts with a small minority population like TX-07 and AR-02.

The blue wave is over.

Let me break down this trainwreck of a post one step at a time, even though it's not going to convince concern trolls like you about anything:

1. Polls can't tell you about Latino turnout at all. I hate when people explain poll results by saying "THERE'S LOW LATINO/(insert whatever subgroup) TURNOUT IN THIS AREA IN MIDTERMS" because polls can't predict turnout.

2. How much of that SD-19 swing was because turnout dropped hard for an obscure special election, thus meaning the electorate could've been much whiter than the actual demographics? It'll probably be a significantly more Hispanic electorate in 2018, let alone 2020 when this seat comes back up again.

3. CA-21 was never on the board at all because that area has laughable turnout AND a strong incumbent. The CA-39 poll had Trump approval at even in a Clinton +9 seat which isn't believable at all. That was also probably our toughest of the OC seats. CA-25 is still a tossup, given that Knight is only up 3 and he's under 50 in a 42-52 Trump approval seat.

FL-26 was always going to be tough because the GOP incumbent is really well liked (and even that isn't preventing his race from being within 3 points AND below 50 against an opponent with 32% name recognition LOL), and the two FL-27 polls are internals. One of those internals is from McLaughlin, which is a notoriously terrible firm that's missed races by 30+ points consistently. The other is from a random firm I've never heard of, and it could very well be just being pushed out to tell people "DONATE TO ME!!!!!"

4. The Nevada polls are in line with what we've seen in other Nevada polls, and Nevada polls have a LONG history of underestimating Democrats, as this post by IceSpear shows: https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=301205.msg6407307#msg6407307

5. What surge? We have two outlier polls with Cruz +9 and O'Rourke +2, which cancel out largely to be a Cruz +4-5 race. Cruz +4 or Cruz +5 would be very much in line with what the race has been stuck at for months.

You are talking to Limo, there is no point in using logic.

[Zaybay]

Cool, the Republican won the race against the Republican! So riveting.

Anyway, onto the big show for today! MN!

[Zaybay]

Cool, the Republican won the race against the Republican! So riveting.

Anyway, onto the big show for today! MN!

I am queasy about this one. This was completely unnecessary, Walz should have picked somebody from a solid blue seat in the twin cities or somewhere else. Why pick somebody from this kind of a district? Why risk it? Surely there are qualified people from solid blue areas in the twin cities, duluth proper, rochester proper, moorehead proper, etc. all around the state.

Eh, C'est La Vie. All that matters at this moment is that we win this seat.

[Zaybay]

Map looks good, numbers not so much for D. It really depends on turnout, it seems.

[Zaybay]

Rarick is now surging ahead.

His vote share went down.....

[Zaybay]

New Results:

Republican      Jason Rarick                1786      48.92%   
Democratic-Farmer-Labor      Stu Lourey  1757   48.12%

42.72% in

[Zaybay]

The race isnt even over you two. Quit it with the #DemsInDisarray garbage.

[Zaybay]

New Results:

About 50% in

Legal Marijuana Now            John "Sparky" Birrenbach   110   2.28%   
Republican                          Jason Rarick                   2310   47.88%   
Democratic-Farmer-Labor      Stu Lourey                   2388   49.49%   
WRITE-IN**                      WRITE-IN**                      17   0.35%   

[Zaybay]

The race isnt even over you two. Quit it with the #DemsInDisarray garbage.

It ain't over yet, but Lourey is chewing through Carlton awful fast.

I literally said it is not over.

Pointless self own by Walz here.

It aint a self-own if the Ds win the seat.

[Zaybay]

Pretty big dump from Pine. Time to see what the rest of the district has to say.

[Zaybay]

Looks like Rarick is the favorite at the moment. This means the GOP picks up one state senate seat, which, I believe, would make this the first pickup for 2019.

[Zaybay]

This is the first competitive special of the year, and it went very badly for Ds. This is a district that voted for Klobuchar and Walz, and only very narrowly went for Stauber and Wardlow. Democrats were seen as favored here coming into the night. But they lost, and lost badly. This is a real sign of a potential change from the mood of 2018. The Democratic Party that won MO HD 97 in a shock upset is not the Democratic party of tonight. Tonight was a very weak Democratic Party. Question is - will it continue? We'll see - Plenty of specials during the rest of the month:

Feb. 12 - GA HD 176, TX HD 125
Feb. 19 - VA HoD 86
Feb. 23 - LA HD 12, 17, 18, 26, 27, 47, 62
Feb. 26 - CT SD 3, 5, 6 ; HD 39 & 99

Stop with the terrible takes.

[Zaybay]

Trump won this by 13 points but it’s pretty much solidly Democratic downballot, right? I’ll guess D+9.

Lmao. What happened here?

The Dems winning streak is over. Also, this district isn't really strongly Democratic, Stauber and Wardlow carried it.

I know, but Democrats have won special elections in districts FAR more Republican than this one is, often by a lot.

Yes, but that time period is over now. The pendulum is swinging back to Rs.

Yeah, its not like the Rs have won any specials in D territory at all this year. None at all.
https://ballotpedia.org/State_legislative_special_elections,_2017
https://ballotpedia.org/State_legislative_special_elections,_2018

[Zaybay]

Not surprising. This is White Rural Georgia. If you were expecting anything close to competitive, you came to the wrong state.

[Zaybay]

JAMES BURCHETT - REP42.50%1,494
BARBARA GRIFFIN - DEM4.10%144
FRANKLIN PATTEN - REP43.13%1,516
BARBARA SEIDMAN - DEM10.27%361


Another disappointment for the Democratic party.

[Zaybay]

JAMES BURCHETT - REP42.50%1,494
BARBARA GRIFFIN - DEM4.10%144
FRANKLIN PATTEN - REP43.13%1,516
BARBARA SEIDMAN - DEM10.27%361


Another disappointment for the Democratic party.

32% of the seat is black or Hispanic, Dems got just 14%. It's a disappointment.

Did you sleep through the GA specials last year where the Democrats got extremely similar performances in the same area?

Context is key.

[Zaybay]

JAMES BURCHETT - REP42.50%1,494
BARBARA GRIFFIN - DEM4.10%144
FRANKLIN PATTEN - REP43.13%1,516
BARBARA SEIDMAN - DEM10.27%361


Another disappointment for the Democratic party.

32% of the seat is black or Hispanic, Dems got just 14%. It's a disappointment.

Did you sleep through the GA specials last year where the Democrats got extremely similar performances in the same area?

Context is key.

Just because it happened in some instances in 2018 doesn't excuse it. The fact is the Democratic coalition is lazy and apathetic here and that needs to change.

Its important because it provides context on why every single GA special not in the metro has given similar results. And this is really just GA, BTW.

Context, its key.

[Zaybay]

Another embarrassing underperformance. Get ready for the red wave in 2020, folks.

Not guaranteed. But - possible. Especially if 15-20 Democratic presidential candidates will cut themselves into small pieces and rather unelectable candidate will be a nominee. This may lead to Trump victory, even with Trump being personally unpopular, and this, in turn,  may cause a sort of wave. Not because Republican party and it's candidates will be good (that's highly unlikely), but - because Democratic may be very bad.... Of course - it's only a scenario, but - it's possible...

He’s being sarcastic

[Zaybay]

Ill set up some actually viable parameters:

Success in House: Did the Democrats win the chamber? Yes, success for the Dems.
Bonus- Did the Democrats win a comfortable majority in the chamber? Yes, uber-success for the Dems.

Success in Senate: Did the Democrats hold the Rs to either one net gain or better? No, failure of a cycle.

Success in Governorships: Did the Democrats win key Redistricting States? Sort of, mixed cycle.

And there you have it.

[Zaybay]

Waiting for the "Dems are in Disarray, they are losing all momentum, etc, etc." take if Pugh loses this Trump 80/20 seat.

[Zaybay]

Basically none of these numbers matter. Pike will decide the election.

[Zaybay]

Guys, this is all decided by Pike County. Stop analyzing the pointless parts of the district and perhaps focus on the county with 60% of the seat's population.