Election Night - Counting Bias by State

[ElectionsGuy]

Political junkies, I need your help. I want to know the political bias of vote counts in each state (meaning which areas of the state, R or D, come in first). I already know most of the important ones, but many of the most competitive Senate elections this year are in smaller states that rarely get talked about or receive attention.

Arizona: ?
Colorado: R Bias
Florida: D Bias
Georgia: R Bias
Iowa: Strong D Bias
Indiana: R Bias
Michigan: R Bias
Missouri: R Bias
Montana: ?
Nevada: ?
North Carolina: D Bias (not relevant in 2018)
North Dakota: ?
Ohio: Strong D Bias
Pennsylvania: Strong D Bias (not relevant in 2018)
Texas: Strong D Bias
Tennessee: R Bias
Virginia: Strong R Bias (not relevant in 2018)
West Virginia: ?
Wisconsin: R Bias

What other important states are to be of importance for this subject on election night?

[ON Progressive]

I don’t think Arizona has any sort of counting bias since the vast majority of ballots are just dumped at once, but someone who knows the state better can correct me on that.

[Senate Minority Leader Lord Voldemort]

California usually has a R bias on election day. Counts the mail-ins (which skew Dem) later.

It has put a lot of Dems over the top a couple days, even weeks after election day.

[Crumpets]

Washington has a slight R bias, but really it's more of an establishment bias. Look for Adam Smith to put up a huge margin in the first returns, and have it narrow over time (I don't think that will be a close election, but it's a good example.)

[MT Treasurer]

Democrats always start out with big leads in Montana until it gradually tightens over the course of the night and Republicans take the lead at some point, then the last 10% or so are actually fairly Democratic-leaning. So Tester will jump out to a big early lead, but if Rosendale is only tied with Tester with >90% of the vote in, he’s toast.

[Xing]

I don’t think Arizona has any sort of counting bias since the vast majority of ballots are just dumped at once, but someone who knows the state better can correct me on that.

I think it has a slight D bias, but I could be wrong. I'd also add that New Hampshire and Maine have a pretty strong D bias, and Alaska has a slight R bias.

[IceSpear]

The entire West Coast has an R bias due to late ballots skewing D.

[TML]

From what we observed in Alabama's special Senate election last year, the Republican candidate led for most of the night before being overtaken by the Democratic candidate near the end. Does this really mean that AL has an R bias, or was this just a one-time occurrence?

[💥💥 brandon bro (he/him/his)]

Virginia is R bias because ballots from Fairfax especially and to a lesser extent Loudon and Prince William are a slow trickle. Not that anybody is watching any competitive statewide races in VA next month anyway.

From what we observed in Alabama's special Senate election last year, the Republican candidate led for most of the night before being overtaken by the Democratic candidate near the end. Does this really mean that AL has an R bias, or was this just a one-time occurrence?

It's hard to tell when any bias in early reporting is going to be very small compared with the margin in the typical outcome.

[Ebsy]

I don’t think Arizona has any sort of counting bias since the vast majority of ballots are just dumped at once, but someone who knows the state better can correct me on that.

I think it has a slight D bias, but I could be wrong. I'd also add that New Hampshire and Maine have a pretty strong D bias, and Alaska has a slight R bias.

I believe it depends on the part of Arizona. Republicans tend to do better in the early vote than election day vote, so Democrats should improve as the night goes on.

[TML]

Virginia is R bias because ballots from Fairfax especially and to a lesser extent Loudon and Prince William are a slow trickle. Not that anybody is watching any competitive statewide races in VA next month anyway.

Before the early-mid 2000s, SW VA used to vote D while NOVA used to vote R. This would imply that VA used to have a D bias which has been converted into an R bias over the last 10-15 years or so, right?

[Pandaguineapig]

I don’t think Arizona has any sort of counting bias since the vast majority of ballots are just dumped at once, but someone who knows the state better can correct me on that.

I think it has a slight D bias, but I could be wrong. I'd also add that New Hampshire and Maine have a pretty strong D bias, and Alaska has a slight R bias.

Arizona has a slight r bias ,in that 95% of the vote dumps immediately and what trickles in after that usually leans D. If McSally has a lead larger than 1.5% after the initial dump she probably wins, anything less than a 1% lead after the initial dump means she is likely doomed

[Pandaguineapig]

Missouri also has a strong D counting bias as it often takes a long time for several of the rurals to come in, Kander actually led Blunt until late in the night in 2016

[TML]

Virginia has an R bias but it was much less pronounced last year than in the past because NOVA trickled in pretty quickly

I think it was more because the overall winning margin was bigger than any Democratic statewide win in recent memory. In fact, an analysis of vote shifts from 2016 to 2017 suggests that Northam did better than Clinton even in SW VA (despite neither D candidate winning most of the counties in that region), which caused Gillespie's early lead to disappear quicker than it did for McCain, Romney, or Trump. I would even go a bit further and state that in the event of a double-digit Democratic blowout, Republicans might not even hold the lead for any substantial period of time during the night.

[henster]

I thought urban counties were just counting faster than before in VA and that would explain the less R bias.

[Attorney General & PPT Dwarven Dragon]

Missouri also has a strong D counting bias as it often takes a long time for several of the rurals to come in, Kander actually led Blunt until late in the night in 2016

Yes, but it hasn't been consistent - There was an R bias in 2006, 2008, 2010, and 2012 (unfortunately there were no statewide contests in 2014).

[Ebsy]

The bias in Missouri is totally dependent upon how long it takes the City of St. Louis to count its ballots.

[IceSpear]

Kansas is probably going to have an R bias if Johnson County takes forever to count like it usually does.

[Vosem]

Virginia's very strong R bias on Election Night is well-known. North Carolina typically has a noticeable D bias, though not as strong as Virginia's. Indiana also sometimes has a mild D bias, or at least it had one in 2016.

In terms of the distinction between results on Election Night and the final results, CO and CA have very strong D biases (of several points; Republicans generally have to be up around ~52-48 on Election Night in CA to have actually won the race). Some other, much weaker (won't swing the result by points, but if the election is within a few hundred votes, noticeable) patterns I've noticed include consistent swings toward the Democrats after Election Night in AK and OH, and swings to the Republicans in AZ and NY.

The primary pattern is that the more ideological (Sandernista or Freedom Caucus) candidate nearly always gains in post-Election Night counting; in CA Sanders achieved a 7-point swing post-Election Night (the state went from Clinton+14 to Clinton+7) and in one of the more dramatic primaries in 2016 Andy Biggs went from being down like 900 votes on Election Night to ultimately winning by 16.

[nerd73]

From what we observed in Alabama's special Senate election last year, the Republican candidate led for most of the night before being overtaken by the Democratic candidate near the end. Does this really mean that AL has an R bias, or was this just a one-time occurrence?

I remember checking the AL margin graph for 2016 in NYT right before the special election, and I noticed Trump had a bigger lead there earlier in the night.

[Oryxslayer]

Indiana has a Pub bias, and anyone who says otherwise can't read a map. The most Dem part of the state, Gary, takes one hour later to report than the rest of the state.

[Pandaguineapig]

Indiana also sometimes has a mild D bias, or at least it had one in 2016.

Did it really have on in 2016?  I remember the early Indiana/Kentucky returns looking disastrous for Clinton being one of the early indicators that Trump was doing well overall.

Kentucky is a weird case in that it usually has a D bias (and sort of had one for 2016 sen) because the ancestrally democratic coal country usually comes in first, Trump won that region by so much that the less overwhelming margin he had in the rest of the state narrowed that margin somewhat

[Pandaguineapig]

Indiana has a Pub bias, and anyone who says otherwise can't read a map. The most Dem part of the state, Gary, takes one hour later to report than the rest of the state.

It will probably be even more pronounced this year as Braun's base in the the southwest corner of the state tends to report first, and Donnelly's base in the north tends to report last

[Mr.Phips]

Kentucky seems to usually have a D bias since Louisville usually reports early.

Illinois usually has D bias as Chicago tends to report first.

South Carolina has a Dem bias due to black areas reporting first.

[Pandaguineapig]

New Jersey has a slight Republican bias as south Jersey tends to report first