Early & Absentee Voting Megathread - Build the Freiwal

[Pandaguineapig]

How are Early Votes looking for Donnally in Indiana?

Turnout is high everywhere so it's probably a wash, but absentees look awesome for the GOP

Is there any way to tell if the Libertarian candidate is taking many votes away from Braun?

No, but the mailers aggressively pushing the libertarian candidate would signal that the Democrats likely see Braun leading and that Donnelly will end up well below 50

[libertpaulian]

How are Early Votes looking for Donnally in Indiana?

Turnout is high everywhere so it's probably a wash, but absentees look awesome for the GOP

Is there any way to tell if the Libertarian candidate is taking many votes away from Braun?

Eh, it depends.  Remember, in Indiana, partisan registration doesn't exist.  Every registered voter is non-affiliated, no matter how they may personally identify.

[Arkansas Yankee]

The Tampa Bay Times article did not say Nelson or Gillum could not win.  It merely expressed a belief that a Blue Wave was not building in Florida.

[SCNCmod]

How are Early Votes looking for Donnally in Indiana?

Turnout is high everywhere so it's probably a wash, but absentees look awesome for the GOP

Is there any way to tell if the Libertarian candidate is taking many votes away from Braun?

No, but the mailers aggressively pushing the libertarian candidate would signal that the Democrats likely see Braun leading and that Donnelly will end up well below 50

If polls are even close to accurate- It looks like Donnelly needs for the Libertarian candidate to get around 6% or better.  If this how you read the polls?

[ajc0918]

You folks realize that the incumbent governor only won by a point in 2014, right?

Every recent election has been close in Florida. Obama who had a superior GOTV campaign won by 2.81% in 2008 and by only .88% in 2012.

Scott won governor in 2010 by 1.2% and in 2014 by 1%. This is a very close state. What people don't understand is that a lot of the population growth here has actually been white and conservative because of retirees and the suburban housing boom. And that they are reliable voters for the GOP who turn out.

 It seems that many people feel confident that Democrats will win with independants, great. But Democrats should do a better job of turning out their base and groups that will be reliable Democratic voters, instead of hoping they convince swing voters.

That is what Dems are doing. Look at the democratic margins in the big counties compared to 2014. Read as 2014 / 2018 (2014 D-R margin / 2018 D-R margin)

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Source: http://steveschale.com/

[KingSweden]

How are Early Votes looking for Donnally in Indiana?

Turnout is high everywhere so it's probably a wash, but absentees look awesome for the GOP

Is there any way to tell if the Libertarian candidate is taking many votes away from Braun?

Eh, it depends.  Remember, in Indiana, partisan registration doesn't exist.  Every registered voter is non-affiliated, no matter how they may personally identify.

If there’s no partisan registration then trying to interpret EV numbers from the state is meaningless.

[Pandaguineapig]

How are Early Votes looking for Donnally in Indiana?

Turnout is high everywhere so it's probably a wash, but absentees look awesome for the GOP

Is there any way to tell if the Libertarian candidate is taking many votes away from Braun?

No, but the mailers aggressively pushing the libertarian candidate would signal that the Democrats likely see Braun leading and that Donnelly will end up well below 50

If polls are even close to accurate- It looks like Donnelly needs for the Libertarian candidate to get around 6% or better.  If this how you read the polls?

Yeah 6% is probably the goal, the problem is that such a large portion of the vote is already in (and those votes are rarely third party)

[KingSweden]

How are Early Votes looking for Donnally in Indiana?

Turnout is high everywhere so it's probably a wash, but absentees look awesome for the GOP

Is there any way to tell if the Libertarian candidate is taking many votes away from Braun?

No, but the mailers aggressively pushing the libertarian candidate would signal that the Democrats likely see Braun leading and that Donnelly will end up well below 50

If polls are even close to accurate- It looks like Donnelly needs for the Libertarian candidate to get around 6% or better.  If this how you read the polls?

Yeah 6% is probably the goal, the problem is that such a large portion of the vote is already in (and those votes are rarely third party)

Incidentally Libertarians do pretty okay in Indiana, which has always surprised me, as the state doesn’t strike me as ripe ground for it

[Crumpets]

How are Early Votes looking for Donnally in Indiana?

Turnout is high everywhere so it's probably a wash, but absentees look awesome for the GOP

Is there any way to tell if the Libertarian candidate is taking many votes away from Braun?

No, but the mailers aggressively pushing the libertarian candidate would signal that the Democrats likely see Braun leading and that Donnelly will end up well below 50

If polls are even close to accurate- It looks like Donnelly needs for the Libertarian candidate to get around 6% or better.  If this how you read the polls?

Yeah 6% is probably the goal, the problem is that such a large portion of the vote is already in (and those votes are rarely third party)

Incidentally Libertarians do pretty okay in Indiana, which has always surprised me, as the state doesn’t strike me as ripe ground for it

IIRC, the Libertarian Party was originally founded in Indiana.

[SCNCmod]

Top 10 early voting states so far compared to 2014 totals:

1. Tennessee: 151.9% (Taylor Swift effect?)
2. Texas: 136.1% (Beto effect?)
3. Indiana: 127.9%
4. Nevada: 114.4%
5. Georgia: 108.8%
6. Minnesota: 106%
7. Delaware: 103.2%
8. North Carolina: 94.9%
9. New Mexico: 93.5%
10. Montana & Louisiana: 87.6%

35th and last: Oregon at 23.9%

Only 35 states have numbers/percentages so far. I guess most of the other states (including Arizona) don't have early voting or it hasn't started yet.

Numbers from electproject.org

With Indiana being #3 on this list... Is the more fervent support for Braun or Donnelly (or the Libertarian)?  I thought this race was somewhat of a sleeper- surprised to see it getting such a high early vote.  How do ppl on the ground in Indiana view this large early vote?

[Brittain33]

Top 10 early voting states so far compared to 2014 totals:

1. Tennessee: 151.9% (Taylor Swift effect?)
2. Texas: 136.1% (Beto effect?)
3. Indiana: 127.9%
4. Nevada: 114.4%
5. Georgia: 108.8%
6. Minnesota: 106%
7. Delaware: 103.2%
8. North Carolina: 94.9%
9. New Mexico: 93.5%
10. Montana & Louisiana: 87.6%

35th and last: Oregon at 23.9%

Only 35 states have numbers/percentages so far. I guess most of the other states (including Arizona) don't have early voting or it hasn't started yet.

Numbers from electproject.org

With Indiana being #3 on this list... Is the more fervent support for Braun or Donnelly (or the Libertarian)?  I thought this race was somewhat of a sleeper- surprised to see it getting such a high early vote.  How do ppl on the ground in Indiana view this large early vote?

Bear in mind that in 2014, neither the governor nor either senator was up for election, and the only races on the ballot were lower-tier executives and legislative/House.

[SCNCmod]

Top 10 early voting states so far compared to 2014 totals:

1. Tennessee: 151.9% (Taylor Swift effect?)
2. Texas: 136.1% (Beto effect?)
3. Indiana: 127.9%
4. Nevada: 114.4%
5. Georgia: 108.8%
6. Minnesota: 106%
7. Delaware: 103.2%
8. North Carolina: 94.9%
9. New Mexico: 93.5%
10. Montana & Louisiana: 87.6%

35th and last: Oregon at 23.9%

Only 35 states have numbers/percentages so far. I guess most of the other states (including Arizona) don't have early voting or it hasn't started yet.

Numbers from electproject.org

With Indiana being #3 on this list... Is the more fervent support for Braun or Donnelly (or the Libertarian)?  I thought this race was somewhat of a sleeper- surprised to see it getting such a high early vote.  How do ppl on the ground in Indiana view this large early vote?

Bear in mind that in 2014, neither the governor nor either senator was up for election, and the only races on the ballot were lower-tier executives and legislative/House.

That makes sense.

[SCNCmod]

Top 10 early voting states so far compared to 2014 totals:

1. Tennessee: 151.9% (Taylor Swift effect?)
2. Texas: 136.1% (Beto effect?)
3. Indiana: 127.9%
4. Nevada: 114.4%
5. Georgia: 108.8%
6. Minnesota: 106%
7. Delaware: 103.2%
8. North Carolina: 94.9%
9. New Mexico: 93.5%
10. Montana & Louisiana: 87.6%

35th and last: Oregon at 23.9%

Only 35 states have numbers/percentages so far. I guess most of the other states (including Arizona) don't have early voting or it hasn't started yet.

Numbers from electproject.org

With Indiana being #3 on this list... Is the more fervent support for Braun or Donnelly (or the Libertarian)?  I thought this race was somewhat of a sleeper- surprised to see it getting such a high early vote.  How do ppl on the ground in Indiana view this large early vote?

Same question for TN?  How do ppl on the ground view the large early vote?  (Energy for Blackburn, Energy against Blackburn, energy to save Bredesen's campaign, is more of the early vote coming from Nashville/ or from Blackburn's district?)

[J. J.]

I took a look at the amount the final RCP average was off the actual results in 2016 in some of these states.  This is what I found:

FL   +1.0 R
IN   +8.3 R
MO +7.5 R
TX   -3.0 R
AZ   -0.5 R
NV   -3.2 R

If this were added/subtracted from the current RCP results, the Republicans would take IN, MO, TX and AZ (by 0.2). The Democrats would take FL and NV.

[ON Progressive]

I took a look at the amount the final RCP average was off the actual results in 2016 in some of these states.  This is what I found:

FL   +1.0 R
IN   +8.3 R
MO +7.5 R
TX   -3.0 R
AZ   -0.5 R
NV   -3.2 R

If this were added/subtracted from the current RCP results, the Republicans would take IN, MO, TX and AZ (by 0.2). The Democrats would take FL and NV.

Ah yes, because polling error is always the same every election. Obama totally didn’t overperform polling in nearly every battleground state in 2012, after all.

[Gustaf]

Top 10 early voting states so far compared to 2014 totals:

1. Tennessee: 151.9% (Taylor Swift effect?)
2. Texas: 136.1% (Beto effect?)
3. Indiana: 127.9%
4. Nevada: 114.4%
5. Georgia: 108.8%
6. Minnesota: 106%
7. Delaware: 103.2%
8. North Carolina: 94.9%
9. New Mexico: 93.5%
10. Montana & Louisiana: 87.6%

35th and last: Oregon at 23.9%

Only 35 states have numbers/percentages so far. I guess most of the other states (including Arizona) don't have early voting or it hasn't started yet.

Numbers from electproject.org

With Indiana being #3 on this list... Is the more fervent support for Braun or Donnelly (or the Libertarian)?  I thought this race was somewhat of a sleeper- surprised to see it getting such a high early vote.  How do ppl on the ground in Indiana view this large early vote?

Same question for TN?  How do ppl on the ground view the large early vote?  (Energy for Blackburn, Energy against Blackburn, energy to save Bredesen's campaign, is more of the early vote coming from Nashville/ or from Blackburn's district?)

Similar answer - there was no competitive governor or senate race happening there in 2014.

[DataGuy]

I took a look at the amount the final RCP average was off the actual results in 2016 in some of these states.  This is what I found:

FL   +1.0 R
IN   +8.3 R
MO +7.5 R
TX   -3.0 R
AZ   -0.5 R
NV   -3.2 R

If this were added/subtracted from the current RCP results, the Republicans would take IN, MO, TX and AZ (by 0.2). The Democrats would take FL and NV.

Ah yes, because polling error is always the same every election. Obama totally didn’t overperform polling in nearly every battleground state in 2012, after all.

It's not sound to assume that polls will always miss the exact way they did in 2016, but at least in the House of Representatives, history does suggest that the incumbent House party is favored to overperform the generic congressional ballot. On average, the party controlling the House on Election Day has overperformed the GCB by 2.1%. Controlling the House of Representatives actually has a much stronger correlation with overperformance than controlling the White House.

I analyzed that trend recently: https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=304364.0. We'll see if it holds this year.

[KingSweden]

Top 10 early voting states so far compared to 2014 totals:

1. Tennessee: 151.9% (Taylor Swift effect?)
2. Texas: 136.1% (Beto effect?)
3. Indiana: 127.9%
4. Nevada: 114.4%
5. Georgia: 108.8%
6. Minnesota: 106%
7. Delaware: 103.2%
8. North Carolina: 94.9%
9. New Mexico: 93.5%
10. Montana & Louisiana: 87.6%

35th and last: Oregon at 23.9%

Only 35 states have numbers/percentages so far. I guess most of the other states (including Arizona) don't have early voting or it hasn't started yet.

Numbers from electproject.org

With Indiana being #3 on this list... Is the more fervent support for Braun or Donnelly (or the Libertarian)?  I thought this race was somewhat of a sleeper- surprised to see it getting such a high early vote.  How do ppl on the ground in Indiana view this large early vote?

Same question for TN?  How do ppl on the ground view the large early vote?  (Energy for Blackburn, Energy against Blackburn, energy to save Bredesen's campaign, is more of the early vote coming from Nashville/ or from Blackburn's district?)

Similar answer - there was no competitive governor or senate race happening there in 2014.

At the very least in TN there were Senate/Gov races, but they were utterly uncompetitive

[SCNCmod]

DataGuy- I could see that holding this year... because isn't the Generic Congressional ballot 6-8% pro-Dems.  So if the actually number came in at 4-6% pro-Dem ... your hypothesis would hold.

[Aurelio21]

I took a look at the amount the final RCP average was off the actual results in 2016 in some of these states.  This is what I found:

FL   +1.0 R
IN   +8.3 R
MO +7.5 R
TX   -3.0 R
AZ   -0.5 R
NV   -3.2 R

If this were added/subtracted from the current RCP results, the Republicans would take IN, MO, TX and AZ (by 0.2). The Democrats would take FL and NV.

I looked at these numbers earlier... but for a different reason.  Since elections tend to have a pendulum swing effect... I was wondering if polling models would over-compensate for 2016 polling errors.  If so, this would lead to polls in IN & MO being tilted a bit too Republican this year... and polls in NV & TX to a lesser extent being slightly tilted Dem.  Polls in AZ & FL staying about the same.

If over-correcting is the case- all of these Senate races really are razor edge close this year (other than Texas... but Texas has its own polling challenges this year in trying to gauge the Beto effect).  The states potentially most affected by over-correcting would be IN & MO, since they were outside the margin of error in 2016. (If an over-correcting occurred, polls could indicate that IN & MO would go Dem this year).

Has J.J. ever heard of "confirmation bias"? Polling in 2016 was not weighed for education which resulted in the infamous underpolling of Mr Trump. Reading pollsters like Siena helps understand the world around you.

Siena et al have corrected their method -  and are likely poised to underestimate the Democrats this time.
The hypothesis of DataGuy is much more plausible, as Undecided voters are primarily undecided about re-electing the incumbent. Usually, they decide to give someone they think to know a second chance. Negative qualities are remembered 10 times better than positive qualities, unless you know things about someone beforehand(advantage for the incumbent) and immunizes your belief system against negativity.

[SCNCmod]

I took a look at the amount the final RCP average was off the actual results in 2016 in some of these states.  This is what I found:

FL   +1.0 R
IN   +8.3 R
MO +7.5 R
TX   -3.0 R
AZ   -0.5 R
NV   -3.2 R

If this were added/subtracted from the current RCP results, the Republicans would take IN, MO, TX and AZ (by 0.2). The Democrats would take FL and NV.

I looked at these numbers earlier... but for a different reason.  Since elections tend to have a pendulum swing effect... I was wondering if polling models would over-compensate for 2016 polling errors.  If so, this would lead to polls in IN & MO being tilted a bit too Republican this year... and polls in NV & TX to a lesser extent being slightly tilted Dem.  Polls in AZ & FL staying about the same.

If over-correcting is the case- all of these Senate races really are razor edge close this year (other than Texas... but Texas has its own polling challenges this year in trying to gauge the Beto effect).  The states potentially most affected by over-correcting would be IN & MO, since they were outside the margin of error in 2016. (If an over-correcting occurred, polls could indicate that IN & MO would go Dem this year).

I would assume that the 2 states that pollsters definitely changed their models for... are IN & MO.  The question is how much did they change their models... and how much, if any, is there a swing back among voters in these states.

[RFK Jr.’s Brain Worm]

Thoughts on the last few pages:

CA-07 has one of the highest turnouts in CA so far. This district is entirely within Sacramento county, which is one of five counties that is experimenting with sending ballots to all registered voters. You can mail these ballots in or drop them at a drop box or voting center.

Doris Matsui’s district (CA-06) is mostly in Sac County and might be worth watching as well (in terms of whether or not sending ballots to all voters increases turnout).

Why is Mineral County, NV ancestrally Dem?

[RI]

Why is Mineral County, NV ancestrally Dem?

Hawthorne Army Depot is the primary employer. The primary population lived in Babbitt, a planned community of government-owned duplexes from WWII until the 1980s. Most of Hawthorne's operations have been contracted out now to private companies.

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

Why is Mineral County, NV ancestrally Dem?

Because there were minerals that were mined in Mineral County? Mining Minerals = Miners = WWC Populist Traditional Dem Voters?

https://pubs.usgs.gov/bul/0725h/report.pdf

[YE]

Why is Mineral County, NV ancestrally Dem?

Much of rural Nevada is but a high Native American population has held off the Dem bleeding more so than other areas.