2022 Generic Ballot / Recruitment / Fundraising / Ratings Megathread

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Meanwhile back in reality, Trafalgar has R+9 on the generic ballot

https://www.thetrafalgargroup.org/news/nat-generic-ballot-0627/

What was the survey period for this? It just says ‘June’…and I believe that this wa what the generic ballot was among LV for November as of a week or two ago. Today is a completely different story, however.

It was June 20-23.

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Emerson GCB:

https://emersoncollegepolling.com/national-poll-biden-with-higher-approval-than-us-congress-trump-leads-gop-nomination-contest/

Republicans 46%
Democrats 43%

1271 registered voters, 2.7%
6/28-6/29

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The NRCC has added 10 more candidates to their "Young Guns" program:

https://twitter.com/ercovey/status/1549368903310131203

They have also identified multiple candidates as part of their "On the Radar" list - which as far as I can tell includes candidates who haven't officially been nominated (FL-15, NH-02, the NY seats) and various reach seats (CO-07, IL-08, PA-12):

https://twitter.com/ercovey/status/1547938901607608323

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National Journal released their rankings of the top 20 House seats most likely to flip:

https://www.nationaljournal.com/s/718341/ihotlineis-2022-house-power-rankings/

1. WI-03 (Open)
2. MI-10 (Open)
3. AZ-02 (D, O'Halleran)
4. AZ-06 (Open)
5. TX-15 (Open)
6. IA-03 (Axne)
7. NJ-07 (Malinowski)
8. PA-07 (Wild)
9. MI-07 (Slotkin)
10. MI-08 (Kildee)
11. CA-22 (Valadao)
12. VA-02 (Luria)
13. OH-09 (Kaptur)
14. ME-02 (Golden)
15. IL-17 (Open)
16. PA-08 (Cartwright)
17. MI-03 (Meijer)
18. PA-17 (Open)
19. NV-03 (Lee)
20. NY-22 (Open)

All of these districts are highly vulnerable (and the Democratic-held ones especially will likely flip), but the ordering of these rankings and some omissions (TN-05, GA-06, the two D-held Florida districts that were made more Republican in redistricting - although they might see those ones as givens already - as well as seats like CA-27 and IL-13 which are more Democratic than the D seats on here) don't make a lot of sense.

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^That tweet is incorrect, Cook actually moved five seats (three in favor of Democrats). Here is the full list of rating changes:

https://mobile.twitter.com/Redistrict/status/1555551014576693249

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A tied GCB would still yield a GOP House majority (although not an overwhelming one).

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Hard to see a way you could justify putting Pennsylvania and Colorado in the same category.

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Did we see a continuous step by step decline in Dem performance by education in 2020, or is that new in 2022? I don’t remember when we completed our shift from U-shape (Dems best among no education, advanced degrees) to downward slope.

Yes, both of the major exit polls found that higher education correlated with higher support for Democrats (at the national level) in 2020.

New York Times/Associated Press:

Trump 53%, Biden 46% - High school or less (27%)
Trump 50%, Biden 48% - Some college, or associate degree (34%)
Trump 42%, Biden 56% - College graduate (25%)
Trump 40%, Biden 58% - Postgraduate study (15%)

CNN/Edison Research (if you combine Some college and Associate's degree groups like NYT did, Biden would have won that cohort by about 49-48):

Trump 54%, Biden 46% - Never attended college (19%)
Trump 47%, Biden 51% - Some college (23%)
Trump 50%, Biden 47% - Associate's degree (16%)
Trump 47%, Biden 51% - Bachelor's degree (27%)
Trump 37%, Biden 62% - Advanced degree (15%)

You might be thinking of income, which didn't have a linear pattern in either poll, or possibly a specific state where the non-college population is heavily non-white and thus was more Democratic.

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A Democratic group is making a small ($94K) ad buy in the NH-02 GOP primary to try to boost the more right-wing candidate, Bob Burns, over Keene mayor George Hansel-

https://www.politico.com/news/2022/08/29/new-hampshire-gop-primary-00054137

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New Crystal Ball rating changes:

https://centerforpolitics.org/crystalball/articles/notes-on-the-state-of-politics-sept-7-2022/

AK-AL: Safe Republican > Toss-up
MI-03: Toss-up > Leans Democratic
WA-08: Toss-up > Leans Democratic

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The NRCC has added 7 candidates to their "On the Radar" program - which appears to be a bunch of reach seats:

https://twitter.com/kirk_bado/status/1569682704844689408

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NRCC adds 13 more candidates to their "Young Guns" program-

https://twitter.com/kirk_bado/status/1570416579631775744

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https://twitter.com/Redistrict/status/1572570949500960771

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New Inside Elections rating changes:

https://twitter.com/JacobRubashkin/status/1573382557357510658

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Cook has made 10 more House rating changes today:

https://twitter.com/Redistrict/status/1577668535425318912

CA-09: Harder - Lean D to Likely D
FL-07: OPEN (Murphy) - Likely R to Solid R
FL-27: Salazar - Likely R to Lean R
IL-06: Casten - Lean D to Likely D
IA-01: Miller-Meeks - Likely R to Lean R
MI-08: Kildee - Toss Up to Lean D
NV-04: Horsford - Toss Up to Lean D
PA-07: Wild - Lean R to Toss Up
TX-15: OPEN (Gonzalez) - Lean R to Likely R
TX-34: Flores/Gonzalez - Lean D to Toss Up

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Sean Trende also wrote a whole chapter in a book about the 2018 elections trying to debunk that it was not a wave election/favorable for the Democrats. Suffice it to say, the people at RCP certainly have some...peculiar opinions.

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I can’t believe I’m doing this, but… I’m going to defend RCP’s 2000 prediction.

Given, they are Republican hacks and put a thumb on the scale. It was true then and it’s true now.

But, going back to 2000:

There was ample polling evidence during the campaign supporting the idea that Bush could win big. It wasn’t a consensus and it wasn’t the case in the final weeks, and some polls turned out to be duds, but data was there.

Presidential elections were less and differently polarized. Remember that in 2000, the previous Republican win was in 1988 by Bush’s father, and the map was a landslide.

Red California, Illinois, and Washington were unlikely in 2000 but not nearly as unthinkable as they are now.

If you sketched out a best-case scenario based on polling and assumed America was completely ready to swing back to 1980-1992 Republican margins, you would draw this map.

Both Bush and Gore made stops in CA, IL, and WA during the last two months of the 2000 campaign (amusingly, in retrospect, at roughly the same time visiting states that are now Safe R like WV, TN, and AR). It's probably important to remember the 2000 campaign occurred before the general outline of our current electoral map was established after the 2000 election.

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Cook moved OR-06 to Tossup:

https://twitter.com/CookPolitical/status/1579874136591306754

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NYT/Siena is in the field with another national poll now, per NYT's "The Tilt" newsletter.

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https://twitter.com/allymutnick/status/1580543260883582977

In addition to Porter, the other double-digit Biden seats the CLF is targeting with these buys are CA-49 (Levin), CT-05 (Hayes), CA-22 (Valadao), CA-13 (OPEN, Duarte R nominee), TX-34 (Flores/Gonzalez), and RI-02 (OPEN, Fung R nominee).

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https://twitter.com/CookPolitical/status/1580916904725999616

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RRH Elections is raising money to poll three House races (which districts TBD):

https://rrhelections.com/index.php/2022/10/14/weekend-open-thread-for-october-14-16-2022/

I would be quite interested in seeing these given how few non-internal House polls we have gotten, and they had a good track record this cycle based on the two special elections they polled (their TX-34 poll was right on the money, and their NM-01 result wasn't that far outside the margin of error in addition to nailing the GOP candidate's vote share).

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A few rating changes from Cook:

https://twitter.com/CookPolitical/status/1582491151768031232

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It's extremely odd that AZ-02 is competitive but Dems don't seem to want to bother in AZ-01 and AZ-06, both tiny Biden districts. I know they need to focus on their incumbents, but it also seems hard to imagine that the GOP is running away with it in 01 and 06 too.

Tbf, if they are losing AZ-01 and AZ-06, then AZ-02 is probably much less favorable for Democrats than their spending indicates. Given some of the party's other spending choices this cycle, I think it is just as simple as spending heavily out of loyalty to incumbents rather than investing in some open seats/pickup opportunities that probably aren't sure things anyway (I don't think this is such a good strategy either, but I can understand it).

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https://twitter.com/kkondik/status/1582774090238418946