2020 Absentee/Early Voting megathread 2

[DaleCooper]

Wow! Still some chance of salvaging Florida?

No way. Biden's ceiling in Florida is one vote less than whatever Trump's total is.

[DaleCooper]

Wow! Still some chance of salvaging Florida?

No way. Biden's ceiling in Florida is one vote less than whatever Trump's total is.

Reminds me of the "Running Man" from Zelda. He always beats you by exactly one second.

Love it! Believe it or not, I was actually replaying Ocarina of Time today!

[DaleCooper]

I'm just spitballing here, but isn't it also possible that Republicans are doing relatively well in Florida early voting because old retirees are more likely to vote on weekdays? It's just a guess, but I'd need to see their gains hold during the weekend for me to get worried.

I'm no expert, but the panicking seems premature and unfounded.

[DaleCooper]

Are people really writing off Florida already?

It's probably for the best. Even if Biden wins 100% of the National Popular Vote, Florida would still be Tilt R at best.

[DaleCooper]

Did we already discuss the PA Supreme Court ruling re: signature verification? I couldn't find it while browsing back through previous pages.  

I didn't see any discussion, either, but this one is a big deal. Also hard to see how the US Supreme Court could justify hearing an appeal to this from the PA Supreme Court when the laws on the topic vary widely from state to state with no federal standard, so that should settle the issue.

From my understanding, the law they want to use as a justification for throwing out ballots based on signatures literally has no provisions related to signature requirements. So there really isn't even a case to appeal.

[DaleCooper]

Earlier polling data indicated that black voters were more likely to vote on election day rather than mail their ballots, but I don't know if that took into account in-person early voting. That could possibly answer the small discrepancy so far in Georgia.

[DaleCooper]

A lot of conservatives on Election Twitter really seem to believe the data and the environment are pointing to a Trump victory.

As every Democrat says, Trump could still win, but it's not because that's what the evidence now shows is likely to happen.

Conservatives say this about every election though.

Here is some food for a thought.

https://twitter.com/Alex_Roarty/status/1319725828024995840

The information we have about what Republicans are saying behind closed doors also seems to indicate that they expect and are planning on losing both the White House and the Senate.

[DaleCooper]

https://twitter.com/Nate_Cohn/status/1320129918232109056

And Wisconsin is already over 1.3 million votes, nearly matching Hillary's total in 2016.

[DaleCooper]

Really ugly numbers in Florida. Let’s see if the Obama rally this weekend can turn things around but it may be time to consider redirecting resources to GA and TX.

🤔🤔🤔

https://twitter.com/jmartnyt/status/1320142364044906496?s=21

No idea why that would be his first thought. The Biden campaign has released lots of material indicating that Georgia is one of their primary targets outside of the Rust Belt, and regardless of how the campaign feels about Florida, there are two competitive Senate seats in Georgia so it'd be foolish not to target the state even if they thought they had a lock on Florida.

[DaleCooper]

From my understanding, while it is a risk, with proper instruction and awareness it's fairly easy and intuitive to correct the naked ballot issue. You place your ballot inside of the envelope that is included with your ballot, as instructed. With signatures, you can sign in good faith as instructed yet still get your vote challenged and thrown out, so it's a big win that the PA courts threw out the signature validation requirements.

[DaleCooper]

https://twitter.com/umichvoter99/status/1320410525507985408?s=21

So Dems are going to get a 600k mail in ballot lead after all, lol

Was the talking point that Dems needed a 600k lead in mail in ballots or a 600k lead in all of early voting, in-person and mail combined?

[DaleCooper]

Given how polarized mail-in voting is, I'm not at all surprised at the potential for Biden getting 99% of Florida Democrats and 12% of Florida Republicans (that mail in their ballots).

[DaleCooper]

Looking good in Michigan!

[DaleCooper]

MN, WI,and MI are around 40-45% of 2016 turnout - how does this look to anyone? not sure what to think of it.

They'll at least get to their usual rates of 69-80%. You can't count MN's turnout other than on Fridays, since that's the only date in which they update.

On the rest, for WI, what matters is who is turning out in the state, as in, the counties that are pulling more than their weight in the electorate. In D favored elections, Dane punches way above the line, while Milwaukee simply turns out at about their weight (rather than below). So far, that's what we're seeing this year in WI

I don't know much about Michigan.

got it - out of all of these states is "republicans" doing the best?

I don't understand this question.

Presumably it's: which state are Republicans doing best in?

[DaleCooper]

Have the early vote totals influenced anyone's opinions on any states?

For me I think I'm more optimistic about North Carolina and Georgia.  Especially North Carolina.  We keep hearing about the urban and suburban areas experiencing epic growth there and the rural areas in population decline.  The raw numbers out of some of the democratic counties seem to be bearing that out.  If the urban and suburban areas trend left this election as they are suspected to this could be a double whammy against Republicans: higher margins + a lot more raw vote out of those counties.

Not at all, other than revealing that Texas voters know that they live in a tossup state. The GOP is going to get their vote out closer to and on E-Day, countering what Dems build up now. It'll come down to who did better during their favorable timeslots, which is only knowable after the votes are tabulated. Anything else is just tea leaves/astrology.

Of course, this is the thread with a schedule about when to gloat and worry, so I am probably not the norm.

I'm not so sure. I don't doubt that they'll get their usual turnout and easily match 2016, but if the GOP were really competent about getting their vote out, they'd be doing it now. As Ralston said a while back, a vote that's already cast is worth more than a person's intention to vote in the future. Given how crazy and uncertain these times are, waiting for the last minute absolutely will harm their turnout, even if only in a statistically negligible way or by preventing them from getting the maximum amount of votes possible.

[DaleCooper]

I think Ralston is more saying that he might not have the data necessary to call Nevada for Biden before election day, not so much that it's a tossup or anything.

[DaleCooper]

hot take: the reason SCOTUS is sort of leaving the PA case open is because Dems have returned their ballots at such a high rate and are so educated on the issue that the majority of late ballots might actually be REPUBLICAN.

I don't have a take on the SCOTUS situation, but the Republican return rate in pretty much all of the swing states is so much lower than Democrats that it doesn't seem clear who would be hurt most by the targeting of late ballots.

[DaleCooper]

What should we expect from Arizona after today?

[DaleCooper]

Biden himself has likely already surpassed Trump's 2016 total in North Carolina.

[DaleCooper]

Looks like TX is gone. FL will be a heavy lift too.
https://twitter.com/snowmanomics/status/1323329093136506882?s=21

Looks like NC is gone for Trump by the same standard. 

The standard is that all data no matter what it says indicates that Trump is winning. So actually by the same standard NC is gone for Biden.

[DaleCooper]

Is it true that those O'Malley-Dillon numbers are only assessing the percentage of voters by party affiliation, and thus leaving out NPAs, or are they estimates of the actual vote?

[DaleCooper]

Giving the game away.

https://twitter.com/Jennifer_Hiller/status/1323376828522860545

The judge ruled that the votes count. They aren't being thrown out.

I know, but I'm showing how he said the quiet part out loud.

The more desperate and scared they get, the more brazen their crimes will be.

[DaleCooper]

I think people are really underestimating moderate Republicans and NPAs in Florida. I'm smack dab in suburban Florida in a swing house district and there are alot of Biden signs. Also a few Biden flags.

Yes, I know this is very anecdotal, but my precinct was also very traditionally Republican and I've been seeing tons of signs for Biden and local Democrats. Again, I know it's anecdotal, but you can practically feel the suburban disdain for Republicans in the air this year.

[DaleCooper]

The reason I'm skeptical of the Erickson commentary is that he's pretending that there are enough undecideds left to swing the election dramatically in one candidate's favor. The vast majority of people have already voted in Georgia. There isn't going to be a huge shift towards Republicans at the last minute because there aren't enough minds left to change, let alone all the data that indicates there are very few undecideds anyway.