Virginia Mega Thread: The Youngkin Administration

[Chips]

This is going to sound ironic...But I looked up the weather and it is expected to rain in some areas of Northern Virginia tomorrow...

[Chips]

Whatever happens, can we agree to NOT delete posts if we were wrong? That takes the fun out of things.

[Chips]

Ok, that's reason no. 2 for me not to rate this as Tossup instead of D-leaning. (no. 1 being the Election Day vote)
I trust Sabato.

Sabato does tend to know what he's talking about most of the time which is certainly something to take into consideration there.

[Chips]

It's okay if anyone gets the race wrong. We all get it wrong sometimes. Deleting posts that show you massively off is..to put it kindly, cowardly.

[Chips]

Ok, that's reason no. 2 for me not to rate this as Tossup instead of D-leaning. (no. 1 being the Election Day vote)
I trust Sabato.

Sabato does tend to know what he's talking about most of the time which is certainly something to take into consideration there.

Sabato does have a good track record, yes.
I read through the analysis and saw the crux of his stated reason was the fall in Biden's approvals though, and he himself was not very sure of the conclusion he made.

It's worth noting that as of late the fall in Biden approvals is only part of the story. The disapprovals are stuck at 51%. It's clear what is happening - people who aren't fans of Biden's job performance but are still loyal Democrats, to the point they are even unwilling to say they disapprove of his job performance. It's clear that Biden's fall in approvals has basically minimal in terms of impact on the election, because these sorts of voters would have voted for T-Mac anyway.

Biden's approvals don't function the same way as we're used to in some areas - it's not surprising if they didn't in this way either. I still think McAuliffe is favored. On that basis, I found myself disagreeing with Sabato. But I respect his stance on this all the same.
A lot of uncertainty on this, a lot of the fog, will be cleared over the next two days.

I agree with this stance as well.

[Chips]

Not predicting this to happen, but one has to wonder what the narrative will be if McAuliffe winds up winning by a Northam/Biden 2020-esque margin. Seems like the possibility of such a result has been so decisively dismissed that there isn't a coherent agreement on what it would "mean."

I agree with Sabato in that this would likely mean that just because Biden is down, doesn't mean 2022 has to be a bad year for the Dems.

[Chips]

I don’t think it’s going to happen, but what if the polls are UNDERestimating Youngkin and he wins by like 5%-10%? That would be interesting.
I do think this is the largest plausible range election I have seen.

Two things...

#1. Democrats should REALLY begin to be sweating about 2022.

#2. A few blue posters might unfortunately begin to make fun of NSV and some other posters who thought McAuliffe would win by 5 or more.

[Chips]

https://mobile.twitter.com/KevinDaleyDC/status/1455292483953467401

Okay, I know that this is an internal which cannot be entirely trusted but...if there's no poll that comes out tomorrow that shows anything better than a tie for McAuliffe by 4 or 5PM, I'll change my final prediction to a slight Youngkin win.

[Chips]

Hmm. Seems like early voting and voting reports coming in so far might be indicating a slight McAuliffe win. It's still way too early to tell as to who will ultimately come out on top, But I think the early voting and turnout reports coming in are pointing to a narrow McAuliffe victory at the moment.

[Chips]

Hmm. Seems like early voting might be indicating a slight McAuliffe win. It's still way too early to tell as to who will ultimately come out on top, But I think the early voting reports coming in are pointing to a narrow McAuliffe victory.

Interesting.  You are more fair minded than most on this forum, why do you think it's pointing that way?

Turnout seems to be going steadily for McAuliffe in NOVA. Same with the downstate areas but I don't know if I can say the turnout reports we're getting so far indicate a Youngkin victory. A Youngkin victory is certainly possible, but I think the race is leaning slightly for McAuliffe based on turnout reports so far but I also concede I could very well be wrong.

[Chips]

I think I'm going to finalize my prediction as a McAuliffe+2. I could be right on the money or off by several points in either direction. I could be off by several points in either direction but that's okay.

[Chips]

Hmm. Seems like early voting might be indicating a slight McAuliffe win. It's still way too early to tell as to who will ultimately come out on top, But I think the early voting and turnout reports coming in are pointing to a narrow McAuliffe victory at the moment.

I think you may be right

It's possible that Glenn Youngkin can still pull this off, but I am simply not seeing the kind of turnout that makes me think he can win this. Right now republican should be doing way better than they currently are and their turnout should be though the roof but so far that is not what we are seeing

now it's still early and who who knows, maybe as the day goes on, things will look better Republicans and Glenn Youngkin will go on to win this election, but as of right now it is starting to look like a narrow McAuliffe win to me

True. No one should be confident of anything. There's a ton of votes still to be counted and anything can still happen but I do have one side as a slight favorite based on said data.

[Chips]

Never change, Atlas lol.

To sum up - is it fair to say there are positives so far for both sides regarding turnout and there are no meaningful takeaways so far?

This is correct.  Basically we will know almost nothing useful until actual results start coming in.

I agree wholeheartedly. It seems as though McAuliffe might have a slight edge but no one will have any idea for sure of what's happening until votes start to come in. I honestly think it could very well be until 8PM or potentially even later before we have enough of the vote in key swing areas to truly get a grasp on what might happen.

[Chips]

I would like to remind everyone that exit polls aren't always reliable. If these are the truth though then yes things would be looking pretty good for Youngkin.

[Chips]

Everything we seem to have now points to essentially a dead heat. I can say with somewhat reasonable confidence that we're going to be in for a relatively long night and that perhaps everyone needs to make plans to stay up later than usual.

[Chips]

Everything we seem to have now points to essentially a dead heat. I can say with somewhat reasonable confidence that we're going to be in for a relatively long night and that perhaps everyone needs to make plans to stay up later than usual.

dead heat based on turnout but not on exit polls wich favor rep.

I'm not taking the exit polls as seriously as they're often unreliable.

[Chips]

Everything we seem to have now points to essentially a dead heat. I can say with somewhat reasonable confidence that we're going to be in for a relatively long night and that perhaps everyone needs to make plans to stay up later than usual.

dead heat based on turnout but not on exit polls wich favor rep.

I'm not taking the exit polls as seriously as they're often unreliable.

An exit poll that models the VA electorate as 73% white is probably unreliable, no?

Maybe? But exit polls are often just weird anyway. It's usually not wise to take them too seriously at face value.

[Chips]

Everything we seem to have now points to essentially a dead heat. I can say with somewhat reasonable confidence that we're going to be in for a relatively long night and that perhaps everyone needs to make plans to stay up later than usual.

Based on the exit poll I’d say Youngkin is winning by 53-44. Honestly, I think it’s time to stick a fork in Virginia, as I’m more concerned about what’s happening in New Jersey, because if we lose that the Democrats are finished.

If Democrats lose NJ you will never see me on this forum again, lmao. Nobody serious thinks that's even a remote possibility.

I'd put a Murphy loss at roughly a 5% chance.

[Chips]

Wat

Yeah I question the validity of these early exits strongly

Also recalled 2020 vote choice was 46-46 Trump-Biden

Ouch.
Yeah, bin it.

[Chips]

As a sidenote, Anyone else sometimes have a bit of trouble posting due to new replies being posted?

[Chips]

The Fox poll was right.
https://twitter.com/toomertastic/status/1455652508739768323?s=21

How does this not discredit the exit poll, if anything?

Maybe the logic there is that maybe this implies that a decent portion of Biden voters didn't vote in this race or something? IDK...But yeah I'm more on the opinion that these exit polls are worth about as much as bad quality paper.

[Chips]

I predict that if Mcauliffe loses, Democrats will learn exactly 0 lessons about the types of candidates they run in these elections. No one—and I mean no one—should be losing a gubernatorial race in a state where the Presidential candidate from their party won by 10% less than a year ago.

[Chips]

If Youngkin doesn't win there are going to be a whole lot of angry blue avatars on here. They are boosting themselves up for a landslide that might not even happened based on an early exit poll.

And even if he does win you won't see Democrats threatening violence or demanding audits. That is the difference between the parties.

There's plenty of embarrassment to go around amongst Atlas election analysts regardless of how this turns out.

Sad but true really.

[Chips]

I have a question for all of you. What's one county/city you're going to be watching incredibly closely? For me, that would be Radford.

[Chips]

I have a question for all of you. What's one county/city you're going to be watching incredibly closely? For me, that would be Radford.

I think I'd go with Prince William County.

I'm assuming you picked that to see the margins. I picked Radford as I think it's an underrated bellwether. Montgomery County is another one.