Georgia's Very Own Megathread!

[Adam Griffin]

Some updated Georgia numbers. I've downloaded the huge absentee list to assess the count of all ballots cast and requested up through Monday (10/20), and also sorted it to show how many of those ballots have been cast and returned. In addition to this, I'm using the public voter file I have access to in order to break down early voters (through Sunday; doesn't include today's voters) by "party" (which is assessed from party primary voting records).

As of 10/20:

Ballot Status
All Ballots Cast/Requested: 241,920
Ballots Cast/Returned: 185,387

As of 10/19 (First Week + Sunday)

Historic Public Voter File Data (Based on Primary Voting History)
All Ballots Cast/Returned: 156,106

Republican 43.1%
Democrat 39.5%
Independent 6.1%
No Data 12.3%

(It should be noted that public voter file data/primary voting history skews Republican these days, due to a near-supermajority of Georgians living in Republican-dominant counties, so the numbers are quite possibly even better than they'd appear.

Are those numbers good or bad for Nunn?

Hard to say considering that I've never done this sort of comparison before. I did just do some sketchy math that attempts to take into account what I know about Georgia's primary dynamics (which is practically everywhere, although to a greater degree of skewing in some areas).

I started out by assessing areas where one party is the dominant force/primary is equivalent to election, which gives you 63% R / 37% D in terms of percentage of population that lives in an area where that party's primary is more influential. I then took what I know about the open primary voting habits of people from the opposite party in such circumstances and tried to reverse engineer numbers to put people where they actually belong. After all of that, I got this:

Democratic: 41.1%
Republican: 37.5%
Independent: 9.1%
No Data: 12.3%

[Adam Griffin]

And the flip-side to bringing ol' Zig-Zag back into the mix...

Could they have found a woman to put in the commercial with more of a Southron accent?

Well only a foolish UGA graduate would "trust" that corrupt clown Nathan Deal.. is all I garner from that, her education didn't teach her much

What really pissed me off was that they used someone from the Class of 1999. What, they couldn't find a recent graduate to praise these changes, and instead they had to go back to the time when Democrats still ruled? "Of course HOPE got you through college in the late 1990s, you dum-dum".


Also:

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http://politics.blog.ajc.com/2014/10/21/only-one-third-of-183416-new-voters-describe-themselves-as-white/

[Adam Griffin]

Dem unknowns

Not to rekindle that discussion we had about the unknowns from a while back but do you think a lot of the unknowns might be Hispanics?

I imagine a lot would decline to state their race because of paranoia over profiling, plus checking multiple boxes (e.g. both "Hispanic" and "white" for example) might be processed as unknown?

BK that was what I said when we discussed it; are you now saying the opposite of what you were way back then

I personally think that around 50% of those unknowns are Latinos; maybe more. Not a complete correlation, but the more Latino-populated counties usually have much higher rates of unknown RVs.

[Adam Griffin]

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[Adam Griffin]

THE GUN IS BACK

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And to top it all off, he's going after Allen from the right on immigration (in part by associating a $15,000 contribution from Associated General Contractors of America PAC as taking money from a group that "supports legalized undocumented workers"):

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[Adam Griffin]

Jahn Barrah is absolutely the best and I really hope he runs for the Senate against Isakson

This was the cycle where he should've ran; Hillary's coattails should be strong enough that we can elect someone a bit more liberal than him in 2016. I like him, but I think his political relevance on a statewide level is quickly fading. Maybe he could run as a safe bet in 2018 if Carter loses, if just to ensure we don't get another round of terrible maps (I'd certainly support him over that turncoat Reed).

[Adam Griffin]

Did Barrow not run this year because Nunn and Carter already made their interest known? It seems like it would've been a decent proposition since Georgia as a whole is more Democratic than his solid R district.

The DSCC were in talks with both Barrow and Nunn in 2013, and the story goes that Barrow wasn't interested in running for Senate all that much and ultimately declined. It wouldn't surprise me if Barrow just didn't want to deal with (what would have been) a very competitive primary with no guarantee of winning it. Also, Barrow loves a competitive general election and so maybe Georgia wasn't enough of an uphill battle for his tastes.

[Adam Griffin]

Early voting figures by race look good - but more so bad.

Through Tuesday, 2014:

Total Votes Cast: 239,749

Whites: 66.7%
Blacks: 28.3%
Other: 4.0%
Latino: 0.5%
Asian: 0.5%

And to put it into perspective, here are the figures for early voting for 2010:

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Get it together, minorities: nobody's going to take you seriously if you don't vote.

[Adam Griffin]

I how all of these scandals are coming out last-minute for practically every GAGOP statewide elected official:

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WSB refuses to release the name of the woman, but digging through campaign finance reports, I only spotted one woman during that time period who received anywhere near the amount of money they mentioned - Elizabeth Dewberry - who is a novelist and who left her novelist lover in an affair to be with Ted Turner, lol.

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67 contributions totaling $150,469.48

!!! Perhaps I missed a few and/or they went through other sources, but that's literally the only woman who shows up on both 2006-2007 reports frequently enough to fit the bill.

EDIT: LMAO screw you Facebook I love how four year-old articles somehow resurface around the same time every year. Without knowing the details or her name prior, I'm still impressed at how I actually did manage to dig her up on my own anyway

[Adam Griffin]

Getting closer to election night has me looking through classic local news coverage from the past.  Here are two goldies:

WBS-TV's coverage of the 1992 vote - including an extremely early call for Clinton, prolific discussion on the lottery referendum, and the heated Fowler/Coverdale senate result which was initially projected to be won by Fowler outright.

Also, there's WSB's coverage from the 1980 election - which includes Carter's concession speech, and the erroneous projection that Herman Talmadge had been convincingly reelected over Mack Mattingly, only to loose by a small margin later on in the night.

I hope you guys enjoy!

Best part ever

[Adam Griffin]

Quick question guys. I turn 18 on the 15th of November, which is about a week after the General Election. If I register to vote, am I allowed to vote in the run-offs?

Nearly 100% sure, and you can already register to vote (you just have to be 17 1/2 to register). If you got a D/L, you can do it right now online using your D/L number here:

https://registertovote.sos.ga.gov/GAOLVR/#no-back-button

[Adam Griffin]

Quick question guys. I turn 18 on the 15th of November, which is about a week after the General Election. If I register to vote, am I allowed to vote in the run-offs?

No, the registration date for the general election is the same for the run-offs - October 6, 2014.

If you're already registered, and you turn 18 between the elections then I don't know...

Well crap, then I guess you can't, Clinton. It sucks because had you registered before October 6 (you could have), then you'd be able to vote in the run-offs (since you can register 6 months before your 18th birthday).

[Adam Griffin]

Here's the margin shifts between last week's SUSA poll and the new one. One of these things is not like the others...

Governor: no change
Senate: Perdue + 5
Lt. Governor: Cagle + 3
Sec. of State: Kemp + 2
Attorney General: Hecht + 2
Superintendent: Woods + 3

Update: I saw a Greg Hecht ad on FOX 5 during the evening news tonight, talking about how he prosecuted child rapists. Apparently he has money for ad buys now so that's prob why he's surging

Really? I've only seen the deluge of governor and Senate ads.  My aunt claims to have seen a Casey Cagle ad but I'm not convinced.

After 9PM I think the cost for ad space drops a lot because that's when I've been seeing the downballot candidates' stuff. Yesterday I even saw a Gary Black ad!

Fun fact: excluding Deal/Perdue propaganda (which I've seen very little of), Gary Black is the only Republican candidate whose signs I've seen in NW GA. Also, I've yet to see a Perdue or Deal commercial in the general election; Nunn's team started hitting our media market about 10 days ago (was coordinated to begin the same day Sam came to Dalton) and they're running all the time. Unusual, as we never get GA Dem TV ads up here.

[Adam Griffin]

Here's the margin shifts between last week's SUSA poll and the new one. One of these things is not like the others...

Governor: no change
Senate: Perdue + 5
Lt. Governor: Cagle + 3
Sec. of State: Kemp + 2
Attorney General: Hecht + 2
Superintendent: Woods + 3

Update: I saw a Greg Hecht ad on FOX 5 during the evening news tonight, talking about how he prosecuted child rapists. Apparently he has money for ad buys now so that's prob why he's surging

Really? I've only seen the deluge of governor and Senate ads.  My aunt claims to have seen a Casey Cagle ad but I'm not convinced.

After 9PM I think the cost for ad space drops a lot because that's when I've been seeing the downballot candidates' stuff. Yesterday I even saw a Gary Black ad!

Fun fact: excluding Deal/Perdue propaganda (which I've seen very little of), Gary Black is the only Republican candidate whose signs I've seen in NW GA. Also, I've yet to see a Perdue or Deal commercial in the general election; Nunn's team started hitting our media market about 10 days ago (was coordinated to begin the same day Sam came to Dalton) and they're running all the time. Unusual, as we never get GA Dem TV ads up here.

Here in Gwinnett it's just Perdue and Deal except for one stretch of road near Buford where there's randomly four of those big poster-sized yard signs for Casey Cagle all within two miles from each other

I do love that Nunn's uncontested in your airwaves up there, it'll surely sway at least a few votes

It's really weird: both Deal and Perdue seem to be taking for granted this part of the state in both trivial and meaningful ways (and if there was ever a time not to do that, you'd think it would be now). Obviously they'll win up here, but I'd say if Republicans fall below 65% in Floyd, Whitfield, Paulding, etc, then it doesn't bode well for them at well given the increased Dem support in the rest of the state, too.

It's not just the TV ads, which matter, but even in the meaningless stuff like signs...this is the first time I can remember where Democrats are beating Republicans in the sign game in my county.

[Adam Griffin]

Carter's final commercial

[Adam Griffin]

"And if Michelle Nunn wins, Democrats keep control of the Senate..." -Barack Obama

I have heard this line at least twenty times today in radio ads, usually coupled with Nunn's "I defer to the President's judgement". It's brutally effective

Why in the world would Barry-O say something like that anywhere near a microphone?

Oh and now we're seeing Perdue and Perdue-affiliated PAC ads in the Great White North.

[Adam Griffin]

With the final day of early voting counted, turnout among blacks is up 13% compared to 2010, and down 7% among whites.

http://politics.blog.ajc.com/2014/11/01/african-american-share-of-early-ballots-up-10-percent-over-2010/

Hmm, their figures are off a bit compared to mine, but still holding strong. I'm not sure what they mean here, though:

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Do they mean blacks have almost matched the actual 2012 figure (nominal)? At any rate, we need to compare it to 2010 first, and not 2012. Between early voting in 2010 and total votes cast in 2010, black share of electorate only dropped by one point (from 29% in early voting to 28% in total votes). If this election mimics that, then this would indicate an electorate that is even blacker than 2012 or 2008. Of course, more black people could simply be voting early and there may be far fewer voting on Election Day.

Georgia, Final Early Vote Totals and Analysis:

Wow. I'm not sure what it looks like in every other state (I'll compare later), but the total share of early voters in Georgia jumped from 678,000 in 2010 to 930,000 in 2014.

The black share of the electorate jumped by close to four percentage points (from 29.0% in 2010 to 32.7% in 2014). The white share of the electorate shrank by more than five percentage points (from 66.5% in 2010 to 61.1% in 2014).

When we go by party affiliation based on primary voting record (on a statewide level, this is more accurate than it'd appear and I've explained in detail before why this is), the early vote electorate in Georgia effectively swung from R+6 in 2010 to D+1 in 2014.

By age and by gender, we saw a fairly steady hold between 2010 and 2014. Females were 55% in 2010; closer to 56% in 2014. The youngest and oldest brackets grew and shrank very modestly, respectively, while the 51-64 age group saw the largest growth between 2010 and 2014.

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Here are two maps that show 2014 early vote turnout compared to 2010 early turnout. The first one shows it in sheer numbers; the second one shows it in a "trend-like" format (counties that saw EV percentage growth greater than the state as a whole are green; those that saw less or shrank are in red).

2014 Early Vote Turnout as a Percentage of 2010 Early Vote Turnout



TREND - 2014 Early Vote Turnout as a Percentage of 2010 Early Vote Turnout

[Adam Griffin]

Does anyone else think the risk of a turnout drop in the runoff has been overstated?

1. We're already dealing with the reduced electorate of a midterm
2. The meme is mostly based on Chambliss's reelection in 2008 where he got like 49% in spite of record turnou
3. It will get the full attention from donors as the last race
4 The Nunn campaign has proven to be professional and will doubtlessly run a first-class GOTV operation

Wish I could find my multiple posts on the matter scattered about, but this is exactly what I've been thinking. I think if anything, it'll look more than 1992 than 2008 in terms of the drop-off.

[Adam Griffin]

Georgia Megathread Election Chat, beginning @ 7:00 PM!

[Adam Griffin]

Does anyone know what time Jason will speak tonight? His speech writer just called to ask if he could mention my story in his remarks.

Probably after 10, I'd say, if results are as tight as we'd expect.

[Adam Griffin]

Performance increase/"half-swing" map for Georgia Gubernatorial race (D is blue; R is red):



Proud to say that there's a silver-lining for me in all of this. I organized Whitfield County via the party and the coordinated campaigns, and it was the second-strongest swinger in the state (D +5.63), only behind Rockdale (D +5.65). Clarke was third (D +5.37).

[Adam Griffin]

And here's the 2010-2014 Senatorial performance increase/"half-swing" map (R is Republican, D is Democrat).

[Adam Griffin]

[Adam Griffin]

Georgians: Turnout dropped from 2010 to 2014. Simply put: how the christ

Speaking of which, here's a map that shows where nominal turnout increased/decreased, and by how much

[Adam Griffin]

Georgians: Turnout dropped from 2010 to 2014. Simply put: how the christ

Speaking of which, here's a map that shows where nominal turnout increased/decreased, and by how much

And one that shows 2014 turnout (%) by county