Election 2018 Open Thread - Part 1

[Dereich]

Democrat took the lead in the Agricultural Commissioner race:

https://twitter.com/MarcACaputo/status/1060609182544642048

Looks like we’ll at least have 1 statewide office holder in the sunshine state.

How does an unknown Ag Commissioner candidate beat out two high profile races with well-known candidates?!

I wouldn't really call her unknown. I got campaign emails from her on email accounts that have nothing to do with politics. I also got my only Democratic robocall of the race for her. Plus, I think I saw more Fried signs than for anyone other than MAYBE Gillum here. I'd argue that she easily ran the best Democratic campaign in Duval county. If she did that well elsewhere the only surprise is that she isn't leading by more.

[Dereich]

Wait so the 25K error is 100% Nelson voters?

No but the under vote in Broward was so extreme in comparison to the rest of the state that more people votes in cabinet races than for U.S. Senate. There is confusion on why that is since Senate was a marquee race. Nelson would benefit from these voters.

Broward SOE was using new machines so there is thought that there could be some sort of error since the under vote in Broward was huge compared to the rest of the state. Nelson's lawyers don't believe it is due to ballot design.

Even if they did believe that it was due to ballot design, they wouldn't say it.

[Dereich]

A couple notes about the undervote:

Nelson has 10,301 fewer votes in Broward County than Gillum
Scott has 10,647 fewer votes in Broward County than DeSantis

Also, Broward County, as far as I can tell, is not reporting any results on their site for the FL-24 race, but they are reporting results for the uncontested FL-20 race. As far as I can tell, there may not have even been a FL-24 slot on the ballot. CNN reports Hastings with 201,000+ votes in the FL-20 race, but 0 votes for Wilson in the FL-24 race.

wait WHAT

There are 0 votes for Wilson because she wasn't on the ballot. She ran unopposed.

Is that a Florida thing? Whenever there have been unopposed races when I've voted, the unopposed person was still on the ballot.

I believe unopposed races here only appear on the ballot if there is a valid write-in candidate in the race. I could be wrong, but that's my recollection of the law.