2022 Generic Ballot / Recruitment / Fundraising / Ratings Megathread

[Devils30]

It would be something if this ended up being a neutral or Democratic year, and would be unprecedented. Over the last century, there have only been four midterms in which the President's party did well - 1934 (New Deal realignment), 1962 (Cuban Missile Crisis), 1998 (Clinton impeachment), and 2002 (9/11 effect). What distinguishes 2022 from these preceding years is that the incumbent President in those years enjoyed strong approval ratings, while Biden's approval (according to RCP) is at around 43%, similar to Obama's in 2010. It would be extraordinary if Democrats managed to hold their ground with the President underwater by 10 points in approvals.

One thing we are missing is polls from the 1876-1900 era which is probably the most similar to today's. At some point one side will breakthrough but the activists for now are content to only play to the base.

[Devils30]

It's really a choose your own adventure!

InsiderAdvantage: Biden 45/54 approval, R+5 on GCB
Echelon: Biden 45/54 approval, D+2/3 on GCB

It is really tempting to just block RCP, Twitter and even this site for 12 days. Not sure what looking at the polls is going to accomplish.

[Devils30]

The ballot return numbers in Nevada are not looking bad for Dems.

[Devils30]

Extended version, Schumer claims "we're going downhill in Georgia"

https://twitter.com/RiegerReport/status/1585728117200543748

I don't think Walker is likely at all to win without a runoff. Warnock will dominate the black vote and Walker will struggle to get enough of the white college vote around Atlanta to get 50% or more. GA also never polls as well for Dems as PA so it might be false concern and confidence on both ends.

[Devils30]

Caveat on Nevada: turnout is VERY low at the moment, so it wouldn't take much to turn things around, especially if the rurals start picking up steam. But things do look good as of today.

The rurals can only do much for Rs in NV...and AZ.

[Devils30]

Also figure there may have been a sugar high of sorts in GA after the initial Walker allegations (averaging going up to above Warnock +4) and now it's coming back down to earth.

Look at the last several polls. It’s literally all the trash ones on the right.

https://twitter.com/vanceulrich/status/1585843044011515905?s=46&t=ZHoLiKYYsgAIRxzKT9NGUg

I also don’t understand why anyone is taking GOP pollsters at their word on CA-27, this one has no business being in a lean R category.

[Devils30]

https://www.270towin.com/2022-house-election/L5V0pYq

What happens if the effect from Dobbs is real in high education suburbs, these move further D compared to 2020 as we saw in the specials while Dems drop off a tad but not significantly in Hispanic areas. Let's say Biden +8 places become Dem +3-5 or so and WWC districts shift right but only slightly. NY/OR/RI is a weak spot but lets say Ds lose 4% off their 2020 but ultimately GOP efforts in CT-5, RI-2, NY anything is wasted.

And we get something like:
Democrats 49%
Republicans 48%

Is the above map really a crazy outcome? KS-3, NE-2, NJ-7 share a lot of similarities and there is room for a Dem dropoff in CA-22, 27, NM-2 where they can still win. OR-4,6, CT-5, RI-2, NY-17 shift right but not enough to flip and NY-19 (Ithaca in, Dutchess out) still looks decent for team Blue.

Note, Peltola, Cartwright, Kaptur, Golden winning Trump seats could be huge in this scenario. These four (and possibly Axne) surviving could push the Dems popular vote margin required down from 2-3% to as low as 0.5-1.5% in my opinion.

[Devils30]

The Political Environment is much more worse then Democrats will admit to themselves.

Consider this: President Biden is going to New York State to save Kathy Hochul and to New Mexico to save Michelle Lujan-Grisham? C'mon! That doesn't pass the smell test.

This reminds me when President Obama campaigned for Pat Quinn in Illinois and Anthony Brown in Maryland during the 2014 Midterms and they both still lost + it wasn't even close in both Races.

I agree with this. Democratic leaders, strategists, and donors certainly are not on the "offensive", and are not acting as if they are leading the Generic Ballot right now. Yet there are still people who insist that Democrats are winning and that they are poised to sweep the elections in a few weeks.

Quite frankly, even if the Democrats were leading on the GCB right now, they would never be "acting" like it in public, especially after so many polling errors in the past. Even if the Dems were up by 10, there would still be an entire aura of "is it even real?"

Plainly, these days, because people are so burned by polls, only a Republican lead among polls is to be trusted. Even a Dem is leading, there is still whispers of, "but are they really?"

The Democratic campaigns are probably seeing concerning numbers in their own internals, and are acting accordingly. I would expect for there to be a much more aggressive investment of Democratic time, money, and resources into Republican-leaning districts and states if they truly felt that they held a dominating lead in the Generic Ballot. Instead - aside from the Hofmeister-Stitt rate in Oklahoma and the Oz-Fetterman race in Pennsylvania - they are clearly on the defensive at this point, and are calling in national support for their candidates in states such as Oregon, New Mexico, and now, New York, which should not be in danger for them. I don't think we would be seeing Biden and Obama going to these states if they weren't concerned about those races.

Well there was also 2020, where Democrats were kind of fooled into thinking they should go for other GOP districts than they shouldn't have, so whether or not Dems have a lead, I think it's smart just to go for the ones that you absolutely need first and foremost. Even if you have a lead or not.

Oregon is a more specific case with the GOV race, they needed to nationalize it a bit to sink Johnson and scare Dem voters back into Kotek's column. Grisham may be in a bit of trouble, but most of the polls (sans Trafalgar) and the EV don't really indicate that, and Biden may still be relatively popular in New Mexico, so may not be a huge surprise he's going.

Is Biden planning on doing a rally in New York or something? I didn't see that. I saw he did an event with Hochul/Schumer yesterday, but that looked like more of the usual small-time stuff.

https://twitter.com/redistrict/status/1586085207827890177?s=46&t=IQbLk_K4EEYQSm0QtNQP9A

I would like another round of polls. But is NV-1 just another Vegas polling problem? That might be ground zero for low response/transient population.

For NJ-7 I would like some proof, Kean has a lot of Christie’s political hacks around him with plenty of ties to national media for years.

[Devils30]

The Political Environment is much more worse then Democrats will admit to themselves.

Consider this: President Biden is going to New York State to save Kathy Hochul and to New Mexico to save Michelle Lujan-Grisham? C'mon! That doesn't pass the smell test.

This reminds me when President Obama campaigned for Pat Quinn in Illinois and Anthony Brown in Maryland during the 2014 Midterms and they both still lost + it wasn't even close in both Races.

I agree with this. Democratic leaders, strategists, and donors certainly are not on the "offensive", and are not acting as if they are leading the Generic Ballot right now. Yet there are still people who insist that Democrats are winning and that they are poised to sweep the elections in a few weeks.

Quite frankly, even if the Democrats were leading on the GCB right now, they would never be "acting" like it in public, especially after so many polling errors in the past. Even if the Dems were up by 10, there would still be an entire aura of "is it even real?"

Plainly, these days, because people are so burned by polls, only a Republican lead among polls is to be trusted. Even a Dem is leading, there is still whispers of, "but are they really?"

The Democratic campaigns are probably seeing concerning numbers in their own internals, and are acting accordingly. I would expect for there to be a much more aggressive investment of Democratic time, money, and resources into Republican-leaning districts and states if they truly felt that they held a dominating lead in the Generic Ballot. Instead - aside from the Hofmeister-Stitt rate in Oklahoma and the Oz-Fetterman race in Pennsylvania - they are clearly on the defensive at this point, and are calling in national support for their candidates in states such as Oregon, New Mexico, and now, New York, which should not be in danger for them. I don't think we would be seeing Biden and Obama going to these states if they weren't concerned about those races.

Well there was also 2020, where Democrats were kind of fooled into thinking they should go for other GOP districts than they shouldn't have, so whether or not Dems have a lead, I think it's smart just to go for the ones that you absolutely need first and foremost. Even if you have a lead or not.

Oregon is a more specific case with the GOV race, they needed to nationalize it a bit to sink Johnson and scare Dem voters back into Kotek's column. Grisham may be in a bit of trouble, but most of the polls (sans Trafalgar) and the EV don't really indicate that, and Biden may still be relatively popular in New Mexico, so may not be a huge surprise he's going.

Is Biden planning on doing a rally in New York or something? I didn't see that. I saw he did an event with Hochul/Schumer yesterday, but that looked like more of the usual small-time stuff.

https://twitter.com/redistrict/status/1586085207827890177?s=46&t=IQbLk_K4EEYQSm0QtNQP9A

I would like another round of polls. But is NV-1 just another Vegas polling problem? That might be ground zero for low response/transient population.

For NJ-7 I would like some proof, Kean has a lot of Christie’s political hacks around him with plenty of ties to national media for years.

Yeah, NV-01 is a good question. Siena undercounted Dems considerably in their 2018 NV poll, but it's possible that was an anomaly.

I'm unsure about NJ-07 too. Malinowski actually seems to be putting up a good fight. I feel like prior to the last few months, people assumed he was all but dead. He's raised way more than Kean, and the district is pretty educated. I'm not sure where the tangible signs are that he's struggling a lot.

It’s also the VA-2, PA-7, IA-3 polls that suggest maybe this thing isn’t quite over. After all this polarization it’s hard to buy this bifurcated NY OR RI being a wave but Dems holding on in swingier territory. We had that theory with the Molinaro +8 poll in NY-19 and the results were not exactly in line with it.

[Devils30]

https://twitter.com/PollProjectUSA/status/1586716493177200641?s=20&t=RSXLK8_...

Pretty much the same thing they've had the last 3 months. It will be interesting if the Dems can actually keep it to a 13-16% GOP margin with whites. A lot of these recent polls have Dems getting only 77% with blacks but plenty of reason to be skeptical. You still see solid Dem numbers with moderates.

Also only 27% are age 45 and below, seems very very low.

[Devils30]

https://twitter.com/MacFarlaneNews/status/1586720670901223424

If there were actually a 218-217 result (either way), how long do you think it would take for that to be called, given slow counting in CA, NY, AK, possibly others?

Like 7.5 months!

[Devils30]

https://twitter.com/PpollingNumbers/status/1586789028501901316

LOL RCP is a joke

This is all a conservative journalist project, not anything serious.

[Devils30]

https://twitter.com/PpollingNumbers/status/1586789028501901316
LOL RCP is a joke

This is all a conservative journalist project, not anything serious.

Given they have Utah as lean R as well, how is it a conservative journalist project.

I mean having WA as toss up is pretty clowny. While I think Lean R is also a bit silly for UT there’s reason to think that one is at least more variable than one might expect, while WA there is little reason to think Smiley can actually win.

I do think WA will have a Lean D final margin of like 6-8 now, down from the ~10 I thought it would be last week. But I’d still be beyond shocked if Smiley actually pulled it off.

We had a vote of 2 million in August and Dems had like 57%. Not sure what has happened since to justify these polls.

[Devils30]

GCB polling:

Morning Consult midterm tracker - tied - 46/46
https://morningconsult.com/2022-midterm-elections-tracker/

Cygnal (R) - R+2 - 49/47
https://www.cygn.al/october-national-voter-trends-panel/

Fabrizio(R)/Impact (D) - R+2 - 46/44
https://www.wsj.com/articles/gop-prospects-rise-amid-economic-pessimism-wsj-poll-finds-11667295002?st=vg18ueadts8mbog&reflink=article_copyURL_share

Dems need this to be like 2000 and 2012 where the state polls are accurate while the national polls are way off. 2016 was the exact opposite with national polls being solid but missing the GOP electoral college edge.

[Devils30]

A 15-18 seat GOP gain with NY seats, CT-5, RI-2, NJ-7 would hardly be an awful scenario for the country. These Rs are pretty unlikely to cause the same problems as MAGA world.

This would also make a 2024 house flip easier with Trump on ticket.

[Devils30]

https://twitter.com/pollsterguy/status/1587403364077273089
Enough said! Bill is right. Democrats not releasing their own Data because things are looking increasingly grim.

Center for Data Progress (an explicitly Dem-tied pollster), whose last polls are R+4 GCV, Masters-Kelly tie, Johnson +5, and Laxalt +1

From the pollster that had a ~6% pro-dem miss across the board in 2020

They've had a GOP lean this year though and missed by 11% in NY-19.

[Devils30]

How fun would it be if Marquette threw in a Barnes +2 poll tomorrow to further mess with our heads.

[Devils30]

There is still weird Democratic strength with moderates and independents in the AZ, WI FOX polls and even the PA one.

[Devils30]

Everyone is herding at R +2-4. It may very well be right but it’s not methodically sound.

I’m not sure Dem turnout will bd as anemic as some expect (see the specials and KS referendum) but we need a 4 point miss for Ds to keep both houses.

[Devils30]

The only way Ds defy history is if these models with much greater GOP enthusiasm are off and in fact younger Dems show up. The KS referendum offers some optimism in this respect and a lot of white college voters are high propensity.

Still, outside of abortion people are just not on the Dems side with the most salient issues. The Ds have gone way too far to the left on energy and crime to appease their progressive base in Cali and NYC.

Still, the R+3 everyone has this morning reeks of herding. You would expect more tied and some R+6 instead of R+2-4 everywhere.

[Devils30]

Rasmussen drops their final(?) GCB poll - R+5

https://twitter.com/Politics_Polls/status/1588552860362747907

They had R+1 in 2018 as their final poll.

[Devils30]

ABC/Washington Post GCB Poll

Likely Voters
Republicans 50%, Democrats 48%

Registered Voters
Republicans 49%, Democrats 48%

This is hardly a red wave if realized, Rs probably are capped around +15 House seats under this.

[Devils30]

Ds can keep the house with a 1% PV win. Remember winning Peltola, Kaptur, Golden, Cartwright reduces their need to win every Biden +2 seat.

Rs will also get a huge PV margin out of Florida that will be 20-8 whether it's a 3% win or a 9% win.

[Devils30]

Are Dems getting an Obama bump? A Paul Pelosi bump? It does seem like GOP momentum is blunted right now.

It is a weird day, like Ds if they actually win by 1% are not far off from a House stunner.

[Devils30]

Ds can keep the house with a 1% PV win. Remember winning Peltola, Kaptur, Golden, Cartwright reduces their need to win every Biden +2 seat.

Rs will also get a huge PV margin out of Florida that will be 20-8 whether it's a 3% win or a 9% win.

That point about the DeSantification of Florida skewing the national House popular vote is a pretty good one that I never thought about before.

Yep, the Dems decided they didn't give one f*** about Florida this year.