Georgia's Very Own Megathread!

[Adam Griffin]

Wouldn't the electorate be more like 32% black if Abrams is the nominee? It was 32% black in 2012, and I figure Abrams would do a decent job bringing up black turnout. Black people actually have pretty good midterm turnout in Georgia. I believe it was 30% black even in 2014.

It was 30% black in '08, '12 & '16; 28% in 2010 and 29% in 2014.

Until/unless proven otherwise, I remain highly skeptical that the presence of a black state-level candidate will dramatically increase black turnout or support. There have been a variety of black candidates for multiple statewide offices in GA in the recent past (including 2 Senate candidates) and none of them demonstrably increased turnout. Furthermore, there appears to be no evidence that any of these candidates exceeded the 90% threshold in terms of black support.

Obama did of course, but those were very different circumstances for a number of reasons. At best, I think any Abrams effort may modestly increase the black share of the electorate: let's not forget that almost all of the "low-hanging fruit" so to speak were activated/engaged in 2008 and 2012 (and those voters largely continued to participate in 2010 and 2014, at least proportionately speaking), and there will also likely be a surge of interest in voting among non-black Democrats, moderates and independents as well.

[Holy Unifying Centrist]

Cast my vote for Leader Abrams this morning.

For those tuned into the Republican side, who would you prefer to come out of these run-off matchups?

Cagle v. Kemp
Cagle v. Tippins
Cagle v. Hill

And which one do you think would be the most vulnerable against the Democratic nominee?

I'm not sure if my dad got my absentee ballot, but if he did, I'm voting for Clay Tippins in the primary, and would prefer him over all of the other Republicans.

Brian Kemp is the most vulnerable to the democratic nominee because he's an asshole. Casey Cagle is probably the best because Nathan Deal is very well regarded, and Cagle has many of his same connections.

As for the general, I will probably be voting Evans/Abrams, especially vs Hill & Kemp (if they somehow won). Vs Tippins, I am leaning towards Evans/Abrams but still open to voting him for now. I would like to see more infrastructure & education investment in Georgia so I'm pretty sure I'll mostly be voting democrat (also the religious liberty bill the GOP keeps bringing up is bad). Unsure about Medicaid expansion. Would like to see more people get health care, but it's expensive (for both Georgia & the rest of the USA taxpayers), and I would like to see more education investment especially first.

[Rookie Yinzer]

Really great piece on the Democratic primary. Talks about a lot of the nuances in the race like Evans gaining the support of most of the black legislators in the state, Abrams' electability in the face of being unmarried and childless, who's really the insurgent candidate in the race, etc.

http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2018/05/stacey-abrams-vs-stacey-evans-georgia-governors-race.html

[Rookie Yinzer]

New Evans ad attacking Abrams on the HOPE fiasco. Looks targeted at undecided black and young voters.

https://youtu.be/3Q_YFwVNqqQ

ETA: Doesn't mean much, especially since we have open primaries but here's some early voting data for week one:

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https://politics.myajc.com/news/state--regional-govt--politics/republican-voters-outnumber-democrats-far-georgia-early-voting/fjTUBXtwjtizKMONu49VjI/

[OneJ]

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Is turnout among the Dems good relative to the Republicans in Georgia from these obviously very early figures?

[Adam Griffin]

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Is turnout among the Dems good relative to the Republicans in Georgia from these obviously very early figures?

I tracked this information in 2014, but I can't find the information now. I thought I might have fed it into a Google Fusion Table and mapped it out, but that doesn't appear to be the case.

(However, if you'd like to see what percentage of each county's primary ballots were DEM/GOP in the past 2 midterms, click here)

GA's early vote tends to start out somewhat close to the final composition of votes, and becomes increasingly Democratic throughout each day of early voting, with Democrats pulling even or outright winning the early vote. I recall in the 2014 general, projections were suggesting (based on raw demographics alone) at the end of early voting that Carter and Nunn were likely winning those votes.

Anyway, here are some figures that might be helpful:

2018, Early Vote Primary Composition (as of 5/4): 52.4% GOP, 47.6% DEM
2016, Primary Composition: 65.1% GOP, 34.9% DEM
2016, Pres Primary Composition: 63% GOP, 37% DEM
2014, Primary Composition: 64.8% GOP, 35.2% DEM
2012, Primary Composition: 67.5% GOP, 32.5% DEM
2010, Primary Composition: 63.3% GOP, 36.7% DEM

If this holds (and assuming my memory isn't off), then there very well may be a huge shift in terms of the percentage of primary ballots pulled that are Democratic.

[Adam Griffin]

Update: as of today, 72,705 AIP/ABM ballots have been cast or requested (via mail) in Georgia. Of those ballots and outstanding requests, the composition is such:

Votes	%	Party
35895	49.37	Republican
34128	46.94	Democratic
2682	3.69	Non-Partisan

Of the 72,705, there are 19,289 outstanding ABM ballots yet to be returned. The outstanding ballot composition is:

Votes	%	Party
9531	49.41	Republican
9054	46.94	Democratic
704	3.65	Non-Partisan

Kind of amazing to see statistically no difference between ballots cast and mail ballots outstanding; the Democratic percentage is even identical down to the hundredth!

[Podgy the Bear]

The early vote trend to the Democrats is quite encouraging.  It's hard to reach a conclusion why this is so.  And we can't assume this has any bearing on the final outcome.   Nevertheless, there's reason to think there could be a race in November.

[Rookie Yinzer]

Evans’ latest attempts to wrangle up some black votes has been really cringe worthy (at least to me).



Then she had a press conference today with like a dozen black surrogates where they ragged on Abrams, with Vincent Fort being the loudest detractor. One of her surrogates (State Rep. Dar’shun Kendrick) was on social media saying Abrams had delusions of grandeur if she thought she was going to win with natural hair and being childless.  I wish Evans would have released some actually policy proposals leading up to this instead of waiting until the last two weeks to use black surrogates to assault Abrams’ character and splitting hairs about the HOPE Scholarship cuts that she praised when it happened.

I can only imagine what stunt she’ll pull at their last debate next Tuesday.

[KingSweden]

Attacking Abrams over “natural hair” is, uh...

[Blair]

This certainly seems to be becoming the most bitter primary on the Democratic side this cycle (ignoring  Lipinski v Newman)

[GeorgiaModerate]

The state is probing possible absentee ballot irregularities in Atlanta mayor runoff:

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[Young Conservative]

The state is probing possible absentee ballot irregularities in Atlanta mayor runoff:

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I think everyone knows Norwood lost because of a corrupt system- twice. I hope this shows tangible proof of that.

[Adam Griffin]

Update: as of Tuesday, 99,173 AIP/ABM ballots have been cast or requested (via mail) in Georgia:

Votes	%	Party
49633	50.05	Republican
46297	46.68	Democratic
3243	3.27	Non-Partisan

Of the 99,173, there are 20,531 outstanding ABM ballots yet to be returned. The outstanding ballot composition is:

Votes	%	Party
9754	47.51	Republican
9680	47.15	Democratic
1097	5.34	Non-Partisan

And comparisons to previous primary composition:

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[Rookie Yinzer]

Evans was a defense lawyer for Bank of America/Countrywide when they were accused of predatory lending practices:



https://www.theroot.com/when-white-politicians-profit-off-black-pain-and-then-g-1825823106

Interesting for someone who has been working overtime and telling mistruths to characterize herself as the real progressive and the better choice for the African-American community.

ETA: Another awful Kemp ad where he brags about having a truck big enough to round up "illegals".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Q1cfjh6VfE&feature=youtu.be

[Chancellor Tanterterg]

Evans was a defense lawyer for Bank of America/Countrywide when they were accused of predatory lending practices:



https://www.theroot.com/when-white-politicians-profit-off-black-pain-and-then-g-1825823106

Interesting for someone who has been working overtime and telling mistruths to characterize herself as the real progressive and the better choice for the African-American community.

ETA: Another awful Kemp ad where he brags about having a truck big enough to round up "illegals".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Q1cfjh6VfE&feature=youtu.be

Attacking lawyers for their clients’ crimes is really sketchy.

[Adam Griffin]

Update: as of Wednesday, 111,728 AIP/ABM ballots have been cast or requested (via mail) in Georgia:

Votes	%	Party
56284	50.37	Republican
51971	46.51	Democratic
3473	3.12	Non-Partisan

And comparisons to previous primary composition:

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[Adam Griffin]

Update: as of Thursday, 124,527 AIP/ABM ballots have been cast or requested (via mail) in Georgia:

Votes	%	Party
63075	50.65	Republican
57754	46.37	Democratic
3698	2.98	Non-Partisan

And comparisons to previous primary composition:

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[KingSweden]

A D swing of 13 matches what we’ve seen elsewhere...

Not that primary results are all that predictive

[Adam Griffin]

A D swing of 13 matches what we’ve seen elsewhere...

Not that primary results are all that predictive

For what it's worth, I'd be shocked if the final two-way tally including ED holds up anywhere near these figures (I could see 57/43 being realistic), but it's surprising me a bit how the numbers are getting more GOP-friendly with each day of early voting. That might reverse in the final week, but historically, the early vote tends to get more Democratic (at least based on demography; it's a stronger correlation in primaries than even party affiliation in GA) as the period progresses. Based on the simple D/R primary totals thus far, I'd actually bet on the ballots requested/cast thus far to be at least plurality-Democratic in terms of GE intent.

Then again, it may very well just be due to early voting becoming increasingly synonymous with voters of both parties and therefore becoming more proportional with each election...but if that is the case, then these numbers could be somewhat reflective of the final primary electorate. I also seem to remember the Ossoff ED/EV split being substantially larger than normal, so who knows.

[Holy Unifying Centrist]

My dad forgot to pick up a primary ballot for me and him, so that's 2 less GOP primary votes I guess. I was going to vote Clay Tippins and I assume he was going to vote Brian Kemp. I was also going to vote against my GOP congressman Drew Ferguson for a Republican challenger who supports DACA.

Hopefully Casey Cagle doesn't break 50% in the runoff...

[Rookie Yinzer]

You won’t be able to do in-person Early Voting?

[Politician]

Guess: Abrams beats Evans by ~5 points. Cagle does not clear the runoff and faces Kemp.

[GeorgiaModerate]

Guess: Abrams beats Evans by ~5 points. Cagle does not clear the runoff and faces Kemp.

I think these are pretty good guesses.

[Holy Unifying Centrist]

You won’t be able to do in-person Early Voting?

I am in New Jersey right now, so unfortunately no.


As for my primary predictions, right now I'm predicting:

- Democratic primary
Stacey Abrams 60%
Stacey Evans 40%

- Republican primary
Casey Cagle 52%
Brian Kemp 25%
Hunter Hill 11%
Others 12%


I might change my predictions before primary day, but that's what I'm going with right now.