2017 Special Election Thread: CT House 68

[The Other Castro]

Turnout is reportedly light, as expected, in the 2 Senate districts with special elections today.

In Senate District 32 (the Republican seat), Watertown is one of the largest towns and has 15,523 registered voters, but had only 1,453 people vote by noon.

Polls close at 8PM Eastern.

Extrapolating 12% turnout from 10.5% turnout at midday seems misguided. Don't most people with jobs vote after work?

The 12% number from before is just what the area usually gets, though I expect it may be a bit higher than usual.

Also, some early turnout reports from SD 32 show some possibly positive signs for the Democratic candidate. Turnout is lower in the Republican's hometown.

[heatcharger]

So... anyone have a results page? I've found nothing.

[The Other Castro]

So... anyone have a results page? I've found nothing.

There don't seem to be any yet.

[Holmes]

I found this on Twitter.

https://mobile.twitter.com/THEBehuniak/status/836745768769826816

Can't verify because the stupid CT SoS has no results page.

Same guy says it looks like Cava won't win though.

[Ronnie]

I found this on Twitter.

https://mobile.twitter.com/THEBehuniak/status/836745768769826816

Can't verify because the stupid CT SoS has no results page.

Same guy says it looks like Cava won't win though.

The guy says that Berthel wins by around 2,000 votes overall:
https://mobile.twitter.com/THEBehuniak/status/836753903144288256

[Holmes]

A Democratic win here would've been a big upset but these results are encouraging.

[The Other Castro]

Laraine Weschler‏ @RA_Laraine
Unofficial results: Berthel 9901 to Cava 8121. Still missing some ballots that need to be hand counted. #32senatect #Ctelection

[Ronnie]

Laraine Weschler‏ @RA_Laraine
Unofficial results: Berthel 9901 to Cava 8121. Still missing some ballots that need to be hand counted. #32senatect #Ctelection

How strong of a result would you say this is for the Democrat?

[The Other Castro]

Laraine Weschler‏ @RA_Laraine
Unofficial results: Berthel 9901 to Cava 8121. Still missing some ballots that need to be hand counted. #32senatect #Ctelection

How strong of a result would you say this is for the Democrat?

It's not bad at all. Trump won this district by 18, while Cava will end up losing by only 10 or so.

[Holmes]

I wouldn't really overinterpret the results of these special elections.

This is an elections website.

[The Other Castro]

Honestly I'm fairly pleased by these results. Democrats didn't really have a chance at SD 32, but they matched the best score on my predicted range of results.

[GlobeSoc]

The good thing about these specials is that it shows that the off-year electorate is slight-dem right now, which is good news.

[Virginiá]

I wouldn't really overinterpret the results of these special elections.

You mean these special elections, or all of them? You've been putting a decent amount of emphasis on MT-AL and GA-06 yourself.

[Heisenberg]

I wouldn't extrapolate too much from state legislative specials. Congressional specials, definitely, but not too much (see: NY-20, NY-23, PA-12 in 2009/10).

[Virginiá]

I wouldn't extrapolate too much from state legislative specials. Congressional specials, definitely, but not too much (see: NY-20, NY-23, PA-12 in 2009/10).

Why would there be a difference though? Legislative elections have been shown to be obscure and far enough down ballot where opinions of the incumbent White House party generally dominate voters' decisions.

Personally I think we'll need to wait until after this November's elections to make more solid predictions, but these special elections have been showing some signs.

[Hindsight was 2020]

I wouldn't extrapolate too much from state legislative specials. Congressional specials, definitely, but not too much (see: NY-20, NY-23, PA-12 in 2009/10).

Why would there be a difference though? Legislative elections have been shown to be obscure and far enough down ballot where opinions of the incumbent White House party generally dominate voters' decisions.

Personally I think we'll need to wait until after this November's elections to make more solid predictions, but these special elections have been showing some signs.

^ This^ it should concern RWers a bit that these elections involved a fired up dem turn out with a disinterested GOP turnout because that could be a likely scenario on November 2018

[MAINEiac4434]

Quote from another forum:

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I'm trying not to be over optimistic because Connecticut is still a (IRL) blue state but...this is good.

[Figueira]

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I'm trying not to be over optimistic because Connecticut is still a (IRL) blue state but...this is good.

Still a very Republican district though, and has a lot in common with some areas of New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, etc. Obama lost the district by a slightly wider margin than Cava in 2012.

[Terry the Fat Shark]

The official results will be out on Friday

[Heisenberg]

I wouldn't extrapolate too much from state legislative specials. Congressional specials, definitely, but not too much (see: NY-20, NY-23, PA-12 in 2009/10).

Why would there be a difference though? Legislative elections have been shown to be obscure and far enough down ballot where opinions of the incumbent White House party generally dominate voters' decisions.

Personally I think we'll need to wait until after this November's elections to make more solid predictions, but these special elections have been showing some signs.

As for why is there a difference? Congress is far more partisan, and for the state level, there can be state-level waves that are independent of the national wave (see Kansas 2014, where Brownback nearly lost for example). 

[windjammer]

Well, of course we shouldn't extrapolate these state legislative results with the federal elections, but it still means something: democratic turnout don't always go down during midterms/special elections.

[Attorney General, Senator-Elect, & Former PPT Dwarven Dragon]

For the upcoming PA 197 Election, residency issues have caused republican Lucinda Little to be the only candidate on the ballot, although there are various write-in candidates. If Little wins, she would be the district's 1st Republican Representative in 50 years.

https://www.google.com/amp/www.philly.com/philly/news/politics/state/PA-Supreme-Court-makes-it-official-GOP-all-alone-on-1197th-ballot.html%3Famphtml%3Dy

[Holmes]

So Little got 7.5% and write-ins got 92.5%. Need to wait to see which write-in won.

http://www.electionreturns.pa.gov/ENR_NEW

Turnout was horrible but that's understandable.

[Holmes]

Vazquez won the write-in campaign.

Emilio Vazquez (D) 1964
Cheri Honkala (G) 280

[heatcharger]

Special election happening tonight in Connecticut's 68th House District. Trump won the district by a lot, so it shouldn't be too interesting.