OH-12 Special Election: Balderson vs. O’Connor on August 7

[Co-Chair Bagel23]

Balderson is a strong candidate, he should be able to keep this one.

[Co-Chair Bagel23]

If Lamb could win PA-18, then O Connor can win OH-12.

Except Balderson is a solid quality candidate, Saccone sucked. Also, Lamb is a better candidate than O'Connor.

[Co-Chair Bagel23]

Danny O'Connor is trying to pull a Conor Lamb. Only problem, Balderson is no Saccone and O'Connor is no Conor.

[Co-Chair Bagel23]

Danny O'Connor is trying to pull a Conor Lamb. Only problem, Balderson is no Saccone and O'Connor is no Conor.

Have you seen Balderson's 'I'm with Trump anti immigration commercial'?

Balderson is no different than Saccone.

On policy maybe, but he is day and night on the trail, and that makes a big difference.

[Co-Chair Bagel23]

Melanie Leneghan, the Freedom Caucus candidate who lost to Balderson by 775 votes, is suing Secretary of State and Republican nominee for Lt. Governor, Jon Husted as well as the Muskingum and Franklin County Boards of Election, claiming that improper procedures were used in the recount process. She is seeking to have 16 precincts in Franklin and Muskingum Counties invalidated, which would give her a very narrow primary win.

Whether or not she wins, this is good news for O'Connor, who massively benefits from a divided GOP.

Also Troy Balderson is a much stronger candidate than her. This won't happened though.

[Co-Chair Bagel23]

O'Connor's blowing this.

He's not "blowing it", because he never really had a chance to win that race in the first place.

As I have said months ago, this district does involve a generic Republican (well, even a better version, because Balderson is well liked in the district) and the outgoing Republican was not involved in a sex scandal. Also, Kasich as Governor is popular in OH - so there is no mood for change. Democrats can be happy if the race end up R+8 or something.

While it's true O'Connor is hurt by the fact Tiberi didn't resign in scandal, you're reading the race/district all wrong. Statewide, Kasich is more popular with Democrats than Republicans, but this is still his old stomping grounds and the one Republican district the vestige of the Kasich Republican holds on -- sidling up to him makes sense. It doesn't really hurt O'Connor with anybody. Sidling up Trump, on the other hand, is downright stupid. This is the one Republican-held district that trended to Clinton. R+8 would be a piss poor showing in this environment. It's only a trend of D+3%.

But Troy Balderson is a Gold Tier candidate and O'Connor is like Gremlin with a smashed out window.

[Co-Chair Bagel23]

How will Delaware County vote?

Super heavily for Senator Balderson.

[Co-Chair Bagel23]

Ohio 12th turnout probably won't be ad high as Lamb's glorious victory, but I agree, while current trends look nice, they are a drop in the bucket of results. Granted, in a tight race, a drop can make THE difference.

[Co-Chair Bagel23]

O'Connor won't get 48% in Delaware County.

[Co-Chair Bagel23]

Realistically O'Connor prolly gets mid to high thirties in Muskawhatever county.

[Co-Chair Bagel23]

Realistically O'Connor prolly gets mid to high thirties in Muskawhatever county.

I don't know why you are pessimistic, Cordray and OConnor need each other. If OConnor wins, it wilk help Cordray and Dems can undo the unfair GOP gerrymandering

O'Connor won't win. If I am wrong I will be to busy celebrating to care I was wrong which I will freely admit.

[Co-Chair Bagel23]

Early votes still look good... hope it holds.

[Co-Chair Bagel23]

Today's update. Dems continue to fall modestly, but the difference today was that most of the decline went to a sharp uptick in "Other" voters, either those affiliated with a minor party or with none at all.

Yikes, I can see it dropping to 50 in about 4 days.

Possible but unlikely.

[Co-Chair Bagel23]

Latest poll is I'm right there, another five bucks from everyone who reads this will put us over the finish line at the last minute, let's do this.

[Co-Chair Bagel23]

Here is a potential theory why balderson isn't doing anything - he doesn't care whether he wins or loses. Whoever wins will be in congress for less then three months, at which point they go to a rematch in November. The district has a strong R PVI, and no ancestral Dem DNA, so he shouldn't lose with a regular electorate. A special electorate though right now favors the democrats by a large margin - so why bother contesting that? November should bring out more republicans, even if the environments still ends up favoring Dems.

Its a poor guess - O'Conner if he wins could end up gaining both notability and cash preventing a loss in November. But, its a theory.

If that's his strategy, it's an absolutely moronic one. It's going to be very hard to beat a Democratic incumbent in a climate like 2018.

O’Connor could definitely win this and then lose in November.

Lol that would be so funny.

[Co-Chair Bagel23]

Ed Gillebsy.

[Co-Chair Bagel23]

Looking into this, apparently Balderson's primary opponent, Melanie Leneghan, has filed suit alleging that the primary was rigged in favor of Balderson through fraud in Franklin and Muskingum Counties.

Here is the case on the Ohio Supreme Court docket: http://www.supremecourt.ohio.gov/Clerk/ecms/#/caseinfo/2018/0866

That’s exactly the kind of story Balderson needs heading into next week

Sweet jesus, thank you thank you thank you

twss

[Co-Chair Bagel23]

Trump has colluded with the enemy, but voting machines werent hacked. OH-12 is the perfect state to test if Dems are gonna expand that majority

We don't even have to win it to prove that we are viable as a team this november, we just need to keep it within 3 points to really prove it.

[Co-Chair Bagel23]

I'm growing increasingly confident in my Balderson 52-46 win. O'Connor's internals are showing him consistently 3-4 points down, so I make it a couple points more republican friendly for being a democratic internal poll and we get to a 6 point Balderson lead.

[Co-Chair Bagel23]

It's a tie ...

Standard Midterm LV model: 46-45 Balderson
Low Turnout LV model: 49-44 Balderson
Democratic “Surge” LV model: 46-45 O'Connor

https://www.monmouth.edu/polling-institute/reports/monmouthpoll_oh_080118

Son of Balder will win.

[Co-Chair Bagel23]

Guys, only 32% of their respondents were from Franklin county, look at the crosstabs.

[Co-Chair Bagel23]

Oh yeah, and screw the green party

[Co-Chair Bagel23]

Guys, only 32% of their respondents were from Franklin county, look at the crosstabs.

What should it be?

Among the early votes cast so far, 39% are from Franklin.

Not sure if this is relevant though, because it's just a small amount of early votes.

Tender is right on this one, and it was around 32% in the presidential election. Franklin will probably be higher than 32% this time around, but here is the article:

https://www.weeklystandard.com/david-byler/the-2018-election-heads-to-kasich-land

[Co-Chair Bagel23]

The one think that gives me hope is the independents. In their last poll for Young Lambchop, they only had 3-4 points undecided. In this poll for Balderson and O'Connor, the undecideds are from just below ten points to just over ten points, and they are breaking heavily for O'Connor. This is why Balderson only went up a couple points from the last poll while O'Connor galloped up basically double digits. If there are truly enough undecideds left and O'Connor can continue getting them at a great rate, we are in a good spot.

A lot of big ifs though.

[Co-Chair Bagel23]

Lean R.