Special Election megathread (6/11: OH-6, 6/25: CO-4)

[philly09]

The error in Jackson has been corrected.

Brad Finstad GOP   32,608   55.0%
Jeff Ettinger DEM   25,367   42.8

[OSR stands with Israel]

It's gonna be so funny if the GOP really does blow it this year.

It's starting to feel like a ballgame where the team with a 6 run lead is now only up 1 in the 8th inning.

So was Virginia the grand slam with the bases loaded and two outs

[ProgressiveModerate]

Hot take: With GOP's underperformance even compared to 2020 in suburbs, is NC a more likely Senate flip than WI?

Possibly. I think the thing that holds it back though is Budd seems to have a lot less potential dirt than Johnson, but then again, Johnson was able to greatly outperform expectations in 2016 winning a race that many saw as a default flip.

Another big difference too is that in WI, most of the rurals are light red whereas in NC, you have a lot of ruby red rural communities. If there's an increase in polarization or increased turnout in these rural communities, sorta like what we saw in VA-Gov 2021, it'd be very hard for Dems to overcome.

[Sestak]

So is there a decent chance of sub 5 point margin here?

[ProgressiveModerate]

All of Blue Earth primary vote is in, D 55 - R 45. 1,000 votes.

I'm certain there are more than 1000 votes to come out of Blue Earth

D net votes

Oh yeah that's pretty solid

[Devils30]

Hot take: With GOP's underperformance even compared to 2020 in suburbs, is NC a more likely Senate flip than WI?

Possibly. I think the thing that holds it back though is Budd seems to have a lot less potential dirt than Johnson, but then again, Johnson was able to greatly outperform expectations in 2016 winning a race that many saw as a default flip.

Another big difference too is that in WI, most of the rurals are light red whereas in NC, you have a lot of ruby red rural communities. If there's an increase in polarization or increased turnout in these rural communities, sorta like what we saw in VA-Gov 2021, it'd be very hard for Dems to overcome.

Beasley is a better candidate than Barnes though, Barnes could become the latest casualty of the Elizabeth Warren wing.

[Minnesota Mike]

So is there a decent chance of sub 5 point margin here?

Outside chance of an Ettinger win. More likely he falls a couple percent short. If the College students were back in Mankato and Winona he might have done it.

[It’s so Joever]

COME ON OLMSTED GET MOVING

[ProgressiveModerate]

Hot take: With GOP's underperformance even compared to 2020 in suburbs, is NC a more likely Senate flip than WI?

Possibly. I think the thing that holds it back though is Budd seems to have a lot less potential dirt than Johnson, but then again, Johnson was able to greatly outperform expectations in 2016 winning a race that many saw as a default flip.

Another big difference too is that in WI, most of the rurals are light red whereas in NC, you have a lot of ruby red rural communities. If there's an increase in polarization or increased turnout in these rural communities, sorta like what we saw in VA-Gov 2021, it'd be very hard for Dems to overcome.

Beasley is a better candidate than Barnes though, Barnes could become the latest casualty of the Elizabeth Warren wing.

To me they both seem pretty milk-toast though that just may be me.

[philly09]

Brad Finstad GOP   36,892   53.2%
Jeff Ettinger DEM   30,868   44.5

[ProgressiveModerate]

So is there a decent chance of sub 5 point margin here?

Outside chance of an Ettinger win. More likely he falls a couple percent short. If the College students were back in Mankato and Winona he might have done it.

I think it's very unlikely he'd be able to net 7k+ votes out of Olmsted.

[Sestak]

Blue Earth at 90% in, Ettinger +12. Was Feehan +10. Dem net 1200.

[philly09]

Brad Finstad GOP   38,663   53.6%
Jeff Ettinger DEM   31,863   44.2

[Lief 🗽]

It's going to be pretty close when you add the +5000 Dem margin from Olmstead. Unfortunately all the remaining counties are very red, so there's really nowhere else for Ettinger to make up ground.

[Minnesota Mike]

Ettinger out preformed the primary numbers in Blue Earth county by 2%, winning by 12%. Biden +4

[philly09]

Finstad underperforms Trump in Waseca. Ettinger improves on Biden's total.

[philly09]

Brad Finstad GOP   39,127   53.7%
Jeff Ettinger DEM   32,151   44.1

[philly09]

https://twitter.com/Redistrict/status/1557239062972583936

[Dr Oz Lost Party!]

It's interesting how mediocre the GOP's special election performances have been so far during the Biden era, especially when compared to how the Democrats did post-Trump inauguration leading up to the 2018 midterms. The KS-04 special in 2017 saw a 26 point shift leftward, SC-05 saw a 17 point shift, and PA-18, which voted for Trump by nearly 20 points, was an outright flip. We've seen nothing close to that so far from the Republicans and yet we're supposed to believe that they're going to have a 2010-style red wave election victory.

[MT Treasurer]

You know I'm just not going to argue with cons coping about how great this MN-01 result is for them anymore. All I'm gonna say is that I truly hope that the NRCC agrees with you that there are no warning signs here because if they do I'm going to have a very fun November.

No "con" is saying that this is a "great" result for Republicans, but there have been many contradictory signs this cycle. I’m still trying to make sense of it, but one suspicion which I’ve had for quite some time is that people are seriously underestimating how much the party coalitions are actually shifting and how reliable the GOP has become on high turnout (this is hard for many to accept because the media has been equating high turnout with Democratic strength for over two decades, including whenever the subject of "voter suppression" comes up). There are two consistent patterns here: (a) Democrats surpassing expectations in special election after special election; (b) Republicans winning the turnout race handily in virtually all swing state primaries (by margins which cannot be explained away by there being fewer competitive primaries on the R side or voters somehow being sufficiently tuned in to know which primary is "important" or which general election is "truly competitive").

The big problem with all the analyses which place great emphasis on special elections in general and the 2020-PRES -> 2021/2022-SE swing in particular is that they implicitly assume that the electorate that tends to turn out for these special elections actually reflects the November electorate. If that’s the case, then yes, November is going to be very disappointing for the GOP. If that’s not the case, however, I suspect we may be looking at yet another traditional indicator (ground game, fundraising, polling, etc.) which has been shattered in the Trump era.

[wesmoorenerd]

Hot take: With GOP's underperformance even compared to 2020 in suburbs, is NC a more likely Senate flip than WI?

Possibly. I think the thing that holds it back though is Budd seems to have a lot less potential dirt than Johnson, but then again, Johnson was able to greatly outperform expectations in 2016 winning a race that many saw as a default flip.

Another big difference too is that in WI, most of the rurals are light red whereas in NC, you have a lot of ruby red rural communities. If there's an increase in polarization or increased turnout in these rural communities, sorta like what we saw in VA-Gov 2021, it'd be very hard for Dems to overcome.

Beasley is a better candidate than Barnes though, Barnes could become the latest casualty of the Elizabeth Warren wing.

To me they both seem pretty milk-toast though that just may be me.

They're both B-tier candidates. Solid, if not generational talents.

[ProgressiveModerate]

Hot take: With GOP's underperformance even compared to 2020 in suburbs, is NC a more likely Senate flip than WI?

Possibly. I think the thing that holds it back though is Budd seems to have a lot less potential dirt than Johnson, but then again, Johnson was able to greatly outperform expectations in 2016 winning a race that many saw as a default flip.

Another big difference too is that in WI, most of the rurals are light red whereas in NC, you have a lot of ruby red rural communities. If there's an increase in polarization or increased turnout in these rural communities, sorta like what we saw in VA-Gov 2021, it'd be very hard for Dems to overcome.

Beasley is a better candidate than Barnes though, Barnes could become the latest casualty of the Elizabeth Warren wing.

To me they both seem pretty milk-toast though that just may be me.

They're both B-tier candidates. Solid, if not generational talents.

At least we don't have Cumming-ham. He was a disappointing recruit from the start and in hindsight it's too hard to say if he would've won or not without the Scandal. Yes, perhaps that attributed to some of his underperformance in urban/suburban areas but some of that was also downballot lag.

[It's not just that you are a crook senator]

Finstad
50.1%   
54,820
2,485 ahead
Ettinger
47.8%   
52,335

%95 of the votes are in

[Adam Griffin]

Yeah, this is looking like a 3-4 point race increasingly if the overperformance in Blue Earth can be expected in Olmsted. I've been projecting in the primary thread something like a 5-6 point win (based on Finstad holding Trump '20 figures in outstanding precincts), but seeing the consistent pattern...50.5-46.5 feels closer to home. Olmsted is likely at least 70% of what remains and if it goes for Ettinger by 10 points more than Biden, well...

[Gass3268]

https://twitter.com/BruneElections/status/1557244598396882944?s=20&t=yNFQAg5...