Some “Hidden Figures” Heading Into November

21 days to go. Back when you were a kid, this was about the time you started your mental countdown clock until Christmas, or summer break. More than a week, but less than a month, easy to keep track of. And that’s where we are today to the midterms.

The polls all show that anybody who tells you that they know how this is going to come out has their head up their ass. There are too many races within the margin of error to relate here without taking all night, and nobody really trusts the polls anymore anyway. Fortunately, there are several other diagnostic tools available other than polls to give a window into how things are going.

An independent pollster and poli-sci analyst went over some of them today on MSNBC. And while they are by no means dispositive, the trends he points to are interesting. For instance, the media is fond of sounding the alarm because piss poor GOP candidates, mostly in the Senate races are closing the gap with their Democratic opponents, when it shouldn’t even be a horse race. They cite races like Oz in PA, Johnson in WI, and Walker in GA.

All true, but let’s look a little closer. Oz in PA and Walker in GA have never held the lead, and are the far edge of the margin of error. Johnson in WI is an incumbent, if he can’t close in the last month, he has no business running. But at the same time, Abrams in GA has closed the gap against incumbent Brian Kemp from 6.5 to 3.5. Katie Hobbs in AZ has come back from almost 5 points down to -1.5%. And Democrat Val Demmings in FL has scooted up from -6.5 to a margin of error 3.5%. The GOP aren’t the only ones who can close a gap, even in enemy strongholds.

Here’s another indicator that has nothing to do with polling, Voter Intensity. The 2018 midterms set a record for voter turnout, and the Democrats flipped 40 seats. The presidential election of 2020 brought another record turnout, and Biden spanked Traitor Tot by 7 million votes, and duplicated Trump’s winning electoral college totals from 2016. And now, most analysts predict that the 2022 midterms may well be another record turnout.

In both 2018 as well as 2020, one of the bell weather states for predicting voter turnout and intensity, especially African American intensity and turn out was the state of Georgia. In 2018 Georgia voters set a record for first day early voting turnout with some 70,000 voters queueing up to cast ballots. In the presidential year of 2020, Georgia turned out some 140,000 first day early voters. Yesterday was the first day of early in person voting in Georgia, and they turned out 134,000 voters, almost doubling the 2017 midterm record, and only about 6,000 shy of the presidential year 1st day turnout. Rest easy, African American voter enthusiasm is high, at least in Georgia, good news for Warnock and abrams.

The 3rd leading indicator is a polling nightmare, simply because they’re rarely polled, and almost never polled for voter enthusiasm. And that group is of course the 18-24 year old segment. With good reason. The 18-24 group are the lowest turnout bloc, especially in midterm elections. They seldom have landline contacts, and frequently don’t respond to poll calls.

But even with that group, there is recent historical precedent. In 2018, fueled by the Parkland high school shooting in Florida, and fueled by social media, the 18-24 voters showed up in record numbers, and in the ensuing 40 seat rollover in the House, they turfed out an amazing 31 GOP incumbents with A or A+ NRA ratings, leading to the first gun control legislation in Florida since Christ was a carpenter.

Fueled with that success, and more social issues to fight for, the 18-24 bloc showed up at a record 50% in 2020. Of course, with a turnout like that they rightfully expect a little something called results. And Biden has worked hard to court them. He passed the first comprehensive gun control legislation in 30 years. He passed the largest US government investment in climate change in history. He made the largely ceremonial move of pardoning low level federal convicts for pot possession. And he has leaned heavily on the 18-24 group with concern over the rolling back of abortion rights, possibly forcing them into unwanted parenthood.

But while the pollsters may have sold the 18-24 voting bloc short, activists and the DNC ure as shit haven’t. And activist and DNC contacts with this group and their organizers show that the 18-24 group is incredibly motivated. They want LGBTQ protections, abortion rights, more gun control and more climate change progress. And if the general feeling is that this may be another record setting turnout year, there’s no reason to believe that the 18-35 voting bloc is going to be any less enthused. And nobody is counting or taking them into consideration!

One more wildcard to consider. As I have written repeatedly, the Democrats, both the DNC as well as the Democratic candidates have a sizeable lead over the GOP in cash on hand. The GOP is trying to offset this by pumping in huge amounts of dark money for negative Super PAC ads. This is critical for two reasons. First, the aqctual campaigns get special discount rates on television and radio advertising, meaning they get more bang for the buck, and they get to control the content of the ads, critical in the last weeks.

But here’s the thing. Midterm elections are always base turnout elections. With low dollar donations, the DNC, DCCC, and DSCC can contribute directly to the campaigns. This means that the campaigns can afford to get door knockers, canvassers, and phone bank people a couple of pizzas and some gas money. The GOP’s Super PAC money can only go to negative advertising, and the RNC has no chas to help these candidates any money for their ground games. And in politics, in the last weeks of the campaign, the personal touch is critical.

There you have it. This election is way too close to call, but don’t get fooled into thinking that the polls are the be-all-and-end-all of predicting the outcome. And the underlying information is painting a slightly different prospect. Motivate, mobilize, donate, and GOTV.