A week can make a load of difference but at this point I am most confident with this current margin in the swing states:
In order from best to worst for Harris
Michigan +2 Harris
Pennsylvania +1.5 Harris
Wisconsin .5% Harris (Wisconsin will be the closest state)
Georgia +1 Trump
North Carolina +2 Trump
Nevada +2 Trump
Arizona +2 Trump
Harris will of course win NE-2 and win the Presidency with 270 flat. I think AZ and Nevada we will know on election night and not be that close. We will also know PA and MI.
The hot topic right now is Nevada. There has not been a single analyst I've read that says anything but Democrats at this point COULD win in a nail biter. Not exactly fantastic news.
Republicans have shown no signs of losing momentum. Their vote share just keeps coming. The argument is cannibalization and that's the only saving grace for Dems right now.
Mainly I'm looking at gender gaps too. Early vote gender gaps in other swings is larger than NV. Right now the gap is only 2 points.
Some may say that this means that there is a signal of some massive lumbering Democratic-friendly vote somewhere on the horizon and/or on election day involving some combination of Others.
However I completely agree with the point Mark made above- Nevada is not like other swing states. Early vote is literally the backbone of the Machine. It is indisputable that there is no sign the Machine is even turned on right now. The Democratic vote has literally not shown up. This tells me there is little evidence that some massive shift will happen between now and election day or thar in the next few days some hoard of Democratic mail will suddenly thunder down on the USPS after more than a week of early voting.
Harris can and likely will win without Nevada. But as a girl mainly concerned with legislative races and longterm trends, this does -not- look good for the party in the near term.
The same members here attacking some of us for just stating the Nevada reality as it stands today are the same ones who said recently that 'party registration is indicative of nothing anymore.' Well OK. But look how that's helped us now.
This commentary is specific to Nevada. Let me be clear. When talking about early vote Nevada is in a different league and has been for decades.
I am wringing my hands about this state because as house and senate races are concerned, we have little room for regression on our side. We get two senators and three house members from this state.
These are warning signs that frankly have been flashing since Reid died. Who is running the Machine now? A coalition of grassroots and union leadership? Does anyone even know? A shame.
Nevada has always been a big question mark for me. A lot does depend on the idea of any tradition of machine voters (Reid Machine or otherwise) sticking to election day voting. Why do that when voting earlier is an option that's available? (I'm not in Nevada; our state has early voting beginning today ).
Because for many people regarding of affiliation or ideology, voting on "the day" is sacred and special. No other feeling like it. For them voting on another day is like celebrating Christmas not on 25 December or Independence Day not on 4 July.
I think this is true, but up to a point: I don't think it can't fully explain the current NV deficit we're seeing. We know that Nevada is a state where this tradition is less salient -- from shares of early voting not only in 2020 and 2022, but also elections before that. There isn't, to me, a ready explanation for why the NV electorate's views on voting day of vs. early would have shifted significantly since 2016 (or earlier), so presumably there's something else going on under hood that's driving the R+5-6 deficit we're seeing. That could very well be automatic registration/automatic mail ballots, but hard to say.
except polls out today have KH leading in AZ and tied in NC (a gain of 6 pts from CNN previous poll in AZ)...polls from a week or 3 ago don't really matter...and the polls, if you believe them, that will be out this week will be the only polls that are even relevant...and, way too much emphasis is being put on NV...most likely this election will be decided in the hours before we have any concrete idea as to how NV is voting. And there is this little tidbit re' AZ... https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2024/10/29/2280661/-CNN-Harris-leads-53-44-among-Arizonans-who-have-already-voted?utm_campaign=recent.... with more repubs having voted early than Dems and KH still with 9 pt lead
This is why I think looking at party ID on the early vote is not very instructive. We do not know how well Harris' pitch to GOP-leaning women is going to play out. We also know that there was little ground game in 2020 when Biden won. We know that Harris' ground game is perhaps the most comprehensive in history and at least as good as Obama '08 which should push our ED margins up from 2020.
Now, is it possible there is a red wave coming from low propensity whites, a realignment from Latinos (not likely after yesterday), or that the Musk/Kirk turnout operation is better than we think? Of course...but this panicking over each Ralston tweet and the PA firewall (which looks like it will be met soon) is getting tired.
I don't know much about the Colombian-American community, but the others are historically red to begin with.
The other thing about the Puerto Rico slam is that they are US citizens and their population is part of our military and has been for more than a century. This wasn't the typical immigrant bashing.
The Puerto Rico joke got the most traction, but he also made another offensive joke about how Latinos love "coming" here and making babies. Don't think it'll be as damaging, but it doesn't help with non-Puerto Rican Latinos either.
I hear you but relying on Republicans to push us over the top may work in this specific election but is not a viable strategy going forward. The Machine issues need to be addressed immediately.
Dropping back in after a long time, because Nevada's been weighing on my mind. In the interest of taking the good with the bad, the same poll supports at least some cause for concern in Nevada -- T+6 with the EV reg split is R+5 to R+6 implies that indies are breaking just about even (assuming equivalent crossover voting), whatever advantage from Harris gets from indies is being cancelled out by crossovers working _against_ her, or somewhere in between those two.
OTOH, the Arizona number with the current EV reg split of 35 D/42 R suggests some massive amount of crossover voting favoring Harris or a massive advantage among indies, since Harris is almost at D + indie share of current EVs combined. It's certainly plausible that AZ would have more Rs crossing over for Harris than NV, but I'd be surprised if the difference is of that significant a magnitude. Hard to say for sure, and my intuition says that, in terms of crossover voting and/or indie advantage, the truth is probably somewhere in between the levels that this poll implies for the two states.
You make a lot of good points. I disagree with this minor one though: "I think AZ and Nevada we will know on election night and not be that close. We will also know PA and MI." PA early votes will be slow counted as they were in 2020. It will take days unless it is not close. And AZ? It took days last time and to me, it looks real close again. Why do you not think it will be close and who do you think will win it?
Pennsylvania counts faster now. Don't forget that PA-Sen 2022 was called for Fetterman around 12 or 1 AM. I suspect that by the time most people get up Wednesday morning, it will be clear that Harris has won Pennsylvania.
Thanks--good reminder. I recall that the state senate refused to allow counties to process ballots before election day. To me, that's crazy. You do not know how someone voted but you verify that the ballot is proper and should be counted. No reason to hold that up.
The Republican reason for refusing to allow that is simple: They wanted to increase the chances of a Red Mirage, giving greater credence to TrumpтАЩs claims of "stolen election" as the result turned Blue later in the night.
But that was because Fetterman was already up when the E-Day votes were counted, and most of the mail votes were Democratic. If it's close, PA could take a while.
I have to pinch my arm when I start becoming nostalgic about Milhous. Who ever thought America would elect a president that would make George W Bush look like a brilliant intellectual and make Nixon seem like a paragon of integrity?
PA was slow counted, but it was evident pretty early on which way the wind was blowing. It was just not evident enough that reputable news orgs felt confident calling it.
I suspect that the election result like everything except 2000, will be known by the time you wake up on Nov 6. It might not be formally called, but the writing will be on the wall one way or another.
With PA, what's going to happen is that Allegheny County (Pittsburgh & suburbs) will announce the tally of their mail-in ballots (currently 180k but could be 250k+) around 8:01pm, giving Harris & most (if not all) statewide Dems a 110k-ish lead before the rural counties start reporting. The lead will slowly be chipped away until all the rural counties come in, giving the GOP a small lead that will disappear once Philly & its suburbs finish their count.
If I remember correctly, Josh Shapiro was declared the winner at 10:15ish in the Governor's race blowout with 56% in. That will be the absolute earliest anything statewide will be called. Fetterman was declared the winner in the US Senate race around 12:45am Election Night with 89% reporting after never trailing due to the big lead Allegheny County mail gave him at 8pm poll close. The count should go quicker but it could be a late night in PA.
Are those analysts you're referring to aware about Clark County turnout? It's notorious for coming in later and more so on election day. Seems to be premature assessments to argue Democrats can't win in a nail biter when election day hasn't even happened yet.
Also, Senator Catherine Cortez-Masto did in fact win re-election in a nail biter in the Senate race back in 2022. Governor Steve Sisolak was also not popular heading to the midterms. Cortez-Masto's leverage in the race came much later as it took forever to count the Clark County votes.
Now many people have moved on from the pandemic since 2022.
I think the constant freakout over the EV in Nevada is silly we don't know how this year will shake out in terms of how people vote compared to other years and as always the best answer to this anxiety is to do something if you can rather than panic. That said HMP can leave Nevada's house districts because they are all 4-6 points to the left of the state this point was made and ignored a lot in 2022 when people were certain that the red wave would hit the house seats as well. I never understood why the Rs didn't fund the senate race other than lack of resources but the Rs seem to have made a last-minute push there which makes sense. Anything from +2 Trump to +2 Harris seems reasonable to me. We will know more after the election if the EV a week out was determinative and informative on the final outcome.
One week to election day!
A week can make a load of difference but at this point I am most confident with this current margin in the swing states:
In order from best to worst for Harris
Michigan +2 Harris
Pennsylvania +1.5 Harris
Wisconsin .5% Harris (Wisconsin will be the closest state)
Georgia +1 Trump
North Carolina +2 Trump
Nevada +2 Trump
Arizona +2 Trump
Harris will of course win NE-2 and win the Presidency with 270 flat. I think AZ and Nevada we will know on election night and not be that close. We will also know PA and MI.
The hot topic right now is Nevada. There has not been a single analyst I've read that says anything but Democrats at this point COULD win in a nail biter. Not exactly fantastic news.
Republicans have shown no signs of losing momentum. Their vote share just keeps coming. The argument is cannibalization and that's the only saving grace for Dems right now.
Mainly I'm looking at gender gaps too. Early vote gender gaps in other swings is larger than NV. Right now the gap is only 2 points.
Some may say that this means that there is a signal of some massive lumbering Democratic-friendly vote somewhere on the horizon and/or on election day involving some combination of Others.
However I completely agree with the point Mark made above- Nevada is not like other swing states. Early vote is literally the backbone of the Machine. It is indisputable that there is no sign the Machine is even turned on right now. The Democratic vote has literally not shown up. This tells me there is little evidence that some massive shift will happen between now and election day or thar in the next few days some hoard of Democratic mail will suddenly thunder down on the USPS after more than a week of early voting.
Harris can and likely will win without Nevada. But as a girl mainly concerned with legislative races and longterm trends, this does -not- look good for the party in the near term.
The same members here attacking some of us for just stating the Nevada reality as it stands today are the same ones who said recently that 'party registration is indicative of nothing anymore.' Well OK. But look how that's helped us now.
This commentary is specific to Nevada. Let me be clear. When talking about early vote Nevada is in a different league and has been for decades.
I am wringing my hands about this state because as house and senate races are concerned, we have little room for regression on our side. We get two senators and three house members from this state.
These are warning signs that frankly have been flashing since Reid died. Who is running the Machine now? A coalition of grassroots and union leadership? Does anyone even know? A shame.
Nevada has always been a big question mark for me. A lot does depend on the idea of any tradition of machine voters (Reid Machine or otherwise) sticking to election day voting. Why do that when voting earlier is an option that's available? (I'm not in Nevada; our state has early voting beginning today ).
Because for many people regarding of affiliation or ideology, voting on "the day" is sacred and special. No other feeling like it. For them voting on another day is like celebrating Christmas not on 25 December or Independence Day not on 4 July.
I think this is true, but up to a point: I don't think it can't fully explain the current NV deficit we're seeing. We know that Nevada is a state where this tradition is less salient -- from shares of early voting not only in 2020 and 2022, but also elections before that. There isn't, to me, a ready explanation for why the NV electorate's views on voting day of vs. early would have shifted significantly since 2016 (or earlier), so presumably there's something else going on under hood that's driving the R+5-6 deficit we're seeing. That could very well be automatic registration/automatic mail ballots, but hard to say.
But it seems that the NV House seats are pretty safe, judging by the outside group spending decisions. And the polling looks strong for Rosen as well.
Sorry, this was supposed to be a response to Gina Mann.
except polls out today have KH leading in AZ and tied in NC (a gain of 6 pts from CNN previous poll in AZ)...polls from a week or 3 ago don't really matter...and the polls, if you believe them, that will be out this week will be the only polls that are even relevant...and, way too much emphasis is being put on NV...most likely this election will be decided in the hours before we have any concrete idea as to how NV is voting. And there is this little tidbit re' AZ... https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2024/10/29/2280661/-CNN-Harris-leads-53-44-among-Arizonans-who-have-already-voted?utm_campaign=recent.... with more repubs having voted early than Dems and KH still with 9 pt lead
This is why I think looking at party ID on the early vote is not very instructive. We do not know how well Harris' pitch to GOP-leaning women is going to play out. We also know that there was little ground game in 2020 when Biden won. We know that Harris' ground game is perhaps the most comprehensive in history and at least as good as Obama '08 which should push our ED margins up from 2020.
Now, is it possible there is a red wave coming from low propensity whites, a realignment from Latinos (not likely after yesterday), or that the Musk/Kirk turnout operation is better than we think? Of course...but this panicking over each Ralston tweet and the PA firewall (which looks like it will be met soon) is getting tired.
I don't know how much Cubans, Venezuelans or Colombians will be angry about slams of Puerto Rico.
I don't know much about the Colombian-American community, but the others are historically red to begin with.
The other thing about the Puerto Rico slam is that they are US citizens and their population is part of our military and has been for more than a century. This wasn't the typical immigrant bashing.
I'm quite aware of that and pointed it out yesterday.
The Puerto Rico joke got the most traction, but he also made another offensive joke about how Latinos love "coming" here and making babies. Don't think it'll be as damaging, but it doesn't help with non-Puerto Rican Latinos either.
True.
I hear you but relying on Republicans to push us over the top may work in this specific election but is not a viable strategy going forward. The Machine issues need to be addressed immediately.
There are no machine issues, except for inside your mind
Dropping back in after a long time, because Nevada's been weighing on my mind. In the interest of taking the good with the bad, the same poll supports at least some cause for concern in Nevada -- T+6 with the EV reg split is R+5 to R+6 implies that indies are breaking just about even (assuming equivalent crossover voting), whatever advantage from Harris gets from indies is being cancelled out by crossovers working _against_ her, or somewhere in between those two.
OTOH, the Arizona number with the current EV reg split of 35 D/42 R suggests some massive amount of crossover voting favoring Harris or a massive advantage among indies, since Harris is almost at D + indie share of current EVs combined. It's certainly plausible that AZ would have more Rs crossing over for Harris than NV, but I'd be surprised if the difference is of that significant a magnitude. Hard to say for sure, and my intuition says that, in terms of crossover voting and/or indie advantage, the truth is probably somewhere in between the levels that this poll implies for the two states.
You make a lot of good points. I disagree with this minor one though: "I think AZ and Nevada we will know on election night and not be that close. We will also know PA and MI." PA early votes will be slow counted as they were in 2020. It will take days unless it is not close. And AZ? It took days last time and to me, it looks real close again. Why do you not think it will be close and who do you think will win it?
Pennsylvania counts faster now. Don't forget that PA-Sen 2022 was called for Fetterman around 12 or 1 AM. I suspect that by the time most people get up Wednesday morning, it will be clear that Harris has won Pennsylvania.
Thanks--good reminder. I recall that the state senate refused to allow counties to process ballots before election day. To me, that's crazy. You do not know how someone voted but you verify that the ballot is proper and should be counted. No reason to hold that up.
The PA Senate is Republican and they love chaos.
The Republican reason for refusing to allow that is simple: They wanted to increase the chances of a Red Mirage, giving greater credence to TrumpтАЩs claims of "stolen election" as the result turned Blue later in the night.
But that was because Fetterman was already up when the E-Day votes were counted, and most of the mail votes were Democratic. If it's close, PA could take a while.
how about before they go to bed Tuesday night? :-)
It may well be called before you intrepid, insomniac election watchers go to bed at 7am. /s
My curfew is 2 am pst...which I started in 1960...JFK v. RMN
I have to pinch my arm when I start becoming nostalgic about Milhous. Who ever thought America would elect a president that would make George W Bush look like a brilliant intellectual and make Nixon seem like a paragon of integrity?
PA was slow counted, but it was evident pretty early on which way the wind was blowing. It was just not evident enough that reputable news orgs felt confident calling it.
I suspect that the election result like everything except 2000, will be known by the time you wake up on Nov 6. It might not be formally called, but the writing will be on the wall one way or another.
Written in ketchup on the wall in Mar-a-Lago.
With PA, what's going to happen is that Allegheny County (Pittsburgh & suburbs) will announce the tally of their mail-in ballots (currently 180k but could be 250k+) around 8:01pm, giving Harris & most (if not all) statewide Dems a 110k-ish lead before the rural counties start reporting. The lead will slowly be chipped away until all the rural counties come in, giving the GOP a small lead that will disappear once Philly & its suburbs finish their count.
If I remember correctly, Josh Shapiro was declared the winner at 10:15ish in the Governor's race blowout with 56% in. That will be the absolute earliest anything statewide will be called. Fetterman was declared the winner in the US Senate race around 12:45am Election Night with 89% reporting after never trailing due to the big lead Allegheny County mail gave him at 8pm poll close. The count should go quicker but it could be a late night in PA.
Are those analysts you're referring to aware about Clark County turnout? It's notorious for coming in later and more so on election day. Seems to be premature assessments to argue Democrats can't win in a nail biter when election day hasn't even happened yet.
Also, Senator Catherine Cortez-Masto did in fact win re-election in a nail biter in the Senate race back in 2022. Governor Steve Sisolak was also not popular heading to the midterms. Cortez-Masto's leverage in the race came much later as it took forever to count the Clark County votes.
Now many people have moved on from the pandemic since 2022.
I think the constant freakout over the EV in Nevada is silly we don't know how this year will shake out in terms of how people vote compared to other years and as always the best answer to this anxiety is to do something if you can rather than panic. That said HMP can leave Nevada's house districts because they are all 4-6 points to the left of the state this point was made and ignored a lot in 2022 when people were certain that the red wave would hit the house seats as well. I never understood why the Rs didn't fund the senate race other than lack of resources but the Rs seem to have made a last-minute push there which makes sense. Anything from +2 Trump to +2 Harris seems reasonable to me. We will know more after the election if the EV a week out was determinative and informative on the final outcome.