States in Play

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Welcome back to Beyond the Polls.
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This week, I'm joined by Chasnny Coombe to talk about
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his new election website.
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State Navigate.
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Let's dive in, friends, I think it's time we have
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a cold, hard conversation, and that is going to be
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about where the midterm looks. This is early April, and
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there's certainly a number of months left to go, but
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for the first time, it's starting to look like twenty
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eighteen again.
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Why do I say that.
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Well, let's take a look at President Jump's overall job
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approval rating today. As I record this, it is forty
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one point one percent on the Real Clear Politics average. Now,
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of course you know that the real one is about
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half a point to a point higher once you take
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out the adults poll, but somewhere between forty one and
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forty two. Job approval rating on March thirty first, twenty eighteen,
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forty one point six right at the same place. Let's
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take a look at the generic ballot again. As I'm
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recording this, the Real Clear Politics generic ballot average has
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Democrats up by six points, and there are no polls
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of all adults in that average, So this is a
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same translation D plus six is the real number? What
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was it on April first, twenty eighteen, D plus six
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point seven. In other words, for the first time, President
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Trump and the Republicans are now converging both with job
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approval and generic ballot on where you stood on twenty eighteen.
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And we know what happened in twenty eighteen. The President
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did improve his job approval rating. He managed to get
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it up to forty five percent on election day according
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to the exit polls. Some of that was just that
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there's always people who will tell pollsters that they're registered
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when they're not, say they're going to vote when they're not.
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So it's not unusual when the actual job approval rating
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is a little bit higher than the polling one, because
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the polling one includes the non voters who think they're
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going to vote or want to give a socially acceptable response.
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But we know what that did. The Democrats picked up
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forty seats in the House on net and they did
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not pick up seats in the Senate. But that's because
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of the sort of seats that weren't playing. We're going
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to get into that in just a minute. Republicans are
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not going to lose forty seats and that's because jerry
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mandering has cut the number of seats at play plus
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polarization and has cut the number of swing seats that
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in twenty eighteen, Republicans went into the election holding twenty
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six Hillary Clinton won districts, they lost twenty three of them.
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The comparable number right now, before we know whether or
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not Virginia has jerrymandered at seats is below ten. So
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there simply is not the sort of low hanging fruit
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the person who's out of step with where their district
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is that you had in twenty eighteen. But you are
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probably definitely looking at a strong double digit loss in
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the House if nothing changes somewhere between ten and thirty,
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probably closer to twenty or so. Again, things can change,
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your violet mileage may vary, et cetera, et cetera, But
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if we're talking about a twenty eighteen environment, it's not
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going to be pretty for Speaker Johnson. The biggest concern though,
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has to be the Senate, and that's because the Senate
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candidates will all run multi million dollar campaigns. They'll spend
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a ridiculous amount of money telling you why the other
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person is good and why they're or the other person
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is bad and why they are good. And when it
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comes right down to it, they all pretty much get
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the same share of the vote as computed to the
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president's job approval rating. Let's look at twenty eighteen. There
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were ten eleven competitive Senate races that time, and you
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take a look at the job approval rating, and you
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take a look at the Republicans score. Eight of those
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eight of those eleven had between eighty seven and ninety
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percent of Trump job approvers voting for them. That's a
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statistical era. It could easily have been that all of
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them got exactly the same percent. That's within the margin
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of era. That means all that money where you're trying
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to say that Dean Heller and Nevada is great and
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Jackie Rosen is terrible didn't really make much of a
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difference compared to what happened in Arizona, where Martha McSally
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was telling everyone that she's great and that Kristen Cinema
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is terrible. It's a function of the job approval rating.
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The only outliers were in Texas and in West Virginia.
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Lou Barletta got eighty six percent. In Pennsylvania. So if
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you drop my range eighty six to ninety nine of
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the eleven got there. Cruz got ninety four percent of
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Trump approvers in Texas, and that extra four percent, given
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that Trump was at a forty nine percent job approval rating,
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was probably the difference between defeat and victory. He won
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by about three points. Four percent of fifty percent is
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two percent.
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So if.
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He would have been in a very tight race with
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Beto o or winning or losing by lesson a point,
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if he had simply performed on average the way everyone
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else was performing, and Joe Manchin did much better, he
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got Joe Manchin got twenty eight percent of Trump approver
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sixty three percent job approval. If he had gotten only
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the ten percent that every other Democrat got or the
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fourteen percent that Bob Casey got in Pennsylvania, Joe Morrissey
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would not be the governor of West Virginia. Joe Morrissey
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would have won for the Senate seat instead.
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So you take a look at.
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That, and you say, the job approval rating is the
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single most important factor going into the Senate race. So
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where do we stand with respect to the Senate seats? Okay,
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so let's take a look at the nine seats that
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people think might be in play this time. I think
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a number that we know are in play, others that
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might be in play. We've got Minnesota, Michigan, New Hampshire,
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and Georgia as the ones that could very well be
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in play. We know that Trump's job approval rating in
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Minnesota and New Hampshire is going to be below his
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national job approval rating because they're more democratic state. So
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if Trump is at forty two nationally, his job approval
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will be below forty in those states, at or below forty.
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If it's up to forty five, it will be in
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the low forties. That's not enough to get it done
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for the Republicans. You get ninety percent of that and
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maybe ten percent of the fifty five percent who are
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on the other side. Five to ten percent is typically
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what you get of the people who disapprove of the president. Well,
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that gets you into the mid to high forties at
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the best. So take those off your table. Then we
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take a look at Michigan, which is an open seat,
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and Michigan in twenty eighteen had a job approval rating
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that was only one point below what the national job
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approval rating was. So if Trump's at forty two. We're
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talking forty one, forty two, forty three, something like that. Again,
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that's not high enough to get it done absent the
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Democrats nominating somebody like Abdula Lsied, and you have a
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mansion like defection from people who disapprove of Donald Trump
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towards the Republican You have to get it up to
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like the forty five or forty six percent for it
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to have a fighting shot of winning Michigan. So then
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let's take a look at the Republican seats that are up.
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What you've got is the first one you take a
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look at is Maine. Now what you had in Maine
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is Sue Collins has won over and over again by
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winning a fair number of people who normally vote Democratic
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and sweeping up with Republicans. She won ninety percent of
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the Trump approver in twenty twenty, so she basically equaled
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what Cruiz was able to get in twenty eighteen. And
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Maine had a surprisingly high forty six percent Trump job
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approval rating. In other words, it was exactly on par
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or maybe a point less than it was in the country.
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Despite its democratic pedigree, There's actually a lot of Trump's
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support there. The reason she won was because she got
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seventeen percent of the people who didn't have a favorable
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opinion of Donald Trump, and she won with about forty
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nine to fifty percent of the vote, and with their
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ranked choice system, she would have gotten over fifty percent.
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Was a pretty comfortable victory. Well, what happens if she
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replicates that and Trump's not at forty six percent? All Suddenly,
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even if she gets seventeen percent of the unfavorables, she
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starts to get down into the danger territory. If Trump
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is sitting at forty two percent, It's going to be
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really hard for Sue Collins. Even if she does as
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well as she did in twenty twenty in getting people
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who voted for Joe Biden to split the ticket and
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vote for her, you get down in the forty two,
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forty three, forty four range, It's going to be really
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hard for Sue Collins. And that's assuming that she can
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peel off as many Democratic leaning voters as she has historically.
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Been able to do. Now, let's take a look at
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the other seats.
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North Carolina open seat because of Tom Tillis's retirement, Democrats
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have a strong candidate, Governor Roy Cooper, that should be
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a state where the job approval rating is roughly even
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with the president. You get it at forty five forty
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six percent. As much as people want to talk about
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Roy Cooper being able to pull votes, a point or
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two extra could make all the difference, But there's no
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indication that this is a candidate who's going to pull
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a lot of votes away from the Trump job approvers.
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But if you're a forty two percent, this is not
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going to be a victory for the Republicans.
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It's just not.
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Take a look at Ohio, Ohio in twenty eighteen, there
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was a contested race, and Trump's job approval rating was
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eight points higher than it was in the rest of
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the country. So for Ohio, even with Trump at forty two,
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that means Trump's job approval rating should be in the
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high forties or as high as fifty points. Well, but
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what that means is if it's forty two, it's a
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horse race. It's a horse race, particularly given that the
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Democrats have Shared Brown, who's outperformed Democrats for quite some time.
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You get it up to forty five forty six, well,
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Shared Brown's probably not going to make a difference because
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then Trump's job approval rating will be over fifty and
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John Houstt should be making through. But at forty two
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you have to look at Ohio and you have to
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wonder Alaska. You know, we've talked about Mary Peltola before
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and she has not had thirty years of history like
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Shared Brown, but she has shown a similar overperformance ability.
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It's two should be a higherum job Trump job approval
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rating than the rest of the country, but more like Montana.
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Montana in twenty eighteen was a Trump job approval rating
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of fifty one six points higher than the national and
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the Republican got eighty eight percent of Trump approvers. He
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lost because John Tester got ninety five percent of disapprovers.
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In other words, the sort of person who voted for
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Trump but was kind of unhappy with them voted for Tester.
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That would be Peltola's route to power. At forty five nationally,
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Peltola probably is close, but no Cigar at forty two nationally, again,
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this is a race that is too close for comfort.
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And then Texas, you've got the question where Texas in
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twenty eighteen was only a couple of points higher. It
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was a forty nine percent job approval rate. Four points
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higher at forty two. That means that Texas will be
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at forty five forty six. And that's not even factoring
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in the data that suggests that Hispanics are turning big
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time against Trump for a variety of reasons. You talk
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about forty two and you talk about Ken Paxton, this
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is another race. Yeah, they can win, but they could
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also lose. And that's what I'm trying to say is
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when we're looking at an environment that's looking more like
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twenty eighteen than it's looking like a more a neutral
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environment or a marginal environment, what you're talking about is
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the possibility of a really bad night. Now again, this
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seven months ago. I'm not predicting anything, but I think
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it's time for that tough talk. Republicans, you're in trouble,
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start to deal with it.
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Well.
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My guess this week is one of the young rising
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stars of what has been called election Twitter. This young
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man started a few years ago when he was in
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high school and has now become the founder and creator
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of a very interesting and unique new website called state Navigate.
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That is Chas not aycom founder and executive director of
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state Navigate.
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Welcome to be on the polls.
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Well, thank you for having me. And what I will
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say is I think I'm sort of on the elder
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status of election Twitter now. You know when I when
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I started out, it was like, oh yeah, I was eighteen,
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you know, when election Twitter is very small, you know,
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in the late twenty tens. You know, I started in
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twenty seventeen. But now it's like, you know, there's so many,
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so many people who are much younger than me.
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And talking about elections.
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They're even younger than when I started, and it's just
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kind of crazy on how much that community has blown up.
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Yeah.
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No, I mean when I was a teenager in the
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nineteen seventies, we didn't have the Internet. You had to
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find books and so forth. So I just got to
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be an election nerd in private. But now you get
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to show off to all of your three million friends
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around the world and build a name for yourself.
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I'm jealous.
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I want to fast forward to my youth and bring
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it into twenty seventeen so that I can be like
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you guys.
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But tell me about state navigate.
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You know, when I look at a lot of different websites,
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both here and internationally, and one of the things I'd
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always for US states me is we've got a federal
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republic and states matter, and yet you've got almost zero
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elections analysis of it. And whenever I try and bring
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it up with people, it's like, oh, it's blah blah blah,
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too hard, too hard, too hard.
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Well, it's not too hard for you.
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Tell us about what State Navigate offers and why you
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decided to go ahead with him.
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Yeah, So, you know, we are a compass for state
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legislatures and and kind of state government in general. But
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you know, our main focus is state legislatures. You know,
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it's part of our democracy that has very much overlooked
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a lot of you know, most of the super majority
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of Americans don't really know much about it. And so,
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you know, we when I was you know, working on
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sea analysis, which was kind of the first iteration I
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would say of State Navigate, which was just like a
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place for the forecast that we would work on and
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a place for you know, maybe some maps here and there,
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or maybe a few interactives.
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You know.
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I while I was working on that, and I was
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in college, I started to gather up ideas in my
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head of like, okay, what what's what's something I want
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to build after you know, see analysis and everything. What's
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something that I think is needed and that's state navigate
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So you know, of course we do the forecast still
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for state legislatures.
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You're also able to uh.
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Now you're not just talking like if you go, I
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just want to interrupt, because the Saboteague political report will
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often have like a generic oh take a look at
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this chamber. It can switch you actually get down to
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the district level and dates that you operate. I just
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wanted to talk about the granularity that you offer that
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no one else that I'm aware of offers.
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Yeah.
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You know, in our forecast, we calculate you know, majority odds,
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super majority odds, tie odds. You know, you're able to
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see all the in the forecast, you know everyone, everybody
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who's running in each district. If you go at our
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district summary pages, you can look at all the candidates
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and how much they've raised and spent their cash on
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hand and how much they've lown themselves. Go to their
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campaign finance profiles and see their Canada campaigns on you
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know how much you know, like who they're taking money from,
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all of their listed donations, all their listed expenditures, and
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we you know have various interactives on you know, state governments,
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mostly focused on elections.
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We do polling as well.
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You know, we are the most accurate polster of the
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twenty twenty five election cycle according to Nate Silver Silver
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Bulletin and also by our own analysis by five thirty
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eight alumni Mary Radcliffe.
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And uh, you know, we.
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Also have like profiles of legislators. We calculate the ideology
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of legislators, what's their likelihood of voting yes or no
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on each floor role call. So you know I gathered
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those ideas throughout college, and you know I thought of, uh,
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you know, State Navigate. We are in our second year
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of operations and you know, we're about to launch. And
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the other thing I forgot to mention is, you know,
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we have like a newsroom where you know, we'll post
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like some of our own analysis and a little bit
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of our own reporting in you know states that we
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are opening right now. We're open in Virginia, West Virginia,
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North Carolina, South Carolina, Michigan, Wisconsin, Alaska, and Utah, so
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eight states, and our next targets are Colorado and Texas.
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And we're about to actually launch subscriptions to you know,
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help help us expand in the more states, maybe hopefully
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eventually help us expand our staff to you know, help
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with the you know, scraping data and managing data and
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all that sort of thing. So, you know, we we
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do a lot at State Navigate. And you know, I
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still have like a three page Google doc of other
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ideas I want us to do before I'm thirty.
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So yeah, well there we go. So this is a
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no longer young man in a hurry building the empire
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of of State Navigate. Yeah, you come from Virginia. You
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started your analysis in Virginia, so I believe Virginia was
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your first state that you put up on State Navigate.
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My listeners through you know that if they were interested
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in the Virginia State legislative elections next year, what would
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you be able to find? Or if you were interested
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in just following the legislature. You're one of these people
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who wants to you know know, Oh, I read these
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things on the X about the horrible things that are
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being introduced, you know, which is a common thing on
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right wing Twitter. And as I often say my friends,
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you guys know that a lot of bills are introduced
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that actually never pass right, what would people who were
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either trying to follow the legislative flow or follow the
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elections fined like on your Virginia section of state navigate.
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Yeah. Absolutely.
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So you know what I will say is technically South
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Carolina was our first day. We launched in South Carolina
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actually a year ago. Uh maybe by the time this
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is released, we were. We came out on April third,
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twenty twenty five, and in South Carolina with the district
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summary pages. But yeah, I'm from I'm from Richmond, Virginia,
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from Hanover and now I'm a city boy, so went
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from the country to the city after graduating. And uh yeah,
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so when it comes to Virginia, you know that's easily
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has a lot of our content. You know, we have
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a lot of written analysis of elections. We have a
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lot of reporting on state politics. You know, like we
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were the first to kind of know how the map
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that was uh you know, proposed by the Virginia Legislature
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was like from the House side and on the Senate side,
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and so we talked a little bit about that debacle
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and how it was drawn to give you know, a
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delegate a seat essentially. I mean, and now it's funny
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enough is that he may not get that seat because
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Terry mccolliff's wife, Dorothy mccolliffe, is running. But uh, you know,
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if you go to State Navigate, you can look at
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our reporting. You can look at early voting that we
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have right now. We just updated it to where you're
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able to see the estimated partisanship of the early vote
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so far. You are able to look at the ideology
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of legislators.
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You're able to.
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See, uh, you know what bills they've sponsored and co sponsored.
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That's not up on Virginia yet, it's on South Carolina,
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but it will be up in Virginia hopefully this month.
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You're able to see, uh, you know, who their top
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donors are. You know, a whole whole bunch of treasure
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trove of data is at your disposal when you come
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to uh to State Navigate for whether it be Virginia
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or you know, in a lot of the states that
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we operate in, Virginia and South Carolina are most developed states.
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Uh.
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The others are kind of partial launches that we're going
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to be adding more content to h and again, you know,
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we're still working on expanding in more states.
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So well's you know, on the one hand, you're listening
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to states and I say, okay, well there's this geographic conference,
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you know, concentration, the old you know, Virginia, West Virginia,
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the two Carolinas. And then I'm thinking, okay, well I
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get Michigan and Wisconsin, uh swing states, closely balanced state
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legislatures or potentially hot races, particularly like for the Wisconsin
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State Senate. And then Utah jumps out at me. It's like, okay,
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you know which of these is not like the other.
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So why did you guys get into Utah.
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Yeah, so we developed our uh you know, or when
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it comes to like the states we launched in, we
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had like people fill out a survey. We had people
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like donate to move up a state. We also had
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like a thing to where it's like the more legislators
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that follow us, the sooner we'll open up there. So
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you know, we have a big audience in Michigan and Wisconsin,
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in West Virginia and North Carolina and Alaska. I think
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like ten percent of Alaska legislature follows us on Twitter.
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So if I call, if I were call correctly, you
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know out of the six cy that there are, Yeah.
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I was gonna say, I actually know how many they
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are and say, okay, you got six.
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Yeah I got six.
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Well you know, lies and lives and statistics, right, but anyway, Yeah,
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and Alaska.
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Is another one that fits in because it's got the
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bipartisan coalition. So it's like the Central States, three swing states,
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and Utah. And what you're telling me is that people
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in Utah liked what you're doing, so you said, okay,
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I'll give you the product.
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Yeah, we have a few Utah legislators there. You know,
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when pretty much it was like in January to where
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I was thinking, like what states should we do? Because
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I knew we had to do Virginia and New Jersey
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because they had elections that year, right, and so only
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in New Jersey. Unfortunately, what we're able to do is
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a forecast either way. And so we needed this like
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two Republican states that had data really easy to access.
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And so you know, I wanted to your point of like,
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you know, we have a little bit of the eastern concentration, right,
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I wanted I was thinking like a western state, so
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you know, whether it be Wyoming, Idaho, Montana, North Dakota,
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South Dakota, but Utah had the easiest So and you know,
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we also have a partner there this year as well,
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in a new media organization launching, and so we're actually
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gonna be doing quite a lot in Utah for the
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primary season coming up that I'm really excited about starting
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starting this month actually, So you know, like right now,
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like our our main focus states are Virginia, West Virginia,
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and Utah for like what we're working on this month,
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and you know a little bit into May, West Virginia's
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primaries in May, Utah's is in June. Will still be
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doing some more stuff in Utah in May, and you know,
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we'll also be launching some more forecasts. You know, we're
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about to launch a Wisconsin forecast when we launched subscriptions
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on Friday. We're about to and then after that we'll
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do like South Carolina and then North Carolina and then
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Utah and uh then Michigan. I think it's like the
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order that we're thinking. So you know, we're always building
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in our current states and you know, while simultaneously building
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out in in new states. You know, each state has
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like a fundraising goal of like either twenty thousand or
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thirty thousand, depending on whether we're open there already or not.
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So you know, as a nonprofit, you know, we look
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for you know, people who are able to help us
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meet our.
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You know with minim are what.
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The public support test, Yes, not concentrated with you know,
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one or two donors. As a longtime C three person,
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I'm well aware of what you have to do to
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get up and running right exactly.
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So you know, it's.
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For anyone who wants to help us open up and stay.
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You know, they can reach out plenty of ways to
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contact me or contact you know state navigating our site
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and you know, so it like we I'm not sure
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what state we're going to do after Colorado and Texas, right, so,
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you know, kind of worlds are oyster there. I have
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some ideas, but you know, just kind of waiting for
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some more dominoes to fall.
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Well. Virginia is the only one of these states that
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actually has this active race because of the April twenty
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first referendum on the democratic maps, which would estimate in
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the current environment, add four seats to the Democrats.
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In the House.
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Of course, in a less democratic environment there are a
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couple of seats that Republicans could win in good years,
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but it is a very democratic cleaning map. What are
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you seeing with respect to early vote. Certainly the aggregate
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number is higher by about five percent as of the
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morning than the similar early vote totals for the twenty
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twenty five results, which was the highest turnout non presidential
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election in Virginia history.
483
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What are you seeing with.
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The respect to geographic distributions or this new partisan predictor
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tool that you.
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Mentioned, Yeah, absolutely, so, yeah, I mean turnout for this
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thing is sky high. I mean total early vote for
488
00:26:24.279 --> 00:26:26.599
the same day equivalent, right, so like twentieth day of
489
00:26:26.640 --> 00:26:29.440
early voting in twenty twenty five versus twentieth day of
490
00:26:29.480 --> 00:26:32.680
early voting in twenty twenty six. Right, So that's what
491
00:26:32.720 --> 00:26:36.519
I mean by same day equivalent, it's you know, one
492
00:26:36.599 --> 00:26:39.960
hundred and five point six percent of the total early
493
00:26:40.039 --> 00:26:41.640
vote for the same day equivalent.
494
00:26:42.000 --> 00:26:42.160
Right.
495
00:26:42.160 --> 00:26:45.279
We're three weeks away from the election.
496
00:26:45.039 --> 00:26:51.519
Now thereabouts, right, you know, twenty days really, so you know,
497
00:26:52.319 --> 00:26:56.119
there we have very very high turnout, which I'll be honest,
498
00:26:56.119 --> 00:26:59.640
I was not expecting, right, but I guess you know,
499
00:26:59.720 --> 00:27:01.440
people have kind of made the point of, like, well,
500
00:27:02.440 --> 00:27:06.240
when we talk about the cost of voting, right, you know,
501
00:27:07.160 --> 00:27:10.440
in political science, there's like a famous cost of voting
502
00:27:10.480 --> 00:27:13.240
equation and when people say like the cost of voting
503
00:27:13.880 --> 00:27:17.119
is like, you know, I think one of it is
504
00:27:17.200 --> 00:27:20.359
time and you know, there's there's time that people have
505
00:27:20.480 --> 00:27:22.200
to spend and making a decision on who to vote
506
00:27:22.240 --> 00:27:25.319
for for Republican or a Democrat this year, right, or
507
00:27:25.359 --> 00:27:27.839
whether they vote at all. This one is a straightforward
508
00:27:27.920 --> 00:27:32.759
yes or no. So I'm wondering if that's why we're
509
00:27:32.799 --> 00:27:36.000
also seeing it's like less I think independence turning out
510
00:27:36.000 --> 00:27:38.359
for this thing, less swing voters. This is very much
511
00:27:38.400 --> 00:27:41.200
a you know, like two rapid dogs going at each
512
00:27:41.240 --> 00:27:44.480
other with the partisan bas is coming out. But yeah,
513
00:27:44.519 --> 00:27:49.599
so we just actually updated are you know, early voting
514
00:27:49.640 --> 00:27:54.319
tracker in Virginia with a model showing what is the
515
00:27:54.440 --> 00:27:58.920
estimated party turnout using lieutenant governor results. Reason why we
516
00:27:59.000 --> 00:28:02.240
use lieutenant governor as alt rather than governor is because
517
00:28:03.039 --> 00:28:07.599
that tracks closest to what the estimated presidential vote was.
518
00:28:09.039 --> 00:28:11.759
You know, on the low end the twenty twenty five
519
00:28:11.799 --> 00:28:14.960
Virginia electorate, it was Harris plus nine. High end is
520
00:28:15.000 --> 00:28:19.599
eleven and Gazala Hashmi won by like eleven or maybe
521
00:28:19.680 --> 00:28:21.000
twelve something like that.
522
00:28:23.200 --> 00:28:24.200
So that's the reason why we.
523
00:28:24.240 --> 00:28:28.960
Use that, And it was actually because of an Australian
524
00:28:29.079 --> 00:28:33.039
lecturer like emailed me yesterday and it's like, hey, you know,
525
00:28:33.319 --> 00:28:35.559
we should probably do like weighted slopes instead of just
526
00:28:35.599 --> 00:28:38.839
a simple regression. And also you know you could technically
527
00:28:38.920 --> 00:28:41.680
use this in order to figure out like what the
528
00:28:41.680 --> 00:28:46.160
partisanship is. And with conversations I've had with people, you know,
529
00:28:46.319 --> 00:28:50.880
like internally, and you know, it tracks with what people
530
00:28:50.920 --> 00:28:53.759
are seeing. So I feel good about the estimate. And
531
00:28:53.799 --> 00:28:56.559
it's really crazy how it's like even down to the
532
00:28:56.559 --> 00:28:59.519
county level. Like Culpeper County, for example, is you know,
533
00:28:59.799 --> 00:29:02.119
sort of an excerp of northern Virginia. I would say
534
00:29:02.359 --> 00:29:04.640
people will fight me on that, but as someone from Hanover,
535
00:29:04.680 --> 00:29:06.559
I would very much say that is pretty much what
536
00:29:06.599 --> 00:29:10.319
I call fake Nova. But so Culpeper is very red.
537
00:29:10.640 --> 00:29:12.680
It's got like this large blue dot in the middle.
538
00:29:13.359 --> 00:29:15.119
Used to be more of a swing town but now
539
00:29:15.119 --> 00:29:18.920
it's pretty much blue. But it's a reliably Republican county.
540
00:29:18.920 --> 00:29:21.759
But the early vote is actually pretty even. I think
541
00:29:21.799 --> 00:29:24.240
Republicans only narrowly won the early vote. And we talked
542
00:29:24.240 --> 00:29:27.279
about mail plus early in person vote in twenty twenty five.
543
00:29:27.319 --> 00:29:28.960
I think they only narrowly won it, but they had
544
00:29:28.960 --> 00:29:33.160
a big election day advantage, right, and so our model
545
00:29:33.200 --> 00:29:36.359
has like Democrats, you know, up by like a point
546
00:29:36.440 --> 00:29:40.599
in the estimated party turnout vote for Culpepper County. So
547
00:29:40.720 --> 00:29:42.279
you know, I got to back test this, you know,
548
00:29:42.359 --> 00:29:47.119
looking at previous early vote and attracts. So you know
549
00:29:47.160 --> 00:29:49.559
when we talk about Dems are up about twenty points
550
00:29:49.559 --> 00:29:52.480
in the early vote. Now that's a lot, but typically
551
00:29:52.720 --> 00:29:58.119
Dems really have an early vote advantage typically. You know,
552
00:29:58.200 --> 00:30:00.880
this is tracking very similar to twenty twenty five. I
553
00:30:00.920 --> 00:30:03.839
believe that compared to the final result, this is about
554
00:30:03.880 --> 00:30:07.119
a point and a half redder. Eventually we're gonna get
555
00:30:07.119 --> 00:30:09.359
in you know, sort of a swing of the same
556
00:30:09.440 --> 00:30:12.359
day equivalent and calculate like what it was on that day,
557
00:30:12.880 --> 00:30:16.319
you know, twenty first day of early voting versus last
558
00:30:16.400 --> 00:30:19.440
year versus this year, and calculate the swing because I
559
00:30:19.480 --> 00:30:21.720
think that's really the best way when we talk about it,
560
00:30:21.960 --> 00:30:26.160
rather than talking about the overall early vote. But you
561
00:30:26.200 --> 00:30:28.200
know a lot of so like Republicans had a really
562
00:30:28.240 --> 00:30:31.000
good start in the early vote, but a lot of
563
00:30:31.039 --> 00:30:33.799
Dems last week, and it looks like this week are
564
00:30:33.799 --> 00:30:36.960
coming out for this thing like crazy. And the satellite
565
00:30:36.960 --> 00:30:40.200
locations which are early voting locations in some of these
566
00:30:40.240 --> 00:30:48.519
big blue localities like Fairfax, Prince William, Chesterfield. You know, Louden,
567
00:30:49.920 --> 00:30:53.799
I believe as well, you know these and you know,
568
00:30:54.119 --> 00:30:55.400
I think like nofolks too.
569
00:30:55.920 --> 00:30:58.319
You know, that's when like you see a big surge
570
00:30:58.359 --> 00:30:59.079
in dem turnout.
571
00:30:59.079 --> 00:31:04.440
But we're already seeing surge, so you know, I think
572
00:31:05.119 --> 00:31:08.440
we may be on track. We'll see, depending on the satellites,
573
00:31:08.480 --> 00:31:10.400
but we could see an electorate that's actually bluer than
574
00:31:10.440 --> 00:31:11.160
twenty twenty five.
575
00:31:12.680 --> 00:31:14.359
One of the things that I found interesting just looking
576
00:31:14.359 --> 00:31:16.559
at trying to break things down is taking a look
577
00:31:16.559 --> 00:31:19.480
at the distinction between the mail vote and the in.
578
00:31:19.319 --> 00:31:20.359
Person early vote.
579
00:31:20.400 --> 00:31:23.640
Because the mail vote is heavily heavily democratic, the in
580
00:31:23.720 --> 00:31:27.519
person vote in Virginia has trended democratic but not by
581
00:31:27.640 --> 00:31:30.200
huge margins, and of course the election day vote tends
582
00:31:30.240 --> 00:31:33.839
to be Republican by significant but not massive margins.
583
00:31:34.519 --> 00:31:37.920
And not only did I find that.
584
00:31:38.200 --> 00:31:41.599
The overall totals were tracking twenty twenty five, but that
585
00:31:41.680 --> 00:31:45.519
the mail versus in person breakdown was very similar, which
586
00:31:45.519 --> 00:31:50.480
would explain why this heavily early vote, which looks to
587
00:31:50.559 --> 00:31:53.680
be if you look at it on a county or
588
00:31:53.720 --> 00:31:56.319
congressional district. It's basis you'd say, oh, well, you know,
589
00:31:56.400 --> 00:31:58.559
this is tilting red, but then you take a look
590
00:31:58.559 --> 00:32:00.599
at it and you say, no, actually, it's these people
591
00:32:00.640 --> 00:32:02.799
who are voting by mail, and they tilt.
592
00:32:02.519 --> 00:32:03.640
Very heavily blue.
593
00:32:04.039 --> 00:32:06.720
And that way corroborate just on a rough basis what
594
00:32:06.759 --> 00:32:09.880
you're finding, you know, which is at this moment where
595
00:32:09.920 --> 00:32:13.519
mail is a larger part of the early vote overall
596
00:32:13.599 --> 00:32:16.880
than it will be once in person voting begins in
597
00:32:17.000 --> 00:32:17.920
earnest in the next.
598
00:32:17.839 --> 00:32:18.519
Couple of weeks.
599
00:32:19.440 --> 00:32:21.839
Of course, it would tilt more democratic because the mail
600
00:32:21.960 --> 00:32:24.200
is a larger component of the early vote right now.
601
00:32:24.799 --> 00:32:26.920
Right mails at one hundred and seven point seven percent
602
00:32:26.960 --> 00:32:29.000
of same day equivalent, whereas early in person is one
603
00:32:29.079 --> 00:32:33.119
hundred and four point five. You know, Republicans throughout the
604
00:32:33.119 --> 00:32:36.960
twenty twenties in Virginia have really worked hard to get
605
00:32:37.000 --> 00:32:39.279
their base out in the early in person vote because
606
00:32:39.279 --> 00:32:42.680
that's what you know they trust. You know, President Trump
607
00:32:42.720 --> 00:32:44.240
is not a big fan of mail in voting, so
608
00:32:44.319 --> 00:32:46.920
it would make sense that, you know, the Republican base
609
00:32:47.039 --> 00:32:51.160
has less trust in mail in voting, but they're all
610
00:32:51.440 --> 00:32:53.720
good with early in person. So you know that is
611
00:32:53.839 --> 00:32:56.880
the Republican goal if you're a you know, consultant or
612
00:32:56.880 --> 00:32:58.599
you're running the No campaign or whatever.
613
00:32:59.720 --> 00:33:00.680
But yeah, I mean.
614
00:33:00.559 --> 00:33:04.920
It's like what I really hate is like people keep
615
00:33:04.960 --> 00:33:07.480
saying like, oh, well, if you look at like the
616
00:33:07.519 --> 00:33:10.640
first congressional district that has very high turnout and that's
617
00:33:10.680 --> 00:33:12.759
represented by a Republican even though you know it went
618
00:33:12.799 --> 00:33:15.720
to Trump by like maybe six points. But like the
619
00:33:15.759 --> 00:33:18.279
thing is is when you go and actually look at
620
00:33:18.279 --> 00:33:21.599
the localities and you get down to the precinct level,
621
00:33:21.920 --> 00:33:24.880
you're easily seeing a trend where it's like the Democratic
622
00:33:25.000 --> 00:33:28.039
precincts we talk about that same day equivalent percentage and
623
00:33:28.079 --> 00:33:32.039
everything are turning out more. You know, the regression is showing,
624
00:33:33.240 --> 00:33:37.680
you know, a statistically significant trend where the Dems are
625
00:33:37.720 --> 00:33:43.039
coming out in these like rural counties, not in all
626
00:33:43.079 --> 00:33:45.279
the rural counties, but you know areas where they have
627
00:33:45.839 --> 00:33:49.599
really black voters, Like black voters are coming out for
628
00:33:49.640 --> 00:33:54.400
this thing like crazy, which is very very surprising. And
629
00:33:54.799 --> 00:33:58.880
that sort of thing is like unless the Republicans in
630
00:33:58.920 --> 00:34:03.319
the No campaign have you know, successfully persuaded black voters
631
00:34:03.759 --> 00:34:05.880
or you know, like like twenty five to thirty percent
632
00:34:05.880 --> 00:34:08.639
of black voters to vote. Know, you know this, I
633
00:34:08.639 --> 00:34:11.239
think I think this is got like a ninety five
634
00:34:11.280 --> 00:34:12.760
percent chance of passing.
635
00:34:12.800 --> 00:34:16.760
Right, Maybe they do, though who knows. You know, like
636
00:34:16.800 --> 00:34:17.119
we don't.
637
00:34:17.159 --> 00:34:23.920
We have no good public polling on this amendment yet,
638
00:34:24.039 --> 00:34:26.360
you know, like and when I say good public polling,
639
00:34:26.400 --> 00:34:28.840
I don't mean like, oh, the polsters are bad. That
640
00:34:28.920 --> 00:34:31.679
being said, Rono College was the most inaccurate pulster I
641
00:34:31.679 --> 00:34:34.280
believe of twenty twenty five and they're one of the
642
00:34:34.280 --> 00:34:36.599
two that have done the poll and they didn't even
643
00:34:36.679 --> 00:34:41.119
use a ballot language or anything. So but you know,
644
00:34:41.159 --> 00:34:43.519
we are going to go in the field on April tenth.
645
00:34:45.119 --> 00:34:47.719
So you know, people, we've got a lot. I think
646
00:34:47.719 --> 00:34:51.280
we've got like twenty five to thirty people who have donated,
647
00:34:51.360 --> 00:34:54.840
and we've raised uh, I think like sixteen hundred dollars now,
648
00:34:55.000 --> 00:34:58.480
and so you know, whether we cover you know, it's like, well,
649
00:34:58.519 --> 00:35:01.239
we budget for three thousand, try and conduct this thing.
650
00:35:01.559 --> 00:35:06.039
Whether we need to you know, do the other fourteen
651
00:35:06.119 --> 00:35:07.920
hundred or whether we raise it, you know, we'll see.
652
00:35:08.920 --> 00:35:11.679
But you know, I have a lot of ideas on
653
00:35:11.719 --> 00:35:13.679
how we want to design the survey. I meet with
654
00:35:13.719 --> 00:35:16.440
a polling committee team next week and we're going to
655
00:35:16.480 --> 00:35:19.000
finalize the design and put in the field and so
656
00:35:19.119 --> 00:35:23.199
we'll be releasing that hopefully like a week before the election.
657
00:35:25.239 --> 00:35:27.239
So but that's kind of the thing here is nobody
658
00:35:27.239 --> 00:35:30.519
knows what persuasion looks like. You know, I very much
659
00:35:30.559 --> 00:35:34.519
don't think and this is why we did Lieutenant governor.
660
00:35:34.599 --> 00:35:38.239
We're talking about like using a party baseline really, especially
661
00:35:38.519 --> 00:35:42.119
since it track closer with the presidential result. But Abigail
662
00:35:42.119 --> 00:35:44.519
Spamberger won over a lot of Republicans, right, you know,
663
00:35:44.760 --> 00:35:47.360
she did what three or four points better than Gazala Hashmi.
664
00:35:48.599 --> 00:35:53.360
You know, anecdotally, I know three people who vote for
665
00:35:53.360 --> 00:35:57.599
Abigail Spamberger and voted for John Reid, and all of
666
00:35:57.639 --> 00:35:58.599
them are voting against this.
667
00:36:01.519 --> 00:36:04.199
So, you know, I think that.
668
00:36:06.760 --> 00:36:13.039
Like the main question is can Republicans successfully successfully persuade
669
00:36:14.000 --> 00:36:17.519
I think, especially college educated voters to vote exist thing?
670
00:36:18.280 --> 00:36:21.159
And then but you know, is that counteracted by the
671
00:36:21.239 --> 00:36:24.360
fact that you know, the ballot language is you know,
672
00:36:24.639 --> 00:36:26.639
I think they're not entirely wrong that it's a push
673
00:36:26.639 --> 00:36:29.119
pull in the way that they were to the ballot language, right.
674
00:36:30.360 --> 00:36:32.239
I think they have a strong legal argument that it's
675
00:36:32.320 --> 00:36:37.000
it's illegal, But that being said, Republicans said this in Ohio, right,
676
00:36:37.119 --> 00:36:42.719
so tit for tat. So you know, whether because the
677
00:36:42.760 --> 00:36:45.719
ballot language is so skewed towards the S side, does
678
00:36:45.760 --> 00:36:51.519
that counteract any losses that they have with the any
679
00:36:51.519 --> 00:36:55.880
sort of college educated Dems who you know, voted for
680
00:36:55.920 --> 00:37:00.639
Kazala Hashmi but voted for Jason Mieris because you know,
681
00:37:01.519 --> 00:37:04.599
I think there are Dems and Independence who aren't a
682
00:37:04.599 --> 00:37:08.440
big fan of jerrymandering. We'll see, we have no idea, right,
683
00:37:08.639 --> 00:37:10.639
so excited to do our poll.
684
00:37:11.280 --> 00:37:12.440
How do you do your polling?
685
00:37:12.559 --> 00:37:16.599
I mean, three thousand dollars is an incredibly cheap amount
686
00:37:16.599 --> 00:37:18.320
of money to do a statewide pole.
687
00:37:19.000 --> 00:37:22.519
Yeah, so we have a good rate from our vendors,
688
00:37:23.719 --> 00:37:27.559
and you know, typically uh, you know, I guess it's
689
00:37:27.599 --> 00:37:30.360
the last state wide pole probably we're going to be doing.
690
00:37:30.400 --> 00:37:31.800
For this three thousand dollars rate.
691
00:37:32.119 --> 00:37:34.599
It's kind of grand grand fathered in when we talk
692
00:37:34.599 --> 00:37:36.480
about budget and all that sort of thing. You know,
693
00:37:36.519 --> 00:37:40.599
we get a like seven hundred sample size, that's what
694
00:37:40.599 --> 00:37:45.119
we shoot for. But yeah, it runs cheaper on that
695
00:37:45.199 --> 00:37:48.320
compared to the market rate. But now you know, for
696
00:37:48.679 --> 00:37:50.840
other state wide poles we're going to be doing eight thousand,
697
00:37:51.039 --> 00:37:54.519
just you know, to to cover a little bit more
698
00:37:54.559 --> 00:37:56.880
of the costs. But you know, we we love Virginia
699
00:37:57.079 --> 00:37:59.559
and we really wanted to do this poll. So it's
700
00:37:59.559 --> 00:38:02.840
it's really you know, because we have a good you know,
701
00:38:02.920 --> 00:38:04.840
market rate and honestly we have a really good response
702
00:38:04.960 --> 00:38:08.639
rate as well, and it's you know, we we work
703
00:38:08.800 --> 00:38:12.119
to try and make our text like we we've kind
704
00:38:12.159 --> 00:38:15.280
of experimented with like what works to get not only
705
00:38:15.360 --> 00:38:17.880
like a good response rate, but also a representative sample.
706
00:38:17.960 --> 00:38:20.360
And they're all sample, so like, for example, we did.
707
00:38:20.199 --> 00:38:25.400
A political field side a political science experiment field experiment
708
00:38:26.239 --> 00:38:29.519
where we like made our text that we send to
709
00:38:29.639 --> 00:38:33.920
eighteen to twenty nine lowercase, and our response rate with
710
00:38:34.000 --> 00:38:35.920
eighteen to twenty nine's.
711
00:38:35.360 --> 00:38:37.119
Like tripled or quadrupled.
712
00:38:38.400 --> 00:38:42.199
So you know, like just figuring out like what what
713
00:38:42.360 --> 00:38:46.480
text with the link right staying within a character limit works,
714
00:38:46.719 --> 00:38:50.360
is you know, something that our team has experience with.
715
00:38:50.480 --> 00:38:53.280
You know, we have actually my old political science professor
716
00:38:53.360 --> 00:38:56.079
Virginia Tech, Nick gutter Is, is on the committee, and
717
00:38:56.079 --> 00:38:58.119
then we have a g Elliot Morris on the committee
718
00:38:58.159 --> 00:39:04.039
as well, and then and our staff Michael Foley Elections coordinator,
719
00:39:04.079 --> 00:39:06.639
and Mary Radcliffe, who's at five thirty eight as well
720
00:39:06.639 --> 00:39:08.800
and she's our data manager, is also on the committee.
721
00:39:09.159 --> 00:39:13.079
And then there's myself, and you know, sometimes we'll like
722
00:39:13.320 --> 00:39:17.360
maybe run by someone who has expertise and can give
723
00:39:17.360 --> 00:39:20.440
a little feedback even though they aren't you know, part
724
00:39:20.480 --> 00:39:24.480
of the committee to try and see, like how can
725
00:39:24.519 --> 00:39:26.679
we get a good response rate because obviously the higher
726
00:39:26.760 --> 00:39:28.400
response rate, the less money you have to pull or
727
00:39:28.840 --> 00:39:31.880
less money you have to spend on your poll. And
728
00:39:31.960 --> 00:39:36.239
then you know, like I think like a seven hundred
729
00:39:36.239 --> 00:39:38.840
sample size for Virginia gets a job done.
730
00:39:39.239 --> 00:39:42.400
So yeah, I mean, depending on what cross stabs you
731
00:39:42.400 --> 00:39:44.360
want to look at, you'll have too small of an
732
00:39:44.400 --> 00:39:46.280
an to say much.
733
00:39:46.440 --> 00:39:47.039
On the cross tab.
734
00:39:47.039 --> 00:39:49.800
But yeah, but you know, like R versus D, you'll
735
00:39:49.840 --> 00:39:53.719
have a large enough male versus female, you'll have large
736
00:39:53.840 --> 00:39:57.599
enough white population, you'll have large enough blacks. Kind of
737
00:39:57.599 --> 00:40:02.000
on a borderline at seven hundred, probably too low, but
738
00:40:02.760 --> 00:40:04.599
you know, non whites as a total, you may be
739
00:40:04.639 --> 00:40:08.360
able to say something. But last, this is kind of
740
00:40:08.440 --> 00:40:11.760
geeky question, but you know, my listeners expect that from me,
741
00:40:11.880 --> 00:40:14.719
you know, which is is this a multi contact mode
742
00:40:14.800 --> 00:40:17.159
or you only text use or do you only push
743
00:40:17.199 --> 00:40:18.559
text that through the mobile phone?
744
00:40:18.840 --> 00:40:21.039
Just text, just text to text online.
745
00:40:21.280 --> 00:40:26.440
Yeah, how do you deal with the likelihood that older
746
00:40:26.519 --> 00:40:30.239
voters who might skew Republican are probably less likely to
747
00:40:30.320 --> 00:40:32.480
do texts online?
748
00:40:32.920 --> 00:40:36.119
Would you not find that I'd fight against that easily.
749
00:40:36.159 --> 00:40:38.559
I mean, that's sort of a problem we have, is
750
00:40:38.559 --> 00:40:41.000
that a lot of old people like answering the answering
751
00:40:41.360 --> 00:40:46.000
polls right, whether it be like phone or text. So
752
00:40:46.239 --> 00:40:52.079
like all of our raw responses skew heavily old right.
753
00:40:52.119 --> 00:40:54.719
When we talk about the actual electorate, if anything, it's
754
00:40:54.760 --> 00:40:57.920
the young people who don't answer it, even for text.
755
00:40:59.079 --> 00:41:02.679
That is the hard graphic when we talk about, you know,
756
00:41:02.800 --> 00:41:05.639
trying to get you know, with with age groups, trying
757
00:41:05.639 --> 00:41:06.880
to get those younger people in.
758
00:41:08.159 --> 00:41:09.559
So so that's sort of the thing.
759
00:41:10.320 --> 00:41:12.920
And of course when we like typically what we do
760
00:41:13.039 --> 00:41:16.360
is like okay, first day, it's like a whole random sample.
761
00:41:16.880 --> 00:41:18.880
We still do a random sample, but we like maybe
762
00:41:18.920 --> 00:41:24.360
over sample like eighteen to twenty nine's right, if we
763
00:41:24.440 --> 00:41:27.280
need those and we give them a custom text or something.
764
00:41:27.920 --> 00:41:28.519
You know, the.
765
00:41:30.280 --> 00:41:34.920
More your raw sample is closer to your weights, which
766
00:41:34.920 --> 00:41:37.000
is how we try and do it. You know, the
767
00:41:37.119 --> 00:41:40.599
less the less uh, you're going to have between the
768
00:41:40.840 --> 00:41:45.440
smallest weight and the highest weight between your respondents, right,
769
00:41:46.639 --> 00:41:50.280
you know, So so trying to make your raw sample
770
00:41:50.360 --> 00:41:54.559
representative is very important to us, just so that you
771
00:41:54.599 --> 00:41:56.159
know to your point, right, you know, a'll have weird
772
00:41:56.159 --> 00:41:58.880
looking cross tabs. Yeah, so we try and do that
773
00:41:58.880 --> 00:42:01.239
as best as possible. Why, I'll, you know, trying to
774
00:42:01.280 --> 00:42:07.760
do it for you know, a decent cost. But still,
775
00:42:07.840 --> 00:42:09.920
you know, we're the most accurate pulster last year's and
776
00:42:09.960 --> 00:42:11.880
so that's sort of the thing is, you know, trying
777
00:42:11.880 --> 00:42:13.119
to make the top line accurate.
778
00:42:14.559 --> 00:42:16.840
That's when I saw your poll last year, Spanburger plus.
779
00:42:16.880 --> 00:42:20.639
I think you had Spamburger plus fifteen thirteen. I'm sorry,
780
00:42:21.079 --> 00:42:23.760
thirteen thirteen. You know I looked at that. Oh that's
781
00:42:23.800 --> 00:42:25.800
too hot. You know, I expected a Spamburger win, but
782
00:42:25.840 --> 00:42:28.320
I thought it'd be like seven nine eleven or something,
783
00:42:28.400 --> 00:42:30.039
And of course you came out to be the one
784
00:42:30.039 --> 00:42:34.599
closest to the actual results. So I think the political
785
00:42:34.679 --> 00:42:37.679
analyst world will be looking to see whether or not
786
00:42:38.079 --> 00:42:40.159
State Navigate can go to for two.
787
00:42:40.840 --> 00:42:41.119
Yeah.
788
00:42:41.159 --> 00:42:42.960
Well see, you know, I think this one is harder.
789
00:42:44.519 --> 00:42:48.079
I mean, we haven't had a general election, because this
790
00:42:48.159 --> 00:42:50.119
is technically a general election right by law, it's on
791
00:42:50.159 --> 00:42:56.920
a special election in April in Virginia statewide, at least
792
00:42:56.920 --> 00:42:59.760
since the nineteen fifties, if not one hundred years. I know,
793
00:43:00.079 --> 00:43:03.280
for Skelly at DDHQ wrote something on this, so there's
794
00:43:03.320 --> 00:43:06.880
no precedent. But you know, we're using We're gonna be
795
00:43:06.960 --> 00:43:09.679
using similar methodology. You know, we comes to our waiting.
796
00:43:10.639 --> 00:43:14.760
We looked at Catalyst data, we looked at apvocast data
797
00:43:14.920 --> 00:43:17.480
and Gallup quarterly party I D and so we're going
798
00:43:17.519 --> 00:43:21.599
to be doing that again and we'll see if if
799
00:43:21.599 --> 00:43:24.360
that works again. So but you know, I think I
800
00:43:24.360 --> 00:43:28.119
think this electorate is going to be harder to pull,
801
00:43:28.599 --> 00:43:30.920
harder forecasts, harder to predict than twenty twenty five.
802
00:43:32.119 --> 00:43:35.800
So yeah, well, Chaz, how can my listeners follow state
803
00:43:35.920 --> 00:43:37.400
Navigate and follow your work?
804
00:43:38.079 --> 00:43:38.320
Yeah?
805
00:43:38.360 --> 00:43:42.639
Absolutely so. State navigate dot org is our website. We're
806
00:43:42.679 --> 00:43:44.960
opened up in eight states right now, but we you know,
807
00:43:45.079 --> 00:43:48.519
will hopefully open up an all fifty at some point.
808
00:43:48.559 --> 00:43:51.880
But you know, just you can subscribe to our newsletter
809
00:43:51.920 --> 00:43:55.480
and keep up with us as well. You can follow
810
00:43:55.519 --> 00:43:58.000
me on Twitter at Chaz Nettycombe c h A.
811
00:43:58.159 --> 00:43:59.440
Z and U T. T.
812
00:43:59.760 --> 00:44:06.400
Y Combe. Everybody forgets e at the end. And yeah,
813
00:44:06.440 --> 00:44:09.400
so you know, just definitely follow state Navigate you can.
814
00:44:09.559 --> 00:44:11.639
You know, it's at State Navigate on all of our
815
00:44:11.679 --> 00:44:16.000
socials to keep up with our work as well. Our
816
00:44:16.039 --> 00:44:23.360
Twitter is the most active starting this month. And yeah,
817
00:44:23.400 --> 00:44:26.440
well this has been great conversation. I enjoy State Navigate
818
00:44:26.559 --> 00:44:28.519
and I look forward to having you back on beyond
819
00:44:28.559 --> 00:44:29.159
the polls.
820
00:44:29.400 --> 00:44:30.440
Yeah, thanks for having me.
821
00:44:37.639 --> 00:44:41.199
Kentucky has an open Senate seat. Mitch McConnell, who has
822
00:44:41.199 --> 00:44:43.639
held a seat since nineteen eighty four, is stepping down
823
00:44:44.079 --> 00:44:47.800
a well deserved retirement, and there is a contested and
824
00:44:48.159 --> 00:44:53.840
increasingly harsh Republican primary to succeed him. That you have
825
00:44:53.920 --> 00:44:57.079
three candidates, but one of them, the one who might
826
00:44:57.119 --> 00:44:59.400
have been considered the front runner and who still polls
827
00:44:59.400 --> 00:45:02.920
well on Vergil Jewel name ID Attorney General Daniel Cameron
828
00:45:03.760 --> 00:45:05.840
is not able to raise a whole lot of money.
829
00:45:05.920 --> 00:45:09.280
It turns out that losing a race for governor, as
830
00:45:09.320 --> 00:45:13.639
he did in the last scubernatorial campaign despite being anointed
831
00:45:14.079 --> 00:45:19.639
by the Republican leadership, is not convinced people that he
832
00:45:19.920 --> 00:45:24.039
is the person to succeed to the Senate, and so
833
00:45:24.079 --> 00:45:26.559
we have an expectation that this is going to be
834
00:45:26.639 --> 00:45:29.119
a race between the two people who do have a
835
00:45:29.119 --> 00:45:33.199
lot of money, and that's Congressman Andy Barr, who represents
836
00:45:33.239 --> 00:45:38.639
the Lexington area, and businessperson Nate Morris, who is making
837
00:45:38.679 --> 00:45:40.920
his first run for public office. So we're going to
838
00:45:40.960 --> 00:45:43.079
have three ads here, two of them by Morris, one
839
00:45:43.079 --> 00:45:46.320
of them by bar and I want to see if
840
00:45:46.360 --> 00:45:50.119
you can figure out what the common theme is. Let's
841
00:45:50.119 --> 00:45:53.679
start with a short ad from Morris, and then we
842
00:45:53.719 --> 00:45:56.480
will go to the ad by bar and then we'll
843
00:45:56.519 --> 00:45:58.440
go to the ad by Morris, and then I'll comment
844
00:45:58.559 --> 00:46:02.159
on all three ads only.
845
00:46:02.280 --> 00:46:04.760
Nate Morris stands with Trump one hundred percent.
846
00:46:04.960 --> 00:46:07.000
Good man, Nate Morris, thank you.
847
00:46:07.199 --> 00:46:09.199
You're a successful business guy. You're really strong.
848
00:46:09.360 --> 00:46:13.159
We will fight, fight, fight, and we will win, win win.
849
00:46:13.280 --> 00:46:15.239
I'm Nate Morris, and I approved this message.
850
00:46:15.320 --> 00:46:22.000
Nate Mars, thank you. I have a message from President
851
00:46:22.159 --> 00:46:22.760
Donald J.
852
00:46:23.039 --> 00:46:26.559
Trump, the wonderful man who's been with me all the way,
853
00:46:26.679 --> 00:46:43.239
Congressman Andy Barr all the way.
854
00:46:44.000 --> 00:46:45.519
He's a good guy and a warrior.
855
00:46:46.559 --> 00:46:49.199
I'm Andrew Barrow, and I approved this message.
856
00:46:50.960 --> 00:46:55.280
Conservative for US Senate Nate Morris, a successful businessman like Trump,
857
00:46:55.440 --> 00:46:58.519
an outsider like Trump, and a deporter like Trump.
858
00:46:58.880 --> 00:47:01.679
That's Nate Morris. I wanted to deport every single illegal.
859
00:47:01.760 --> 00:47:05.119
We called for a full moratorium on any new immigration
860
00:47:05.559 --> 00:47:07.880
until we send every illegal.
861
00:47:07.480 --> 00:47:08.719
Back where they came from.
862
00:47:08.880 --> 00:47:12.320
No carve outs, no acceptance, Every illegal goes back.
863
00:47:12.519 --> 00:47:15.800
Nate Morris is the pro Trump outsider to the port illegals.
864
00:47:16.000 --> 00:47:17.800
Vote Nate Morris for US Senate.
865
00:47:17.960 --> 00:47:20.280
I'm Nate Morris and I approved this message.
866
00:47:20.679 --> 00:47:25.039
Okay, you know, McFly, this is not a hard question Trump.
867
00:47:25.480 --> 00:47:28.239
Every one of them is saying Trump Trump Trump. I'm
868
00:47:28.280 --> 00:47:31.440
Trump's guy, I'm Trump's guy. Trump likes me, I'm with Trump.
869
00:47:32.400 --> 00:47:36.440
As shameless as Republican campaign ads have been in chasing
870
00:47:36.519 --> 00:47:41.960
after Trump fans in Republican primaries. I think this takes
871
00:47:41.960 --> 00:47:46.239
the cake, which is that is interesting that Trump has
872
00:47:46.280 --> 00:47:49.679
not endorsed. Notice that none of them say that they
873
00:47:49.840 --> 00:47:53.960
are Trump's candidate. They can only imply that they're Trump's candidate.
874
00:47:54.199 --> 00:47:55.039
How did they do that?
875
00:47:55.119 --> 00:47:55.280
Well?
876
00:47:55.320 --> 00:47:58.400
They do that with words on the screen that all
877
00:47:58.440 --> 00:48:02.239
of these candidates have things like pro Trump politician, which
878
00:48:02.320 --> 00:48:06.039
is on the Morris Longer ad, or one Trump warrior
879
00:48:06.159 --> 00:48:11.480
which is on the bar ad, you've got Trump's voice
880
00:48:11.719 --> 00:48:14.599
where they're saying good things. Trump is saying good things
881
00:48:14.599 --> 00:48:17.519
about the candidates. Obviously it's a little bit longer in
882
00:48:17.639 --> 00:48:20.559
Andy Barrs, but he's still saying something about Nate Morris.
883
00:48:20.559 --> 00:48:23.280
And you've got apparently Trump was at some rally where
884
00:48:23.320 --> 00:48:26.000
he called everybody out because it looks like the same picture,
885
00:48:26.400 --> 00:48:29.760
you know, the same podium, the same suit, and so forth.
886
00:48:31.960 --> 00:48:34.920
So what distinguishes these ads from one another. Well, first
887
00:48:34.920 --> 00:48:37.480
of all, in the short Morris ad, Don Junior's on
888
00:48:37.599 --> 00:48:42.039
as well, so you've got for the Trump fan, you've
889
00:48:42.079 --> 00:48:46.360
got Trump the president, but a younger demographic also likes
890
00:48:46.400 --> 00:48:50.000
Don Junior, so you've got the double whammy there. For
891
00:48:50.159 --> 00:48:53.159
the longer Morris ad, you've got an issue and that
892
00:48:53.199 --> 00:48:58.239
he's just laser on the hardest of hardcore position on immigration.
893
00:48:58.400 --> 00:49:02.599
Not only to deport every illegal alien who is here,
894
00:49:02.880 --> 00:49:05.960
and that clearly means doesn't matter whether you've committed a crime,
895
00:49:06.000 --> 00:49:08.079
if you're here illegally, you ought to go, but also
896
00:49:08.079 --> 00:49:12.920
a moratorium llegal immigration until one hundred percent of illegal
897
00:49:12.960 --> 00:49:16.280
immigrants are gone. Well, when there's fifteen to twenty million
898
00:49:16.360 --> 00:49:18.119
of them, that means that there's not going to be
899
00:49:18.159 --> 00:49:21.960
any legal migration for quite some time. That is a
900
00:49:22.119 --> 00:49:25.760
hardest of hardcore position, but it shows you where Morris
901
00:49:25.800 --> 00:49:28.119
is trying to campaign. He's trying to campaign to the
902
00:49:28.199 --> 00:49:32.480
right of bar and energize the most maga of maga
903
00:49:32.480 --> 00:49:35.280
on his side. And you see this also saying over
904
00:49:35.320 --> 00:49:38.440
and over again he's an outsider and a businessman like Trump.
905
00:49:38.519 --> 00:49:42.679
Outsider and a businessman like Trump. Then you get to
906
00:49:42.719 --> 00:49:47.280
the bar Ad. The bar Ad actually has no statements
907
00:49:47.599 --> 00:49:50.639
of issue position, but what you do has a very
908
00:49:50.920 --> 00:49:56.239
ingenious device, which is that apparently the crowd was chanting
909
00:49:56.239 --> 00:49:59.639
his name. So what you have is Trump standing there
910
00:50:00.039 --> 00:50:02.920
saying good things about Barr, and over and over again,
911
00:50:03.440 --> 00:50:06.840
what you hear is Andy Barr, Andy Barr, Andy Barr.
912
00:50:06.880 --> 00:50:10.320
I don't think I've ever seen as shameless of a
913
00:50:10.440 --> 00:50:13.639
name id ad as ever, which is to say that
914
00:50:13.719 --> 00:50:17.079
you probably hear Andy Barr's name between ten and twenty
915
00:50:17.159 --> 00:50:20.320
times in a thirty second ad because of the chanting device,
916
00:50:20.719 --> 00:50:23.800
and Trump's picture is on screen the entire time. You've
917
00:50:23.800 --> 00:50:26.719
got words on screen like one hundred percent Trump Warrior
918
00:50:26.840 --> 00:50:29.920
or Trump you know, Trump saying something about Andy Barr.
919
00:50:31.440 --> 00:50:35.199
So they're all trying to do the same thing, and
920
00:50:36.480 --> 00:50:39.800
the interesting question is who's going to succeed. Well, we're
921
00:50:40.119 --> 00:50:43.159
now I'm recording this first week of April. We're talking
922
00:50:43.159 --> 00:50:47.559
about a little bit under seven weeks to go. Lots
923
00:50:47.559 --> 00:50:50.840
of time for this race to develop. But I will
924
00:50:50.880 --> 00:50:55.360
say this the iron law of primaries. Well here comes
925
00:50:55.360 --> 00:50:58.480
back again to Henry's iron law of primaries. The iron
926
00:50:58.519 --> 00:51:00.519
law of primaries is that he can that it will
927
00:51:00.519 --> 00:51:03.960
always do better in an area they have represented than
928
00:51:04.000 --> 00:51:06.639
in areas that they haven't. So if what you have
929
00:51:06.800 --> 00:51:11.719
is Morris and Bar basically splitting the vote because they
930
00:51:11.719 --> 00:51:16.239
have equally effective ads, they won't split the vote in
931
00:51:16.320 --> 00:51:20.079
Bar six Congressional district. And Bar six Congressional district is
932
00:51:20.199 --> 00:51:23.239
more republic It's not the most republican congressional district, but
933
00:51:23.480 --> 00:51:27.199
more republican than at least the third which is the
934
00:51:27.280 --> 00:51:31.639
Democratic seat in Louisville. So it will cast more than
935
00:51:31.679 --> 00:51:34.000
one sixth of the primary vote. If you split the
936
00:51:34.039 --> 00:51:39.800
vote in the other five congressional districts, Daniel Andy Barr's
937
00:51:40.000 --> 00:51:43.119
home court advantage is going to win. That might be
938
00:51:43.199 --> 00:51:46.400
why Nate Morris is a little more intent a little
939
00:51:46.400 --> 00:51:50.159
more intense, a little more focused. He doesn't need to
940
00:51:50.239 --> 00:51:53.800
split the Trump vote or the Trump fan vote. He
941
00:51:53.840 --> 00:51:58.079
needs to win it decisively in order to overcome residual
942
00:51:58.159 --> 00:52:01.880
name id among the establishments port for Daniel Cameron and
943
00:52:02.039 --> 00:52:06.800
Barr's home court advantage. Six plus weeks to go, there'll
944
00:52:06.840 --> 00:52:10.960
be more ads. I expect we'll see a little bit
945
00:52:10.960 --> 00:52:13.639
of mud flying in this race, and people are probably
946
00:52:13.679 --> 00:52:18.000
holding their best snippets until closer to the election. You
947
00:52:18.039 --> 00:52:21.039
do not have a lot of early early voting. Kentucky's
948
00:52:21.039 --> 00:52:24.239
early voting is very short, so I expect this one
949
00:52:24.280 --> 00:52:26.280
to go down to the wire. But this is an
950
00:52:26.320 --> 00:52:30.559
interesting start. And the real Kentucky Derby is not going
951
00:52:30.599 --> 00:52:32.800
to be run at Churchill Downs. It's going to be
952
00:52:32.880 --> 00:52:36.880
run on May nineteenth in the Republican primary.
953
00:52:37.599 --> 00:52:38.599
That's it for this week.
954
00:52:38.880 --> 00:52:41.519
Join me next week as I come to you from Budapest,
955
00:52:41.719 --> 00:52:44.440
where I'll be covering Hungary's important election.
956
00:52:45.000 --> 00:52:46.400
Until then, let's reach
957
00:52:46.440 --> 00:52:56.400
For the stars together as we journey beyond the polls.