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Tag Archives: Indiana
The Midterms — Preview (Part 1)
We are into the home stretch of the campaign. This election comes down to those who want to protect women’s rights, LGBQT rights, our democracy, the middle class, and the safety of our streets on one side against those who want to undermine the concept of free and fair elections and impose an authoritarian theocracy on the other side. The midterm elections are more like parliamentary elections in other countries. There is no national race and winning is about the results of multiple state and local races.
As in 2020, there is expected to be a large number of votes by mail. Some states have changed their laws to allow counting of mail-in ballots to start earlier, but some still require the process of verifying and counting mail-in ballots to begin on election day. So there will be some states in which the Republican candidate will take an early lead based on the in-person votes, but the Democrat candidate will close that gap (and potentially take the lead) as the mail-in votes are counted. On the other hand, in states that announce mail-in and early voting results first, the opposite will occur.
These previews will go in the order of poll closing times. In states that are in two time zones, some states will release results as polls close. Others will hold off on releasing results until all polls close. If I know that a state holds off until all polls close, I will put the state in the time when the last polls close. Otherwise, I will put the state in when the majority of the polls close. I will list the time by Central Standard Time as that is my time zone. For ease of conversion, CST is UTC +8 (i.e. it is 8 p.m. UTC when it is noon CST), Atlantic ST +2 (2 p.m AtST for noon CST), Eastern ST +1 (1 p.m. EST for noon CST), Mountain ST -1 (MST 11:00 a.m. for noon CST), Pacific ST -2 (PST 10 a.m. for noon CST), Alaska ST -3 (9 a.m. AkSt for noon CST) and Hawaiian ST -4 (8:00 a.m. HST for noon CST).
Posted in Elections
Also tagged Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, North Carolina, Ohio, South Carolina, Vermont, Virginia, West Virginia
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Election Night Preview — Part 1 (6 PM to 8 PM EST)
Election Night in the U.S. is always different from how things play out in most other countries. The U.S. is one of a handful of countries that have more than two time zones. And, in most of those other countries, all areas within the same time zone close at the same time. Voting hours in these countries are set by federal law. In the U.S., however, voting hours are set by state law. And that creates a weird sequence of poll closing times.
In addition, poll closing times are, in some sense, tentative. While you need to be in line to vote by the time that polls close, anybody in line to vote gets to vote. For states that close in the early evening, long lines at closing time are nor unusual as there is not much of a window to vote after getting home from work resulting in many people attempting to vote after work still being in line when the polls cloase. And there is always the possibility of an emergency order permitting certain precincts to stay open late to compensate for problems earlier in the day. Even after polls close, many jurisdictions use a centralized counting location. That means that there is a lag time between the polls closing and the ballots getting to the counting location. In my county, the closest precincts are still only getting to the county seat about thirty minutes after polls close and the far edges of the county are getting there around an hour after the polls close. As a result, it typically takes ninety minutes for my small (eighteen precinct) county to report all of the results. Large urban counties can take three to four hours to report all of their election night results. This delay in reporting (which is pretty much the same in most states) is one thing that traditionally makes it difficult to project result. If the three largest counties in a state have only reported 10% of the vote while the rest of the state is 80% in, there is still a large number of votes that can change who wins a close race.
The other issue that will impact this election is the number of mail-in votes. As we have previously discussed, every state has different rules for counting mail-in votes. In most states, early in-person votes will be released around the same time (if not before) the election day votes, but mail-in votes will be reportedly differently in different states. As such, with each state, the big questions will be: 1) is the reported vote just the early vote or also the election day vote; 2) if we have full early vote and partial election day vote, how much does the election day vote differ from the early vote; and 3) how much of the mail-in vote has been counted and how much may remain to be counted or still be “in the mail”? The early count from a state may appear to be lopsided, but — without knowing the answers to these questions — it will be more difficult to determine if we have enough of the vote counted to know who is going to win. In states that are used to large mail-in vote totals, it is not unusual to not know the winner of the closest race for a day or two after the election as we finally get enough mail-in votes counted.
Posted in Elections, General Election Forecast
Also tagged Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, North Carolina, Ohio, South Carolina, Vermont, Virginia, West Virginia
Comments Off on Election Night Preview — Part 1 (6 PM to 8 PM EST)
2018 Mid-Term Election Preview — The Great Lakes
The Great Lakes region has some opportunities for Democrats, but those opportunities are mostly in races for Governor due to the way that Republicans in the region drew congressional district lines after 2010.
Starting in Kentucky, there is no race for Governor or Senator. Republicans currently have a five to one advantage in the congressional delegation. Right now, Democrat Amy McGrath is a slight favorite to pick-up the Sixth District from the Republican incumbent.
In Ohio, it looks like the Democrats are in pretty good shape to hold its Senate seat. The race for Governor appears to be too close to call. Ohio is another state where gerrymandering has led to a very distorted congressional delegation. Republicans currently hold twelve of sixteen seats. The Democrats have a decent shot (but are still underdogs) in the rematch of the recent special election in the Twelfth District. The Democrats have outside shots in five districts, but it is almost certain that, even while possibly losing the state-wide vote, Republicans will control the majority of the Ohio seats in the next Congress.
Posted in Elections, General Election Forecast
Also tagged 2018 mid-term elections. U.S. House, Governor, Illinois, Kentucky, Michigan, Ohio, U.S. Senate, Wisconsin
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Primary Season — Late Spring
Because each state gets to set its own primary date, primary season is a gradual thing. Putting aside a handful of exceptions (and run-offs), most primaries fall into two clusters. The first cluster occurs in May and June (starting on May 8 and ending on June 26). The second cluster occurs in August and September (starting on August 2 and ending on September 13). During both clusters, most primaries occur on Tuesday, and there is at least one state on each Tuesday (other than May 29).
On May 8, there are primaries in Indiana, North Carolina, Ohio, and West Virginia. Key primaries are the Republican Senate primary in Indiana and West Virginia. Both are states won by Trump in which Democratic Senators are running for re-election. In Indiana, you have three candidates running for the Republican nomination. It’s not clear that it really matters who wins or that there is much difference between the candidates. West Virginia is a different matter. The Republicans are scared to death that Don Blankenship could get the nomination. Blankenship is the former CEO of one of the state’s larger coal miner and did time in prison related to miners who died due to unsafe mining practices. The national GOP has (through super-pacs) been running adds against Blankenship. In Ohio, the key races are for Governor with both parties having primaries in the race to replace term-limited John Kasich and Ohio’s 12th District in which there is both a regular primary and a special election primary (most of the candidates are the same in both, so both parties should have the same winner for both primaries, but there is always the chance in a close race that there could be a split result).
On May 15, there are primaries in Idaho, Nebraska, Oregon, and Pennsylvania. The big story is likely to be the new congressional districts in Pennsylvania. Amazingly, there are no incumbent against incumbent primaries although there could be an incumbent against incumbent general election. Given the newness of the lines, it will be interesting to see how the local interests will influence the candidates chosen.
Posted in Democrats, Elections, GOP, House of Representatives, Senate
Also tagged California, Colorado, Don Blankenship, Maine, Mid-term elections, Mitt Romney, Nevada, New York, Ohio, Pennyslvania, Primaries, Texas, Utah, Virginia, West Virginia
1 Comment
Election Night 2016 — What to Look for (Part Two)
As with many other details of election law, each state gets to choose their voting hours on election day. Thus, unlike a place like the United Kingdom where all polls close at the same time and when results are announced is a matter of how long it takes to count the vote, there is a slow progression across the country as the different states close. A complicating factor is that some states are split down the middle by time zones. In most of the states with multiple time zones, the polls close based on the local time (i.e. the polls in the eastern part of the state close an hour earlier than the polls in the western part of the state) rather than all polls in the state closing simultaneously. Another complicating factor is that all states only require that you be in line to vote at the time that the polls close; so, in larger precincts, there can be a long line delaying the report of votes from that precinct. As noted in Part One, part of the projection process is looking at what precincts are still outstanding. In a close state, the long lines at urban precincts (which are likely to favor Democrats) can make it hard to figure how strong the Democratic vote in a state is for an extended period.
In terms of interest, not every state is the same. A lot of states and districts are considered “safe” for President or Senate or Governor or U.S. Representative. Of course, if something surprising happens in those areas, it could be a sign of a wave developing, but most of the attention will be focused on the “battleground” areas that will decide a close election. What follows in the rest of this part and the rest of this series is a review in chronological order of closing time (using Eastern Standard Time) at what to look for as the evening progresses.
Posted in Elections, General Election Forecast
Also tagged Florida, North Carolina, Ohio, Virginia
Comments Off on Election Night 2016 — What to Look for (Part Two)