Texas (and other states') Elections 2018

[Radio Shack Killa 4,555]

1 hour ago, Lyle Lanley II said:

Wow, the way those people are attacking Cruz's wife, I'd expect he'll be begging them to come campaign for him two years from now.

 

 

[Radio Shack Killa 4,555]

Beto O'Rourke

 

✔@BetoORourke

US Senate candidate, TX

 

 

Not right that Senator Cruz and his wife Heidi were surrounded and forced to leave a restaurant last night because of protesters. The Cruz family should be treated with respect.

8:54 AM - Sep 25, 2018

[Army Frog Fan 1,818]

[Radio Shack Killa 4,555]

“The Sept. 30 debate between Senator Ted Cruz and Congressman Beto O’Rourke at the University of Houston has been postponed,” the college posted on Facebook Friday morning. “Senator Cruz will be in Washington, D.C. for weekend votes.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[SuperToad 2,247]

 

[Lyle Lanley II 2,153]

The early "lead" the O'Rourke had in terms of yard signs in Ridglea Hills has evened out with a bunch of Cruz signs being put out.  I've heard complaints on both sides of people having their signs destroyed.  Seems silly to me.

[DirtyThirdFrog 2,081]

12 hours ago, SuperToad said:

 

 

Ha. I know exactly where that is. Not surprising considering the neighborhood. 

 

But yeah. Destroying signs. Lame. For either side. 

 

 

 

[SuperToad 2,247]

In more serious news, the Texas Democrat Party just landed themselves in hot water:

 

https://m.washingtontimes.com/news/2018/oct/18/texas-democrats-ask-noncitizens-register-vote/

[Army Frog Fan 1,818]

50 minutes ago, SuperToad said:

In more serious news, the Texas Democrat Party just landed themselves in hot water:

 

https://m.washingtontimes.com/news/2018/oct/18/texas-democrats-ask-noncitizens-register-vote/

[angelosfrog 2,880]

Number crunching the Texas election over a taco bowl at lunch and came up with some interesting stuff.  I rounded some numbers here and there.

 

As of Wednesday night, 3,360,000 people have early voted in the 15 most populous counties in Texas (not including Travis County because they are one day behind).  That number has been growing by approximately 300,000 votes per day since the first two days of early voting.  Thus, it's probably safe to assume that about 3,950,000 people will cast early ballots in those 15 counties.  https://gallery.mailchimp.com/d3064a2fadaf6089dc58a8393/files/4d97b934-5c6f-4a3d-8c02-2aa44261e1ed/Statewide_Report_Day_10.01.pdf

 

As of yesterday for the top 30 counties in voter registration, 4,337,000 early votes had been cast.  https://www.sos.state.tx.us/elections/earlyvoting/2018/nov1.shtml

 

In 2014, the 15 most populous counties accounted for 64% of all votes cast in the 2014 senatorial election. So, if you assume that the 3,950,000 is 65% of the early vote (conservatively accounting for greater population growth in those counties since 2014), you can project that about 6,000,000 early votes will be cast in the 2018 election.  Given the 4,377,000 votes cast as of last night in the top 30 counties, that seems like a fair assumption.

 

In 2014, 1,700,000 early votes were cast in the top 15 counties.  Applying the 64% assumption, 2, 656,000 total early votes were cast.  Only 4,700,000 total votes were cast in 2014. 

 

The question is, how many people will go vote on Election Day.  In 2014, it was about 2 million.  Will we get 2 million on Tuesday or have most of the voters voted?  Or will we get even more?  In 2014, 55% of the people voted early.  If 45% of the total voters who are going to vote show up on Tuesday, we could get almost 5 million more voters on Tuesday. 

 

According to the New York Times, Cruz's people are telling them that Cruz is ahead by about 8% based on their internal polls. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/02/us/politics/beto-cruz-elections.html  

However, the internal polls only assume a turnout of a little over 6,000,000 and as we can see from the early voting data, that number is going to be way off. The actual turnout is likely to be somewhere between 8 million and 10 million.  FYI, just under 9 million voters voted in Texas in the 2016 presidential election. 

 

The most ten most recent public polls (newest to oldest) have Cruz ahead by 3.1, 5.0, 3.6, 10.0, 4.0, 6.0, 4.5, 4.0, 7.0 and 9.    All of these polls are from October.  You have to go back to September to find any that have Beto ahead or even.  It will interesting to see how this shakes out and whether a huge turnout will make a difference for in the senate election. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[DirtyThirdFrog 2,081]

I drove by 4 early voting locations in Harris County on Saturday. Crazy long lines at every single one of them. 

 

Dont early voting results post right when polls close on Tuesday? 

[NeFrog in the Kitchen Sink 1,309]

 

 

[NeFrog in the Kitchen Sink 1,309]

I'm going to guess the race ends up a 2-3% Cruz win.  Politico had an article on how O'Rourke messed up by not going to middle and trying to sell himself to Texas Republicans more:

 

https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2018/11/04/ted-cruz-beto-orourke-texas-senate-2018-election-222188

 

I don't know if I buy that argument.  He's doing way better than any Dem has done for years.  Hard to argue against his strategy too much. 

[frogtwang 3,170]

Just a mere coincidence. 

 

 

https://www.texasmonthly.com/politics/border-patrol-conduct-crowd-control-exercise-election-day/amp/?__twitter_impression=true

 

“The El Paso Sector U. S. Border Patrol will be conducting a crowd control exercise at the railroad crossing west of the Paso Del Norte Port of Entry on Tuesday, November 6, 2018,” the agency said in a news release. “The exercise will include participants and assets from the United States Border Patrol.”

“Our preparations are ongoing. There is no link to the election date,” said Customs and Border Protection spokesman Roger Maier. He provided a link to CBP Commissioner Kevin McAleenan’s October 29 statement about the agency’s preparations for the migrant caravan from Central America.

[Lyle Lanley II 2,153]

Looking forward to laughing at whichever party has a disappointing night tonight.

[Army Frog Fan 1,818]

1 hour ago, Lyle Lanley II said:

Looking forward to laughing at whichever party has a disappointing night tonight.

 

Exactly.  If there is a blue wave, I will be watching Foxnews.  If it is a ripple, I will be watching MSNBC.  Either way, I will enjoy my cocktails watching someone melt down.

[angelosfrog 2,880]

On 11/2/2018 at 3:29 PM, angelosfrog said:

Number crunching the Texas election over a taco bowl at lunch and came up with some interesting stuff.  I rounded some numbers here and there.

 

As of Wednesday night, 3,360,000 people have early voted in the 15 most populous counties in Texas (not including Travis County because they are one day behind).  That number has been growing by approximately 300,000 votes per day since the first two days of early voting.  Thus, it's probably safe to assume that about 3,950,000 people will cast early ballots in those 15 counties.  https://gallery.mailchimp.com/d3064a2fadaf6089dc58a8393/files/4d97b934-5c6f-4a3d-8c02-2aa44261e1ed/Statewide_Report_Day_10.01.pdf

 

As of yesterday for the top 30 counties in voter registration, 4,337,000 early votes had been cast.  https://www.sos.state.tx.us/elections/earlyvoting/2018/nov1.shtml

 

In 2014, the 15 most populous counties accounted for 64% of all votes cast in the 2014 senatorial election. So, if you assume that the 3,950,000 is 65% of the early vote (conservatively accounting for greater population growth in those counties since 2014), you can project that about 6,000,000 early votes will be cast in the 2018 election.  Given the 4,377,000 votes cast as of last night in the top 30 counties, that seems like a fair assumption.

 

In 2014, 1,700,000 early votes were cast in the top 15 counties.  Applying the 64% assumption, 2, 656,000 total early votes were cast.  Only 4,700,000 total votes were cast in 2014. 

 

The question is, how many people will go vote on Election Day.  In 2014, it was about 2 million.  Will we get 2 million on Tuesday or have most of the voters voted?  Or will we get even more?  In 2014, 55% of the people voted early.  If 45% of the total voters who are going to vote show up on Tuesday, we could get almost 5 million more voters on Tuesday. 

 

According to the New York Times, Cruz's people are telling them that Cruz is ahead by about 8% based on their internal polls. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/02/us/politics/beto-cruz-elections.html  

However, the internal polls only assume a turnout of a little over 6,000,000 and as we can see from the early voting data, that number is going to be way off. The actual turnout is likely to be somewhere between 8 million and 10 million.  FYI, just under 9 million voters voted in Texas in the 2016 presidential election. 

 

The most ten most recent public polls (newest to oldest) have Cruz ahead by 3.1, 5.0, 3.6, 10.0, 4.0, 6.0, 4.5, 4.0, 7.0 and 9.    All of these polls are from October.  You have to go back to September to find any that have Beto ahead or even.  It will interesting to see how this shakes out and whether a huge turnout will make a difference for in the senate election. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

More random election ramblings:

 

5.8 million early votes were cast in Texas so I was a little off on my projection of 6 million but not much.  Almost 4.9 were cast in the 30 most populous counties per the SOS.  The remaining 224 rural counties have 22% of the population but only accounted for 15.5% of the early votes.  I'm not sure if the rural areas will make that difference up on election day or not.  If they don't, that could be somewhat significant since Cruz will do much better there than he will in the urban counties.  However, Beto actually made an effort to campaign in rural areas.  Hillary generally got 25% or less of the vote in places like Tyler (27%), Lufkin (25%), Sherman (22%), San Angelo (24%), Abilene (22%), Midland/Odessa, Lubbock (29%) and Amarillo.  If Beto could get even 30-35% of the vote in some of those towns, that would be huge improvement.   A thousand votes here and there could add up at the end of the night.

 

We need to get a little over 3 million voters today to match the 2016 election totals and I think we can do that.  I'm not sure when, if ever, the vote totals in a midterm have exceeded the totals in a prior presidential election but if they do, I think you can probably throw out a lot of polling because I'm pretty sure the pollsters' "likely voter" model didn't account for a presidential year type turnout.  That's not to say that they might not get it right anyway but if they do it will be largely luck. 

 

Even with the crazy turnout numbers, I"m still predicting a 5% point spread between Cruz and Beto.  Give me Cruz 52, Beto 47 Libertarian guy 1.  I just don't think Beto ran as good a campaign as he could have with all the money he had.  I think Cruz was beatable but Beto was going to have to have a massive voter registration and turnout program among urban and border county Hispanic votes to win and I don't see that he did that.  The early voting numbers from the Valley, El Paso and Laredo are pretty underwhelming and Harris, Bexar and Dallas county numbers are good but not as good as Collin and Denton County.  One good piece of info for Beto from early voting is that by far the reddest large county in the state is Montgomery County and Montgomery had the lowest EV turnout of any of the big suburban counties.  Williamson, Collin, Denton and Ft. Bend were all between 46-49% and Montgomery was only 41%. Trump had 74% of Montgomery County but lost Ft. Bend, got 52% in Williamson, 56% in Collin and 58% in Denton.  For Beto to win, he has to hold Cruz to Trump like numbers or lower in those counties.  

[NeFrog in the Kitchen Sink 1,309]

4 minutes ago, angelosfrog said:

 

More random election ramblings:

 

5.8 million early votes were cast in Texas so I was a little off on my projection of 6 million but not much.  Almost 4.9 were cast in the 30 most populous counties per the SOS.  The remaining 224 rural counties have 22% of the population but only accounted for 15.5% of the early votes.  I'm not sure if the rural areas will make that difference up on election day or not.  If they don't, that could be somewhat significant since Cruz will do much better there than he will in the urban counties.  However, Beto actually made an effort to campaign in rural areas.  Hillary generally got 25% or less of the vote in places like Tyler (27%), Lufkin (25%), Sherman (22%), San Angelo (24%), Abilene (22%), Midland/Odessa, Lubbock (29%) and Amarillo.  If Beto could get even 30-35% of the vote in some of those towns, that would be huge improvement.   A thousand votes here and there could add up at the end of the night.

 

We need to get a little over 3 million voters today to match the 2016 election totals and I think we can do that.  I'm not sure when, if ever, the vote totals in a midterm have exceeded the totals in a prior presidential election but if they do, I think you can probably throw out a lot of polling because I'm pretty sure the pollsters' "likely voter" model didn't account for a presidential year type turnout.  That's not to say that they might not get it right anyway but if they do it will be largely luck. 

 

Even with the crazy turnout numbers, I"m still predicting a 5% point spread between Cruz and Beto.  Give me Cruz 52, Beto 47 Libertarian guy 1.  I just don't think Beto ran as good a campaign as he could have with all the money he had.  I think Cruz was beatable but Beto was going to have to have a massive voter registration and turnout program among urban and border county Hispanic votes to win and I don't see that he did that.  The early voting numbers from the Valley, El Paso and Laredo are pretty underwhelming and Harris, Bexar and Dallas county numbers are good but not as good as Collin and Denton County.  One good piece of info for Beto from early voting is that by far the reddest large county in the state is Montgomery County and Montgomery had the lowest EV turnout of any of the big suburban counties.  Williamson, Collin, Denton and Ft. Bend were all between 46-49% and Montgomery was only 41%. Trump had 74% of Montgomery County but lost Ft. Bend, got 52% in Williamson, 56% in Collin and 58% in Denton.  For Beto to win, he has to hold Cruz to Trump like numbers or lower in those counties.  

 

538 has the final margin at about 4.9, so that agrees with your gut. I tend to think more turnout will be better for Beto, but I can't see it go all the way to a win.  As I guessed above, I'm going with 2-3% Cruz win; I'll split the difference with 2.5.  

 

 

[angelosfrog 2,880]

Age

Age	2018 EAV	2014 Compare (days out)	2018 Share	2014 Compare Share	Share difference	2014 Compare % Change	% of Registered/Active	% of 2014 Total EAV	2018 Modeled Dems	2018 Modeled GOP	2018 Modeled Unclear	2014 Modeled Dems	2014 Modeled GOP	2014 Modeled Unclear
18-29	672,451	118,383	11.46%	5.06%	6.40% △	468.03% △	4.80%	28.77%	355,086	226,460	90,905	65,239	44,092	9,052
30-39	758,118	189,873	12.92%	8.12%	4.80% △	299.28% △	5.41%	32.43%	373,909	287,937	96,272	96,175	80,409	13,289
40-49	917,045	302,567	15.63%	12.94%	2.69% △	203.09% △	6.55%	39.23%	369,082	448,870	99,093	128,380	156,929	17,258
50-64	1,779,500	797,894	30.32%	34.14%	-3.82% ▽	123.02% △	12.71%	76.13%	609,368	1,040,749	129,383	285,875	473,799	38,220
65+	1,741,142	928,054	29.67%	39.70%	-10.03% ▽	87.61% △	12.44%	74.49%	560,844	1,086,887	93,411	291,908	583,463	52,683
Unknown	67	659	0.00%	0.03%	-0.03% ▽	-89.83% ▽	0.00%	0.00%	40	23	4	37	87	535

Race

Where self-reported race is not available, a TargetSmart model is used. 2018 and 2014 voter records have been classified using the same TargetSmart race model.

Race	2018 EAV	2014 Compare (days out)	2018 Share	2014 Compare Share	Share difference	2014 Compare % Change	% of Registered/Active	% of 2014 Total EAV	2018 Modeled Dems	2018 Modeled GOP	2018 Modeled Unclear	2014 Modeled Dems	2014 Modeled GOP	2014 Modeled Unclear
African-American	405,319	202,728	6.91%	8.67%	-1.76% ▽	99.93% △	2.89%	17.34%	360,480	30,645	14,194	181,599	16,052	5,077
Asian	105,712	21,921	1.80%	0.94%	0.86% △	382.24% △	0.76%	4.52%	47,066	37,075	21,571	9,970	9,548	2,403
Caucasian	4,200,956	1,782,506	71.59%	76.26%	-4.67% ▽	135.68% △	30.00%	179.73%	1,095,851	2,766,132	338,973	446,665	1,235,640	100,201
Hispanic	960,066	283,147	16.36%	12.11%	4.25% △	239.07% △	6.86%	41.07%	678,315	176,037	105,714	208,636	55,620	18,891
Other	1,411	546	0.02%	0.02%	0.00% ▽	158.42% △	0.01%	0.06%	554	716	141	181	321	44
Uncoded	194,859	46,582	3.32%	1.99%	1.33% △	318.31% △	1.39%	8.34%	86,063	80,321	28,475	20,563	21,598	4,421

Gender

Where self-reported gender is not available, a TargetSmart model is used.

Gender	2018 EAV	2014 Compare (days out)	2018 Share	2014 Compare Share	Share difference	2014 Compare % Change	% of Registered/Active	% of 2014 Total EAV	2018 Modeled Dems	2018 Modeled GOP	2018 Modeled Unclear	2014 Modeled Dems	2014 Modeled GOP	2014 Modeled Unclear
Female	3,184,650	1,249,993	54.27%	53.48%	0.79% △	154.77% △	22.75%	136.25%	1,397,744	1,494,232	292,674	520,967	655,257	73,769
Male	2,670,955	1,086,077	45.51%	46.46%	-0.95% ▽	145.93% △	19.08%	114.27%	863,744	1,593,232	213,979	346,180	683,220	56,677
Unknown	12,718	1,360	0.22%	0.06%	0.16% △	835.15% △	0.09%	0.54%	6,841	3,462	2,415	467	302	591

 

 

Top figures are for Texas EV.  Tweet at bottom for nationwide EV.  You gotta give Beto credit for getting the young voters to the polls in Texas.  In 2014, the 18-29 group was only 5.06% of the EV and the 30-39 group was only 8.12% of the EV.  In 2018, 18-29 was 11.46% and 30-39 was 12.92%.  That's an 11 point gain in % of votes cast.  The 50 and older group saw their % share decline by nearly 14%.  The 18-39 group nationwide saw gains but only 6.18% of share difference from '14.  You would have to assume that Beto deserves the credit for getting those young voters to the polls in Texas.  The Hispanic share also increased by 4% points, the Anglo share decreased by 4% points and Asians increased by 1% point.  Females also increased their share by 1% point over 2014.  First time voters increased from 3% of the vote to 8% of the vote. 

 

If these trends carry forward into the general election it could get interesting.  I can guarantee you that no one who has been polling has been looking for 25% of the likely voter respondents to be under the age of 30.  For example, the NYT Cruz/Beto poll from early October only had 8% of their responses from the 18-29 age bracket while the EV shows 11.5% of the voters in that bracket.  Of course not all of the younger voters will be Beto voters but 60% of them are according to the poll.

 

 

[Army Frog Fan 1,818]

Hey Beto and your texting minions:

 

[Lyle Lanley II 2,153]

No real big surprise, overall, so far tonight.  Republicans maintain their majority in the Senate, Democrats' chances of taking control of the House looking good (if you're a Democrat).  

 

I was surprised to see Pete Sessions lose.

 

Funny, though, that both parties will be trying to spin tonight as a win for them.  

[Army Frog Fan 1,818]

25 minutes ago, Lyle Lanley II said:

No real big surprise, overall, so far tonight.  Republicans maintain their majority in the Senate, Democrats' chances of taking control of the House looking good (if you're a Democrat).  

 

I was surprised to see Pete Sessions lose.

 

Funny, though, that both parties will be trying to spin tonight as a win for them.  

 

 

Which is why I turned off national news and went out.  No meltdowns tonight

[Lyle Lanley II 2,153]

Just now, Army Frog Fan said:

Which is why I turned off national news and went out.  No meltdowns tonight

 

There's actually a pretty good debate on CNN right now about what a Democratic-controlled House means for the next two years of Trump's presidency.  

 

Pretty good points going back and forth between Van Jones, David Axelrod and Rick Santorum.

[SuperToad 2,247]

1 hour ago, Army Frog Fan said:

Hey Beto and your texting minions:

 

 

Also:

[NeFrog in the Kitchen Sink 1,309]

Yeah things went about as predicted, individual races notwithstanding.  Biggest upsets according to pre-election probabilities were Oklahoma 5th district (6.6% chance that went Dem) NY 11 (20.3% chance that went Dem) and Florida Governor (23% that went Rep).  Other than the Oklahoma district, no real big, 3 TD underdog type upsets.