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Lakshya Jain Profile picture
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27 Jan, 4 tweets, 1 min read
I dunno, there was a pretty important election in Georgia like three weeks ago and I feel like we did okay in that...
Seriously, Trump won this district by 21 and Democrats lost it by 10.6 two months later. You can read a whole ton of random signals into a low-turnout special, but if you want to reconfirm doomerism, go ahead, I guess.

I honestly think it's a decent result.
Now, it's very true Miller-Meeks won it by 3% only in 2018.

So if you're looking for a sign of presidential changes now persisting at a higher rate in downballot races, this is also some type of validation for that.

There's a lot of cross-cutting signals here.
Last thing on this: the Republican lapped the Democrat in fundraising for this race. And those often have some serious impacts in these races (though the Democrat, Stewart, had higher name recognition because of 2018)

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More from @lxeagle17

Lakshya Jain Profile picture
27 Jan
Here's the problem with the recall for the GOP:

(a) Newsom has a ~58% approval rating in December, making a recall less likely (though not impossible). Gray Davis had a 24% approval.
(b) California is way more Democratic now than it was in 2003.
To the "Democrats will splinter the vote" field of thought: I don't know if this is as likely. The state Democratic party is far more coordinated, and I have yet to see anything that changes my mind about the GOP not splintering their own vote through 2 or 3 major candidates.
If this is to succeed, their best bet is to hope Newsom's approval tanks, that the vaccine rollout continues to lag instead of accelerating like it has been this week, and then get Faulconer as their only major candidate. Even that might not be enough. It's a very uphill climb
Read 4 tweets
Lakshya Jain Profile picture
22 Jan
"Aren't you worried about rural whites in the northwest getting galvanized by something soon and turning out for the GOP?"
"You assume they remember there's an election"

-a Georgia Dem in the know on Jan 1.

People really underestimate how tuned out of politics many areas are.
This is something I've tried to emphasize very often: the average Twitter user is far, far more tuned in to politics than most people are. Most of the nation doesn't even know who Jamal Khashoggi is, and that dominated Twitter for days.
Where am I going with this?

1) There are very few consequences for nuking the filibuster at the cost of governing, and the Democrats know this. I'd be surprised to see it stay. Checks matter, vote margins don't.
2) The same rural whites don't turn out in midterms for a reason.
Read 4 tweets
Lakshya Jain Profile picture
21 Jan
The problem with assuming an R+9 national environment is anything more than a tail probability is

(1) coalitions have changed and the realignment acceleration in 2010 really hurt Democrats. Opposite case here.

(2) The nation is now like a median D+3 in general.
If a red wave is to hit, here's what it consists of:

(1) differential turnout in suburbs leading to the Democratic base staying home
(2) large reversion with college+ whites
(3) continued struggles with Hispanics.

I'm skeptical of all of these things happening at once...
(1) That's a dangerous assumption to make that the Democratic base will be super depressed, especially given what we've seen proposed recently and given the fact that a new stimulus is planned.
(2) What from GA makes us think lots of reversion among college+ whites is coming?
Read 5 tweets
Lakshya Jain Profile picture
19 Jan
once again, in a strong parallel to real life, the world watches and waits on Washington with bated breath, praying nothing crazy happens #AUSvIND
WHAT IS HAPPENING ARE WE ACTUALLY GOING TO DO THIS
OMFG NO DID I JUST JINX IT
Read 5 tweets
Lakshya Jain Profile picture
18 Jan
"Democrats always hit 45% in South Carolina, but they never cross it because that's the threshold" ignores the fact that there's been a lot of variability in vote margins across counties...they just tend to cancel each other out! Here's the elasticity of the state from 2014-2020. Image
Something interesting, though, is that these changes appear to have stabilized a lot from 2016 onwards -- looking *only* at elections from 2016-20, we see that margins have begun to settle in. So a blue SC is some ways away. But Cunningham's district? That's perpetually close now Image
I think @kilometerbryman, @SenhorRaposa, and @JMilesColeman have talked about this in more detail with some of their maps and stats, but another classic case of this is Wisconsin. Close in 2004 (D+0.4), close in 2020 (D+0.6)...but with maps that look absolutely *nothing* alike. ImageImage
Read 4 tweets
Lakshya Jain Profile picture
10 Jan
Assuming a reversion to the GOP in the 2022 midterms just because Democrats hold a trifecta ignores
- increasing polarization and an increasingly inelastic electorate
- a favorable D Senate map
- a bad COVID recovery

You're as likely to see a 2002 midterm as you are a 2010 one.
It also ignores educational polarization, which has been the bread and butter of the change sustaining the Democratic Party's competitiveness in off-year cycles and elections. Suburbs are overrepresented in midterms, rurals in presidential years (of late).
What Nate Cohn taught us when our model was failing to capture the strength of Ossoff's early lead initially before the rebuild was that geographic correlation was a proxy of the shift in individual voting likelihood.

Even in small towns, voters with college degrees vote more.
Read 4 tweets

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