We'll be releasing our two weeks out analysis of the early vote in VA shortly. The short version is that there are largely good signs for Dems, but some important areas of underperformance that will need to be addressed in the remaining 13 days.
I'll flag now, one of the most concerning areas of turnout underperformance in VA is among young voters. Voters <30 account for less than half of their 2020 vote share at this point (5.2% vs 10.7%) and slightly more than half their '17 share (9.8%).
In Albermarle County (home to UVA), voters under the age of 30 are underperforming even more severely: accounting for only 4.8% of votes cast thus far, compared to 12.5% at this point in '20 and 12.8% in '17.
To state the obvious: these last 13 days will be decisive in this election. We'll have more analysis to share shortly.
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This is a thoughtful exploration of what seems to be the hot political twitter subject of the week. I'll share my own, less well-organized thoughts here.
First, the Shor conclusion that Dems are facing massive structural hurdles in the Senate/electoral college is inarguable, along with the notion that Dem campaigns need to empower a more diverse generation of leaders.
Unfortunately, I think some of the reporting on Shor's worldview has created a caricature of Dem campaign messaging being driven by a group of 20-something year old wildly liberal staffers. The messaging from most campaign ads is driven by the pollster (who is not 20-something).
This will come across as pedantic, but I believe it's important: We need to stop talking about how groups "swung" from one election to another, as if it's the exact same people voting in each election, especially when talking about voters of color.
First, let me say I am likely as guilty of this as anyone. But as an example, many are talking about how Latino voters swung by 8 or 9% towards the GOP from '16 to '20 (citing the Shor interview here, which I mostly agree with) nymag.com/intelligencer/…
Does this mean that 8 or 9% of Latino Clinton voters supported Trump? Nope. It means that if you compare Clinton's support from Latino voters to Biden's, the difference appears to be about 8 or 9 pts. The trick is, these are two different pools of voters (with a large overlap).
In the first few days after the election, some pointed to partial results in Philly as evidence that Black voters had swung to Trump. Now we have the individual vote history and can say that almost certainly didn't happen.
The early results showed a lower overall turnout and better Trump performance than the final certified results. In the end, Trump outperformed his '16 share by 2.5 pts. Biden ran 1.1 pts behind Clinton. So, was this gap narrowed due to Black voters going for Trump? Probably not.
Now that we have individual vote history we can see how the electorate in '20 differed from '16: 9k fewer Dems voted in Philly than did in '16, while GOP turnout increased by almost 4k. The Dem vote share dropped by 1.4 pts (more than Biden's 1.1 pt lag behind Clinton).
Clay County, GA is a rural African-American county. It turned out at 91.2% of general election turnout, higher than any GOP county I have seen report so far. The rural Black vote came out.
Macon County, another rural African-American county, turned out at 92% of their general election turnout. I am yet to find an encouraging sign for the GOP.
Randolph County, GA, another rural African-American county, turned out at an astounding 96% of general election turnout. We saw this in the early vote - as Black voters accounted for 40% of the non-general election early voters. Just incredible.
Ready to overreact to small sample sizes? Miller County, GA is one of the few reporting complete results. It is heavily GOP and the total vote is 74% of general election turnout (compare that to 85% reported by Fulton). A very small, but not good sign for the GOP.
Wayne County, GA (also heavily GOP) turned out at 79% of general election turnout. Again, if the reports of Fulton at 85% and DeKalb at >90% are accurate, the GOP cannot like these numbers.
Brantley County turned out at 86% of GE turnout. Better for the GOP than the other 100% reporting GOP counties, but still not the overwhelming margins the GOP will need. A long ways to go with this race still, these are just breadcrumbs.
Where do things stand in Georgia as we head into Election Day? First the TLDR version - through historic levels of turnout for a runoff election, with African-American voters leading the way, Dems can win both seats. But it will take one more day of high Dem turnout. Thread:
First, turnout by party. Using modeled partisanship, Dems improved upon their general election early vote share by 2.8 pts. In terms of raw votes, the Dem margin in modeled party is approx. 206k votes better than the general election (when Perdue ran 88k votes ahead of Ossoff).
How have Dems built an advantage in the early vote? Historic turnout from African-American voters. They increased their share of the early vote by 2.9 pts relative to the general election. White college voters increase by 0.1 pts. Meanwhile, white non-college turnout has lagged.