I assume you’ve all been getting out the vote. And donating to one of the organizations in the left sidebar. Maybe you’ve even voted already! OK, now let us take stock of late-breaking developments, which are a little unexpected.
All season I’ve thought that Beto O’Rourke (D-TX) wouldn’t come close to unseating Senator Ted Cruz (R). But the last week of surveys (end dates 10/29 or later, median of n=4 pollsters) show Cruz ahead by only 3.5 +/- 3.1%. That gives me pause.
The 3.1% uncertainty includes 3 points of systematic error by pollsters, based on past midterm elections. That’s a 3.5/3.1 = 1.1 sigma lead, which converts to odds of about 4-1 for Cruz. This is not a slam dunk. I think reports of Beto’s electoral demise are premature. I don’t know who will win, but it could be close.
And the other races? Here’s the last week of surveys (end dates 10/29 or later). Except for Tester, there’s a small but noticeable movement toward Team Blue. It looks like the Kavanaugh bounce has mostly ended.
There are five races within 1 sigma: Indiana, Florida, Arizona, Nevada, and Missouri. All except for Missouri show a slight lead for the Democratic candidate…but with individual win probabilities in the 0.2-0.8 range for either party.
The Meta-Margin is R+4.2%, i.e. overperformance by that much make control a perfect toss-up. Lucas Manning (PEC webmaster) and I will use this data to make a final update to the history tracker.
The systematic (i.e. correlated) error will be known after the election. In the Senate, it usually falls in the direction of Presidential (un)popularity. Democrats could well win all five races, including Missouri (or they could lose all five). If the former happens, that gets Democrats+Independents to 50 seats. In the other direction, an error favoring the President’s party is less likely but would lead to 45 D+I seats.
Of course, Democrats could also fall short. Easy to see that happening, especially in Montana, Missouri, and maybe Indiana. Now we know what Senate races to watch most closely!
And, to state the obvious: if all the close races were to fall the Democrats’ way, the Texas race would become very important indeed.
Nancy Palus, a freelance journalist with an impressive record covering democracy in developing countries, has decided to focus on elections in the United States. The result is Just Lines, a podcast with some pretty good guests so far – Katie Fahey of Voters Not Politicians, and redistricting guru Justin Levitt.
