This Week In Polling!
Less than 90 days until the midterm election and Democrats are still bucking the conventional political wisdom
I’m Michael A. Cohen, and this is Truth and Consequences: A no-holds-barred look at the absurdities, hypocrisies, and surreality of American politics. If you received this email - or you are a free subscriber - and you’d like to subscribe: you can sign up below.
Just a quick reminder that I’ll be Zoom Chatting tomorrow at 12:30 in what will likely be my last Zoom Chat of the Summer (tear emoji). Here’s the link. I’m on vacation starting Sunday — hiking in Utah with my kids and then a sojourn to the West Coast for some rest and relaxation. I’ll still be newsletter-ing but on a more limited schedule.
Polls, Polls, Polls!
Election Day 2022 is 82 days away! Midterm elections traditionally favor the non-incumbent party, and an unpopular president usually drags down the party in power.
And Joe Biden is not popular:
So with that in mind, let’s check in and see how things are going for the Republican Party.
First, let’s take a look at Wisconsin, where incumbent Republican Senator Ron Johnson is seeing reelection.
Oof.
The Marquette Law School poll is considered a top-tier Wisconsin survey. It’s bad enough that Johnson is losing, but Barnes above 50% is the kind of result that could be a big problem for Johnson. First, any incumbent below 50% is in trouble because traditionally undecided voters break for the challenger. Second, to win Johnson not only needs to improve his own standing, but he’ll have to also persuade some voters already favoring Barnes to change their minds. In fact, when looking at polls, the 50% marker is often a better indication of the direction of a race than the actual gap between the two candidates. So paradoxically, a candidate would likely rather be up 51-47 (a four-point gap) than leading 45-39 with a ton of undecided voters, especially if it’s an incumbent.
Considering that Johnson has run a very hard-right campaign (i.e, one focused on mobilizing GOP voters rather than persuading Democrats and independents), he looks to be in major trouble. Already, he’s one of the most unpopular incumbents in the country.
Where do things stand in Pennsylvania?
My God … that is a horrendous poll for Oz and the GOP’s gubernatorial candidate, Doug Mastriano. I seriously doubt that Fetterman is up this much, but then again, it may not be that far off either. This is the polling trend from fivethirtyeight.com.
Fetterman has raised significantly more money, Oz is deeply unpopular among PA voters, and he’s constantly getting trolled by Fetterman on Twitter. I struggle to see how Oz wins, and considering that a Fetterman win will flip a seat from red to blue, it will make it very hard for Republicans to win back the Senate.
How about Ohio?
So this is good news (ish) for Republicans: it’s the first poll in weeks that has Vance ahead, and Emerson is a respected pollster. Still, the gap between Vance and Gov. Mike DeWine, who is seeking reelection, is striking. Even more noteworthy is Vance’s underperformance relative to the generic ballot and Trump’s support in the state. This speaks both to Vance’s weakness as a candidate and his opponent, Rep. Tim Ryan’s strength. Republicans are clearly worried about the race as news broke this week that a PAC linked to Republican leader Mitch McConnell is spending $28 million in pro-Vance ads this Fall. I expect Vance to win, but this race is looking surprisingly close.
Then there is Georgia, where the trend lines all seem to be favoring Democratic incumbent Sen. Raphael Warnock.
In addition, a new poll in Florida has Rep. Val Demings up by 4 over incumbent GOP Senator Marco Rubio. In North Carolina, Democrat Cheri Beasley has a tiny lead over Republican Ted Budd in the 538 polling average. In Arizona, incumbent Democratic Senator Mark Kelly is leading his challenger Blake Masters and in most recent polling, is at or above 49 percent. Rubio and Budd will likely win, but if Kelly keeps his seat (which looks increasingly likely). it’s going to be very hard for Republicans to win back the Senate. They would need to win in Arizona, hold on to Wisconsin and Ohio, and then pick up a Democratic seat — the most likely one being either Georgia or Nevada.
By the way, don’t sleep on Nevada, where Democratic incumbent Catherine Cortez Mastro is polling well below 50 percent:
I’m a big believer in the Nevada Democratic turnout machine, so I think Cortez Mastro probably wins, but she might be the most vulnerable Democratic incumbent in the country.
Quality Over Quantity
One of the interesting takeaways from these recent numbers is that candidate quality still matters.
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