We’ve reached a new phase in the campaign now where I can begin to look at a few new things to help provide added context to the poll numbers. Before I start here, I want to tell you that I do believe that the average of polls is probably going to be accurate nationally and in individual states. This will probably be truest of the most robust (weighted) averages that take into account individual poll bias and history, like Nate Silver’s analysis. So, if Nate Silver is saying, for example, that Obama is going to lose Florida, I am not going to make up some magic argument for why he is wrong. At most, I’ll show you some reason to hope he’s wrong.
There are two states I want to discuss in that vein today. The first is Nevada. Nate Silver projects that Obama will win the state 50.6%-48.2%. That’s pretty close. I think Obama may very well do much better than that. The reason is, of course, the ground game. It has paid enormous dividends.
The final voter registration report is here. And here’s what’s in it:
– Statewide, Nevada Democrats now have a 90,187 raw vote advantage. And yes, that makes for a 7.17% advantage. Back in March, Democrats only had about a 4% statewide edge. And it was even smaller earlier this year.
– In Washoe County, Republicans’ voter registration edge has narrowed even further. It’s now a mere 1,169 raw votes, or 0.005%. In March, Republicans had a 1.76% edge.
– In Clark County, Democrats are closing with a 127,471 raw vote lead, or a 14.96% advantage. In March, Democrats had an 11.68% advantage countywide.
– In NV-03, Democrats are closing with a 7,066 raw vote lead, or a 2.11% edge. In March, Republicans actually had a tiny 0.01% edge.
– In NV-04, Democrats are closing with a 41,094 raw vote lead, or a 13.27% advantage. In March, Democrats had a 9.91% advantage.
This is the Obama for America machine in action. They absolutely crushed the Republicans in “anytime, anywhere” voter registration, wiping out or reversing GOP advantages in federal and state districts throughout the state. And they are very ready to get these new voters to the polls. What’s unclear is whether or not the pollsters are accounting for this boomlet in their likely voter screens.
That’s also a question people should be asking about in North Carolina. The polls have been looking grim there lately and Nate Silver is only giving Obama a 17% chance of winning the state. That means he probably will not win the state. But let’s take a look at something.
North Carolina began in-person early voting on Thursday, and oh what a difference a day makes. In one day, over 150,872 people voted in-person, which is the Democrats preferred method of early voting in North Carolina. The party registration numbers were upended. As of Wednesday, registered Republicans outnumbered Democrats 52 percent to 27 percent and as of Thursday, Democrats outnumber Republicans 47 percent to 35 percent. But before we call North Carolina for Obama, registered Democrats had healthy early vote leads in 2008 and 2004.
North Carolina has an innovation unavailable elsewhere. In-person early voting is called “one stop” voting in the state because a person can register and vote all in one stop at an early voting polling location. Over 100,000 people took advantage of this in 2008. Unregistered voters don’t even make registered voter poll screens, much less likely voter screens. It will be worthwhile to watch if one stop voting moves the North Carolina polling as early voting progresses.
In this case, you can look back at 2008 and the 100,000 voters who registered to vote when they went to vote, and you can assume that at least that many people will do the same this year. And none of those voters should get through a likely voter screen.
To be more precise, only those newly registered voters who have already voted (since voting started on Wednesday) are going to get counted in polls. None of them are likely to have been contacted in the polls we’re seeing today, and if they were, they weren’t counted because they weren’t registered.
Everyone knows that Obama has the superior ground game but the advantage they can get out of their ground game varies according to the rules in each state. In North Carolina, anyone who is eighteen can be dragged off the street and brought to a polling place where they can register and vote. That makes having a stronger ground game a much bigger advantage than it is here in Pennsylvania where we have no early voting and registration closed over two weeks ago.
So, I will be keeping my eye on early voting numbers in a few states and I’ll be making comparisons to 2008 to see if Obama is performing better or worse than he did last time around. Some states are more likely to surprise the pollsters than others, and Nevada and North Carolina are at the top of that list.
