Maybe I am a fool to be hopeful about Joe Biden winning Texas, but the more I look at the early voting, the more optimistic I get. The best source I’ve seen for this is the Texas Tribune, which is a really underrated resource. Based on their information, it’s clear why the state has become a toss-up, and it’s almost hard to believe that Trump can really be ahead there, considering the youth vote, the shift in the suburbs, and number of new registrants voting, and the turnout in the big cities, particularly Houston.
Trump has to hope turnout in the Valley remains low (Kamala Harris visited the region on Friday) and that he gets both huge Election Day turnout and enormous support in the rural areas. Even if the president ekes out a narrow victory, GOP strength in Texas will be isolated, and that’s going to be reflected in the legislature.
To make a comeback, the Republicans will need to win back suburban support, because if they don’t this will be the last election cycle in which they’ll be competitive. The Lone Star State has changed forever.
Supposedly if Texas surpasses 11 million total votes, it flips. They are at 9,66x,xxx right now. Early voting closed Friday. All that’s needed (supposedly) is over 2 million in person voters Tuesday. I think it flips
Lawyers, Guns, and Money crunched some numbers, and Trump is in a big big hole.
https://www.lawyersgunsmoneyblog.com/2020/10/how-high-will-turnout-be-in-the-2020-election-and-how-will-it-matter
Martin, of all the things you’ve nailed, you hit the nail right on the head on the issues Trump will have by disparaging vote by mail. If the CNN poll has it right on early voting (63% Biden), this election is over. There just are not enough voters left.
The numbers are crazy.
https://www.lawyersgunsmoneyblog.com/2020/10/early-voting-totals-continue-to-be-off-the-charts
These people aren’t showing up to show their support for Trump. They’re showing up to get rid of him.
“It’s tough to make predictions, especially about the future”. And especially after getting burned in 2016. It would be great if Texas flips, but I’m not breaking out the bubbly just yet. We’ll need not just a blue wave, but a a blue tsunami to overcome voter suppression and skullduggery, some of which we probably don’t even know about yet.
As Booman recognizes in his opening clause, this falls into the “I’ll believe it when I see it” category. There is also the problem that should TX (and/or FL) become even remotely a non-lock for Repubs, then the “conservative” movement would simply cease to exist as a national political party (to the extent it can even be considered one now.) This is something that is outside the universe of “conservative” reality, and thus cannot exist. Generally, things that can’t happen, don’t.
But it is very clear that if should Biden eke out wins in TX and/or FL outside the recount margin, then the announced strategy of Trumpolini and Roberts’ Repubs to throw the election to Trump via a Trump v. Biden manuever is doomed. This is because Trump v. Biden (as envisioned) is focused on reversing an existing constitutional precedent and then illegitimately throwing out millions of “late” arriving absentee ballots in WI, PA, MN and NC, thus “keeping” the breach open in the Blue Wall. But obviously it simply assumes that Trump wins FL and TX (and all other 2016 Trump states, for that matter).
This absentee ballot gambit can’t work in TX, and that means that more traditional means of vote suppression must be the key for Repubs in TX and FL. If TX “conservatives” actually don’t succeed in suppressing enough in-person voting by Dems, then it’s hard to see what sort of case they can bring up to the corruptly partisan “conservative” 5th Circuit (or in FL, the equally corrupt 11th Circuit). Perhaps Trumpite white militia violence on election day in Dem precincts, as was seen just yesterday when Trumpite Monster Trucks waylaid a Biden bus en route to a rally in Austin? Can TX Trumpite camo-militia walk around brandishing AK-47s at Dem-heavy polling places, as the Repub courts in MI just ruled that Trump brownshirts can do up there? TX Repubs and their militias are not going to go quietly into that good night.
Most likely, after election day chaos orchestrated by Trump, Repubs hold TX and FL by a close count and the election comes down to the fascist High Court method that Kavanaugh, Alito and Gorsuch have already announced for the upcoming case of Trump v. Biden. That case will make Bush v. Gore appear a model of principle, and will be America’s Reichstag Fire. The question is, what will the people (i.e. the majority) do then?
And it now appears that TX Repubs have brought an action to have 100,000 (likely Dem) votes thrown out in Harris County due to being done via “curbside voting”. The case was given to one of the worst rightwing conservative hacks in the federal judiciary. Seems a little late in the game to challenge the legality of something like this, but the law and precedent is not how “conservative” activists masquerading as “judges” decide election law cases….
Watch the votes get discarded on November 4th, just in time to ensure that the people who cast them don’t have a chance to vote at all.
That is the Republican Party from here on out. This country is in absolute danger until the Republican party no longer exists.
I really don’t know anything about whether we will take TX. The turnout is absolutely massive, but the rural counties are so Trumpian and the white vote is very inelastic there. Nate Cohn combing through the data tomorrow, which he said he’d do, should give us a hint as to what the deficit that Trump needs to make up is, and how much of a wall the suburbs need to put up.
More surprising to me is that it seems we are highly likely to flip GA. Biden’s own internals had him +3 there a couple of weeks ago, and the momentum seems with him there, and NC+GA+AZ will do it for us to get to 270 (MN should report early, and NC is as close to a lock as possible to estimate from early vote, IMO).