Greetings from Team Optimism, where on the eve of the all-important midterm elections, it’s hard to see how it’s not going to be a good night for Republicans up and down the ticket, and for the republic.
Legend goes that the famous New York Yankees slugger once pointed to the flagpole beyond the centerfield fence in the 5th inning of Game three of the 1932 World Series against the Chicago Cubs. After taking strike two, Ruth again pointed to the flagpole. He hit the next pitch, a curveball, past the flagpole in centerfield, an estimated 490 feet.
While certainly not nearly as momentous as this moment in time was, here’s my humble, yet rosy predictions for what happen Tuesday night.
I’ve heard all the caution about tempering my enthusiasm. I was on the air with Hugh Hewitt, James Lileks, Ed Morrissey, and several others on Election Night, 2012, when we all just knew in our hearts that Mitt Romney was going to unseat Barack Obama after his first term because of blowback to the Obamacare jam down. We quickly realized how long a night of broadcast can be when the results began pouring in that not only were Republicans not going to win, but it wasn’t really that close. So I do understand the prudence in not getting one’s hopes too high.
This cycle is different. Polling has been, remains, and probably will in the future be as reliable as climate forecasts, but they do show trends and movement, or at the very least a squaring up to reality. And with a few exceptions, all the data points to the country pushing back at the radical left agenda forced upon them by Joe Biden and the Democratic Party. In addition, there’s been no mitigating factor in the news to give them a life raft with American voters. As I’ve said previously, when one party achieves the trifecta – messing with people individually, with their livelihoods, and with their children, they face the grim reaper, electorally speaking.
Governors – Although not focused upon nearly as much as the Senate and House races, certainly not in legacy media, there are going to be some surprises here. Going into tomorrow, the Republicans enjoy a clear advantage, controlling 28 states versus the Democrats’ 22. And it’s going to get better by a net 3 seats. Republicans will add governors in six states, and Democrats will add two.
The two Democratic pickups will be in Maryland and Massachusetts, two solid blue states that previously elected moderate Republican governors, but do not have similar moderates on the ballot this time, so those states are no longer in play. There are 11 toss-up races, all but one where Democrats are incumbents, and that’s where Republicans are going to pick up their five seats.
In Wisconsin, Tony Evers is under 50 in job approval, has been all year, and is down, albeit narrowly, to Tim Michels. Economics are a huge reason, but crime is just killing the Democrats there, and Evers seems unwilling to do anything about it. Mandela Barnes also on the ticket is not helping Evers one bit. In Oregon, Christine Drazan has been leading in the polls, largely on crime, education and economic issues, and is benefitting greatly from a 3rd party lefty on the ballot siphoning votes away from Tina Kotek.
In Nevada, Clark County Sheriff Joe Lombardo is a very charismatic and trusted figure in Nevada politics, and he is poised to unseat Steve Sisolak. Polling has been either at the outer edge of margin of error or beyond, and early voting thus far as reported by Nevada political guru Jon Ralston, is showing soft Democratic turnout in Clark County and huge Republican turnout in the rural areas. In Kansas, the Sam Brownback hangover that is Laura Kelly seems about over as the traditionally red state is about to return to normal by electing Derek Schmidt.
In Michigan, Tudor Dixon is on the threshold of ending the long national nightmare that is Governor Gretchen Whitmer. All the drama, all the lockdowns and mandates, all the incompetence, and all the crime and mismanagement seems to be finally catching up with Whitmer, and the debate with Dixon showed how smooth and competent Dixon is. And finally, in New Mexico, Michelle Lujan Grisham will succumb her seat due to crime, border issues, and corruption, and Mark Ronchetti will take her place as governor. Final score – Republicans net +4.
In the Senate, I’m equally as bullish as I am about the governor races, because the issue set Americans seems to be most concerned about, and on which they either have already voted or will on Tuesday, play into the Republicans’ hands. Going into this cycle, the map for Republicans was a daunting one, having to defend six more seats than Democrats, 20-14, and having to contend with six retirements to the Democrats’ one, meaning their hand is made weaker by fewer incumbents running. That said, here’s what I believe the landscape will look like when the votes are counted.
In Nevada, Adam Laxalt has consistently showed a lead over do-nothing Democrat Catherine Cortez Masto. Chuck Schumer is holding out hope, but he’s about the only one, as the vaunted Harry Reid machine seems to have died along with the former Senate Democratic leader. In Georgia, after a week-long wobble on whether or not Herschel Walker’s personal foibles would overcome him, a strong debate performance and a slum lord scandal Raphael Warnock cannot seem to untangle, have restored a fairly comfortable 4-point margin for Walker.
In Arizona, polling has consistently shown Blake Masters closing, tying, and just a couple days ago taking the lead in two separate polls. At this stage of the game, independents or late breakers aren’t going to go for Mark Kelly. They’ve been waiting to see if Masters is really up to this, and after the crime, the border issues, the economic disaster, all that Mark Kelly voted for and now claims he is “working on”, that race is about over. And Kelly is also saddled with Katie Hobbs at the top of the Arizona ticket. Even though he has tried to separate from her at every turn, the country’s worst candidate for any office, Hobbs, is a millstone around Kelly’s neck. In New Hampshire, in a race I thought unwinnable after the primary there, General Don Bolduc has turned in several terrific debate performances, and has been relentless in fine-tuning his message. Are you better off in New Hampshire than you were two years ago? If not, it’s Maggie Hassan’s fault, because she’s enabled Joe Biden with her vote on everything. It’s resonating, and New Hampshire doesn’t like what Joe Biden is dealing out at all. That’s GOP +4, with holds in Florida, Pennsylvania (yes, Oz will beat Fetterman, take it to the bank), Wisconsin, Missouri, and North Carolina.
My surprise race remains in Washington State. The best overall candidate the GOP has run for Senate in this cycle is Tiffany Smiley. In fact, you can’t run a better campaign than she has. Patty Murray is still under 50%, crime is rampant in Seattle, economics are no better there than anywhere else, and Smiley is within a point in polling. Even though it’s a vote-by-mail state, that’s my surprise pickup, making the final gain GOP+5. If the wave is a tsunami, Joe O’Dea in Colorado will make it +6. Trafalgar’s poll from Friday showed the gap closed to two, but I’m not convinced it’ll close fast enough. If Colorado voted on Election Day, I’d look there for an upset as well, but it’s also a vote-by-mail state, so I’m thinking O’Dea didn’t close the gap fast enough.
House races could run the gamut, but with a starting point of D-220 to R-212, there’s virtually no room for error for the Democrats. And they’ve been full of errors. The generic Congressional polls have been solidly favoring Republicans virtually all year, outside the margin of error. That number dipped to either a toss-up or a slim Democratic lead in the summer after the Dobbs decision was handed down by the Supreme Court, but corrected to Republican leads of outer edge of margin of error as the economy worsened and inflation increased. The current Real Clear Politics average is R+2.8. But the real kicker to this is historical performance.
With only a couple of exceptions, since 2002’s midterm cycle, the RCP average has missed the actual turnout of whichever party had the lead by at least a couple points, sometimes missing as much as 4. That’s not to say it’s anything RCP did wrong, it’s just that polling has tended to miss the strength of the wave in every Congressional election. And there’s always a wave of some kind. It can be a ripple, or it can be a tidal wave. But there’s always something that favors one side or the other, and polling has consistently missed the strength of that something. So if the current projection is +2.8, it’s probably actually is going to be over 5, maybe 6.
Anything north of Republicans plus five, according to Sean Trende at Real Clear Politics, and you find a levee that breaks on the Democratic side, meaning there’s a lot of seats that are in D+4 districts that are going to flip. My number is adding a net 38 seats, making the new Republican majority an even 250.
Pessimists, the floor is now yours. I’ll close with this. Let’s say I’m wrong. I’ve overestimated. We actually only add a couple governors, a couple Senate races, and 25 seats in the House. We’ve still had a good night, now controlling 60% of the state seats, and Republicans in Congress turning Joe Biden instantly into a lame duck. I just think the margins will be bigger, making Joe Biden lamer.
