Haunted by memories of 2016, liberals around the country are riven with anxiety in the campaign’s home stretch. They’re suspicious of favorable polls and making election night contingency plans in case their worst fears come true. Some report literal nightmares about a Democratic wipeout.

“We’re kind of just in the bed-wetting phase now,” said Democratic pollster John Anzalone, a Hillary Clinton campaign alumnus who spent election night 2016 in Clinton’s Manhattan war room.

Two years later, even thinking about the prospect of a repeat of that night’s letdown is still too much for many Democrats to bear.

“Stop it!” shouted Nadeam Elshami, a former chief of staff to House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, when asked about that possibility. To be fair, the possibility has literally haunted his dreams.