The Impact of Advertising Campaigns in Battleground States: The Case for a Republican-Leading Senate Democratic Electoral Candidate
Exactly one month until Election Day, Republicans remain favored to take over the House in November, but momentum in the pitched battle for the Senate has seesawed back and forth as a multimillion-dollar avalanche of advertising has blanketed the top battleground states.
A set of countervailing political forces may have contributed to the closeness of this year’s midterm elections, according to the current results of the national exit poll conducted for CNN and other news networks by Edison Research. It is not certain who will control the Senate or the House next year with votes still being counted and key races yet to be decided.
The Republican senate candidates are a cause for concern for many voters in battleground states where they view them as extreme, unqualified or both. Recent public polls by CNN and other media organizations have found that more voters hold unfavorable than favorable views of virtually all the GOP nominees in the key states – including Blake Masters in Arizona, Herschel Walker in Georgia, Adam Laxalt in Nevada, Don Bolduc in New Hampshire, J.D. Vance in Ohio, Mehmet Oz in Pennsylvania and Sen. Ron Johnson in Wisconsin. Negative assessments of the Democratic candidates in those states have been rising as well, as they face a barrage of Republican attack ads, often tying them to Biden. Even so, in most (though not all) cases, voters hold a relatively more favorable view of the Democratic candidate than the Republican, polls show.
This tension is connected to the double negative election in which most voters are not positive about each party. The impact of it can be seen in the ad strategies of the two sides. Republicans have spent a lot of money tying Democratic candidates to Biden, but Democrats have focused much of their messaging on raising doubts about their Republican counterparts, particularly on abortion and personal ethics. Republicans are trying to nationalize Senate races while Democrats are trying to make them their own.
More voters are tuning into the election and Republican enthusiasm has outpaced Democrats’. Republicans have increased their enthusiasm by more in that time, which is why Democrats aren’t gaining in their enthusiasm levels.
A vice president at Way to Win, which focuses on campaigns and candidates of color, said that stressing the risk to abortion rights can increase turnout among liberal-leaning groups. She mostly agrees that many persuadable voters who would move to Democrats around the abortion issue have already done so, and that the party should make sure it has a competitive message in the final weeks of the campaign. “The reality is everybody is always going to be focused on the things that are affecting their everyday life,” she says. I think it is a false choice to be thinking of the economy or abortion.
The Clinton-Biden War on Social Issues: How the Dems are Misleading the Biden Campaign to Build a Sea Wall against Economic Discontent
There is a difference between the two men. In multiple states, his approval rating went above 50% on election day, according to exit polls. Trump was at 50% or more in all four states where Republican challengers beat Democratic Senate incumbents.
Voters are narrowly more likely to say that Republican candidates near them have a clear plan for solving the country’s problems (32%) than they are to say the same about Democratic candidates (28%). Republicans are more likely to see their own party candidates as having a plan for fixing the problems than Democrats are. 42% of the nation’s voters say neither party’s candidates has a plan for solving problems.
Democrats everywhere are trying to get the attention of the people about issues of rights and values, but they are also making sure to know about the threat posed by Trump and his movement. Since June, as CNN recently reported, Democratic candidates have spent over $130 million on abortion-themed ads, vastly more than Republicans.
In the long run, the most important of these may be the argument that the incentives for domestic production embedded in the three central Biden legislative achievements will encourage domestic production and lead to a boom in US employment.
But those plant openings are mostly still in the future and only a few Democrats (such as Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, Arizona Sen. Kelly, and Ohio Senate candidate Tim Ryan) are emphasizing those possibilities this year.
More commonly, Democrats are stressing legislation the party has passed that offers families some relief on specific costs, especially the provisions in the Inflation Reduction Act allowing Medicare to negotiate for lower drug prices. Democratic pollster Geoff Garin says that highlighting such specific initiatives can allow individual candidates to overcome the negative overall judgment on Biden’s economic management. His main concern is that too many Democrats are sublimating any economic message while focusing preponderantly on abortion.
The Democrats are trying to build a sea wall against the swelling currents of economic discontent by relying on just a few arguments. But the campaign’s final weeks will measure whether that current reaches a level that breaches all of the party’s defenses.
Among likely voters nationwide, the race is a tight split, with 50% backing the Democratic candidate and 47% behind the Republican. But in competitive congressional districts, Democratic support among likely voters dips and preferences tilt toward the Republicans: 48% of likely voters in that group prefer the Republican candidate, 43% the Democrat.
Only 45% of Republicans said that they have already voted or plan to do so. A majority of Republicans said they plan to vote in-person on Election Day.
Democratic candidates do hold some advantages, though. Registered voters nationwide are more likely to see local Democratic candidates than their Republican rivals as caring about people like them (40% to 34%), working to protect democracy (43% to 36%), and uniting the country rather than dividing it (37% to 31%). And voters are more likely to see Republican candidates as too extreme (40%) than Democratic ones (36%).
Donald Trump not being a factor for 50% of voters may prompt a more partisan reaction, and work in favor of Democrats in the competitive districts. Almost three-quarters of the nation’s voters say they are voting to send opposition to Trump, while only 20% say they’ll be sending support. In competitive districts, 54% of Democrats say their vote will be to express opposition to the former President while 47% of Republicans say they’ll be voting to express support.
The survey of of 1,586 adults and 1,469 registered voters was conducted Oct. 24 through Oct. 27 by the Marist Poll and sponsored in partnership with NPR and PBS NewsHour. There is a margin of error of 4 points, which means results could be lower or higher than what is listed.
Among likely Hispanic voters, a narrow 48 percent plurality disapproved of Mr. Biden even as 60 percent said they would vote for congressional Democrats this fall — one of a few groups, including younger voters, who appeared to separate their frustration with the White House from their voting plans.
College was a particularly strong dividing line. Among those with a bachelor’s degree, Democrats held a 13-point advantage. Among those without one, Republicans held a 15-point edge.
The Democrats took over the House and Senate, and won control of the White House, because they relied on a large gender gap to win women.
But the poll showed that Republicans had entirely erased what had been an 11-point edge for Democrats among women last month in 2022 congressional races to a statistical tie in October.
The survey tested former President Donald J. Trump’s favorability rating, as well. He had a 52 percent unfavorability rating, better than Mr. Biden’s 58 percent job disapproval rating.
In a hypothetical 2024 rematch, Mr. Trump led Mr. Biden in the poll by one percentage point. Mr. Biden and Mr. Trump were neck and neck in the women’s election, with Mr. Biden leading by more than 10 points.
Today, the mood of the nation is decidedly sour. 64 percent of likely voters think the country is moving in the wrong direction, compared to just 24 percent who think the nation is headed in the right direction. The percentage of Democratic likely voters who think the nation is going in the right direction fell by 6 percentage points since September, but is still above the low point of the summer.
“People are hurting right now, so everybody is hurting,” said David, a Republican and insurance salesman. “Inflation, interest rates, the cost of gas, the cost of food, the cost of my property taxes, my utilities — I mean, everything’s gone up astronomically, and it’s going to collapse.”
What Do You Want to See in the ‘Mean-Field’ Midterm Elections? Sen. Irina Emanating at the “Senate’s”
Democrats’ enthusiasm was way below the Republicans’ prior to the Supreme Court’s decision. The interest in these elections went up a lot. Democrats closed the enthusiasm gap and were on par with GOP voters over the summer and into September.
So, we want to hear from you. What issues do you want to see address in the elections this year? Are you voting in this year’s midterm elections? What are your deciding factors against voting in the midterms?
You will be subject to the terms of use and privacy policy. As the Privacy Policy says, we want you to be aware that there may be circumstances in which the exemptions provided under law for journalistic activities or freedom of expression may override privacy rights you might otherwise have.
Do Republicans Have the Chance to Escape from the Diffuse With Them? A Study of Kelly and Noble in Phoenix, AB, a Presidential Pollster
Mike Noble, an independent pollster in Phoenix, believes Democrats have a chance to get away from the president. In a poll released Monday by his firm, OH Predictive Insights, Noble said Kelly narrowly led Masters, even though a clear majority of Arizona likely voters expressed a negative view on Biden. One reason for Kelly’s lead is that a majority of voters who were unfavorable towards Biden also disliked Masters, according to Noble. Those ambivalent voters, Noble said, were backing Kelly over Masters by more than eight-to-one.
Democratic hopes that Biden would rise in his approval rating through Election Day were dashed because of the high inflation.
Although Democrats have passed legislation in the past, people are still uncertain about what will happen in the future, according to a political scientist. “If inflation had come down from where it has been, they would be in better shape. But you can’t convince people that things are going better when their own experience tells them that it’s not.”
Over the past twenty or thirty years we have seen a nationalization of these congressional races, where there is a closer connection between opinions about national issues and national politicians and how people vote. It used to be easier for incumbents to run far ahead of a president from their own party’s approval rating based on their reputation in their state or district and their name recognition, things that you gain from being an incumbent. Over time that value has decreased.”
But four other Democrats in 2018 defied that trend to win in states where Trump’s approval stood at 50% or more. The four democrats who won are incumbent Joe Manchin in West Virginia, Jon Tester in Montana, and both candidates in Ohio and Arizona.
Weak personal images may sink some GOP Senate and governor nominees. He thinks that it could save them against the weakest candidates, but not anyone else. He predicts that voters who are dissatisfied with Biden and want a change will be able to get multiple Republican candidates to win who are viewed favorably by more voters.
Noble says Kelly is benefiting from campaign fundamentals: the Democrat has significantly outspent, and also more successfully occupied the center, than his Republican rival. Noble believes that Kelly is overcoming the disgust with Biden because voters already look past the president to the party they plan to vote for. The president’s job approval is not having as much effect as it could. “People accepted that it’s Joe Biden, and pushed him along so they wouldn’t see a direct connection to the Senate vote.”
In modern US politics, exceptions have become rare. Democrats will need more of them if Biden is to hold on to the Senate.
Is The 2020 Election Defraudable? A Study of a Demographic Survey by the National Institute for Voting Statistics (NJVPA)
A majority of Republicans think that the 2020 election is not fraudulent, even if that candidate thinks it is.
While white women with college degrees, who are an important bloc for Democrats, are among the most enthusiastic to vote, Black voters, Latinos and young voters are among the least.
Democrats are losing on a generic congressional ballot test. That’s when pollsters ask who a respondent would vote for if the election were held today, a Republican or Democrat.
In this survey, it’s tied 46%-46% — and that tends to be bad news for Democrats. Historically, they have needed a substantial lead on that question to do well in the House, because of how districts are drawn and with swing districts largely in right-leaning places.
The survey found inflation continues to be the top issue for voters heading into the final days of voting with 36% saying so, followed by preserving democracy (26%), abortion (14%), immigration (9%), health care (8%) and crime (7%).
The three issues that the GOP has focused on the most during these elections are inflation, crime and immigration.
Republicans were less likely to say their candidate should definitely concede if they lost the race. While almost two-thirds of Democrats said so, only 39% of Republicans did.
Most Americans have faith in their local and state governments to conduct a fair and accurate election. Although the Republicans were less likely to say so, most of them said they still have that confidence despite Trump’s behavior.
They say it would be better for the government to be controlled by the same party. Democrats, who are seeing their majorities threatened this year, are driving that with 73% saying so, but a slim majority of independents and about half of Republicans feel the same way.
Also, overall, 27% of Americans say they have already voted with another 28% saying they plan to vote before Election Day. Forty-three percent say they will vote in-person on Election Day.
The Pain of the Deal: Joe Biden’s Debate on the Future of the US Senate and the Crisis of the Capitol Insurrection
The Democrats are facing a nightmare scenario when they close their election campaign on Monday, with Republicans staging a referendum on Joe Biden’s presidency and failure to tame inflation.
It’s too early for postmortems. Forty million Americans have already cast their votes. And the uncertainty baked into modern polling means no one can be sure a red wave is coming. The Senate could still be retained by Democrats even after the House falls.
But the way each side is talking on election eve, and the swathe of blue territory – from New York to Washington state – that Democrats are defending offer a clear picture of GOP momentum.
A nation that splits down the middle politically because it is dissatisfied with its trajectory is going to use elections to penalize the party that had the most power.
The GOP Chairwoman said the Democrats were education, crime and inflation deniers on CNN on Sunday.
“I’m a loyal Democrat, but I am not happy. I just think that we are – we did not listen to voters in this election. And I think we are going to have a bad night.
“And this conversation is not going to have much impact on Tuesday, but I hope it has an impact going forward, because when voters tell you over and over and over again that they care mostly about the economy, listen to them. Stop saying that democracy is at stake.
Biden’s stress on the threat of Trump to the US political system essentially asks voters to prioritize their own economic concerns over the historic foundation of the US political system.
It’s a message that resonates strongly in Washington, DC, where the scars of the US Capitol insurrection are keenly felt. And it is undeniably important because the survival of the world’s most important democracy is at stake. A rebellion that attempted to stop peaceful transfers of power between presidents was instigated by Trump.
But outside the Beltway bubble of politicians and journalists, democracy feels like a far more distant, esoteric concept than the daily struggle to feed a family and to be able to afford to commute to work. After the Covid-19 nightmare that Biden promised, the economic effects linger and it’s not always easy to get back to normal.
The premise of his entire political career has been to restore the balance of the economy and security to Americans working and middle class. His legislative achievements could lower the cost of health care for seniors and create a green economy that will shield Americans from future high energy prices because of global turmoil. But the benefits from such measures will take years to arrive. And millions of voters are hurting now and haven’t heard a viable plan from the president to quickly ease prices in the short-term.
There is no guarantee that extending Trump-era tax cuts would have an impact on the inflation crisis. And divided government would likely mean a stalemate between two dueling economic visions. But the election has turned into a vehicle for voters to stress their frustration, with no imminent hope that things will get better soon.
Obama and the president talked about Republican concerns over the economy in Pittsburgh and claimed that if they won a majority, GOP would cut Social Security and Medicare.
There is not much the president can do to quickly reduce inflation. The Federal Reserve is in the lead and the central bank’s strategy of rising interest rates could trigger a recession that could further haunt Biden’s presidency.
Inflation and gas prices have been worsened by factors beyond the control of Biden, such as the war in Ukraine and supply chain issues brought on by the Pandemic. At the same time, however, economists are debating the wisdom of Biden’s high-spending bills that sent billions of dollars into an overheating economy. Biden lost trust in himself as a result of the White House’s downplaying of the soaring cost of living astransitory, as well as the fact that voters lost confidence in him after the US withdrawal from Afghanistan last year.
The Republican Party also got exactly what it wanted as Trump has delayed his expected campaign announcement until after the midterms, depriving Biden of the opportunity to shape this election as a direct clash with an insurrectionist predecessor whom he beat in 2020 and who remains broadly unpopular. It might have allowed the president to win over voters who dislike the former president and keep his low approval ratings in check.
A GOP majority would contain scores of candidates in Trump’s extreme image and would be weaponized to damage the president as much as possible ahead of a potential rematch with Trump in 2024. And a Republican Senate would frustrate Biden’s hopes of balancing out the judiciary after four years of Trump nominating conservative judges.
High Inflation and Corrupt Crime: Expectations for the Future of the White House and the Biden-Chillenger Warfare
High inflation has also always been a toxic force that brews political extremism and tempts some voters to be drawn to demagogues and radicals whose political creed is based on stoking resentment and stigmatizing outsiders.
Republicans are increasingly bullish on winning big in Tuesday’s midterm elections, as they slam Democrats over raging inflation and crime while President Joe Biden seeks a late reprieve by warning that GOP election deniers could destroy democracy.
In an exclusive interview with CNN, the potential next Republican House speaker, Kevin McCarthy, laid out his plans for power and vowed to tackle inflation, border security and rising crime. He promised broad investigations against the Biden administration on issues such as the Afghanistan withdrawal, the origin of the Covid-19 Pandemic, and how the administration has handled parents and school board meetings. And he didn’t rule out an eventual push to impeach Biden.
In a sign of the critical stakes and the growing angst among Democrats, four presidents – Biden, Donald Trump, Barack Obama and Bill Clinton – all took to the campaign trail over the weekend.
Ex-President Trump, edging ever closer to announcing a 2024 White House bid, will wrap up a campaign he used to show his enduring magnetism among grassroots Republicans, in Ohio, with a rally for Senate nominee J.D. Vance on Monday. In a speech that concluded in pouring rain for Florida Sen. Marco Rubio on Sunday, Trump predicted voters would “elect an incredible slate of true MAGA warriors to Congress.”
Biden, who spent Saturday getting out the vote in the critical Pennsylvania Senate race with Obama, warned that the nation’s core values are in peril from Republicans who denied the truth about the US Capitol insurrection and following the brutal attack on Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s husband Paul.
The president will stop trying to stave off a rebuke at a Democratic event in Maryland. The fact that he will be in a liberal bastion and not trying to boost an endangered lawmaker in a key race on the final night reflects his compromised standing in an election that has reverted to a referendum on his tattered credibility and low approval ratings.
Source: https://www.cnn.com/2022/11/07/politics/election-eve-campaigning/index.html
An ecstasy ensued: Republican presidential candidate Mike Biden’s anti-Trump campaign is a f**** you don’t want to win
Republican National Committee chair Ronna McDaniel predicted on CNN that her party would win both the House and Senate, while accusing Biden of being oblivious to the economic anxiety of Americans with his warnings about democracy.
Look, they are all about the wealthier getting wealthy. The wealthier are able to keep their wealth. The middle class gets stiffed. The poor get poorer under their policy,” Biden said.
The midterms are the first national vote since the chaos and violence triggered by Trump’s refusal to accept the result of the last presidential election and there are already fears that some Republican candidates may follow his example and try to defy the will of voters if they don’t win. Some, like Wisconsin Sen. Ron Johnson, have already raised concerns about the integrity of the vote.
On Sunday, a staffer of the headquarters of the pro-Trump nominee in the Arizona governor’s race opened a letter that contained suspicious white powder. Lake’s opponent, the Secretary of State in Arizona, criticized the incident as being incredibly concerning.
Source: https://www.cnn.com/2022/11/07/politics/election-eve-campaigning/index.html
The First Major Flavor Clashes of the 2024 GOP Nominating Contest in Florida, and the New Presidential Candidate, Ron DeSantis
The first major clashes of the 2024 GOP nominating contest, meanwhile, broke out in Florida with Trump and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis holding dueling rallies Sunday night. The ex-president, who is expected to launch a third White House bid within days, coined a new nickname Saturday for the man who could prove to be his toughest primary opponent: “Ron DeSanctimonious.”
But the Florida governor chose not to engage, turning his ire instead on Biden and calling his Democratic opponent, Charlie Crist, “a donkey” while taking credit for defying Washington officials and experts during the pandemic.
While he was in Florida on Sunday, Trump again teased the possibility of a presidential run, but not as much as he did on Sunday. The next presidential race is likely to get more attention after Arkansas Sen. Tom Cotton said that he wouldn’t join the Republican primary.
Former President Bill Clinton was also called into action on Saturday, stumping for New York Democratic Gov. Kathy Hochul in Brooklyn. The Empire state should be a safe area for the party despite Hochul being in a close race against Zeldin.
“I know the average election rally is just ‘whoop dee doo do vote for me,’ but your life is on the line. Clinton said that young people in the audience had their life on the line.
If the Republicans win back the House, they can force Biden to alter his program in order to get more money for the military. They are promising a relentless round of investigations and hearings into everything from the US withdrawal from Afghanistan and the surge in migrants across the southern border to Biden’s son, Hunter.
The Rise of Independent Politics: John Avlon’s View on the Electoral Process in the Post-Trump Era
CNN senior political analyst and anchor, John Avlon, is here. He is the author of “Lincoln and the Fight for Peace.” The views expressed in this commentary are his own. CNN has more opinion.
The pattern shows that swing votes are provided by independent voters. But that view may come as a surprise to many academics and professional partisans who spend much of their time between elections arguing that truly independent voters don’t really exist — they are just “leaners” — essentially closet partisans who don’t want to admit it.
That reversal came after independent voters backed Barack Obama over the GOP’s John McCain by 8 points in 2008 and sealed the deal for Democrats in 2006 when they took back the House while winning over independent voters 57% to 39% in exit polls.
Many people who initially self-identify as independent voters are eventually asked to join one of the two parties.
Some independents with an ideological policy agenda are also conservative and liberal, but the majority of them are Moderate mainstream, that is, they don’t really care about ideological policy agendas and don’t worry about being left out of politics in times of one-party rule.
This instinct that divided government will provide a check and balance on partisan excess is less true in the post-truth, post-Trump era, where GOP moderates account for less than a quarter of their party. The independent Senate candidacy of Evan McMullin in Utah will give residents of a conservative state their first competitive race in decades.
The close election seems to have shown that the elections weren’t just a referendum on the president or the economy. The Supreme Court’s overturning of Roe v. Wade brought abortion to center stage, with about 27% of voters calling it their top issue. About 6 in 10 voters felt negatively about the decision, with nearly 4 in 10 expressing anger. Democrats had a roughly 11-point edge over the GOP when it came to which party voters trusted more to handle issues related to abortion.