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When Democrats won the House in 2018, they did so with the help of a big increase in turnout that achieved the largest voter turnout for a midterm election in more than 100 years.
However, half of the voting population did not take part.
This year, early voting has increased in some of the key states, but when I spoke with Michael McDonald, the University of Florida political scientist known for tracking early voting data, he predicted that turnout would fall below that level. 2018.
McDonald has a new book out that analyzes the huge achievement of the 2020 presidential election, when nearly 67% of the eligible voting population cast a ballot. There’s more about the book and tracking early voting at his US Elections Project website.
We talked about what people should take away from the last election and what he’s seeing as he tracks early voting data for the current election.
What follows is an abridged version of our longer phone conversation.
WOLF: You’ve written a book about this amazing democratic achievement of voting during a pandemic. What do you want people to take away from this research?
MCDONALD: We have to give a lot of credit to the election officials, the volunteers who staffed the polls and the voters themselves who participated in the highest turnout presidential election since 1900.
There was no one alive who voted in the 2020 election who voted in the last election where we had a higher turnout. This is truly a great achievement. We managed to do something that was historic under exceptional circumstances. This is the very positive news.
Unfortunately, the other takeaway from the book is the relentless attacks on the vote that were made during the election, coming from the rhetoric with (former president Donald) Trump, and then just going through that party. This is broken in democracy, and we can see it happening in real time with the 2022 election.
WOLF: You mentioned the highest turnout in 100 years in 2020. I saw in the book that the turnout for the 2018 midterms was the highest since 1914. We’re seeing both more people questioning the integrity of the election and more turnout. What do you think about this?
MCDONALD: The last time we had extremely high turnout was in the late 1800s, and that period was also characterized by strong polarization. We don’t have survey data, so we can’t go back and ask voters if they were polarized, but we can guess that what was happening among our elected officials in the federal government also reflected what was happening among voters.
And so we have entered a period of higher polarization, and you can point to the culprits for that. But whatever the cause, we’ve certainly gotten to a point where people really think it matters who runs the government, and it really matters that their side is running the government.
When people perceive this difference between parties and the importance that policy differences have in their lives, they are more likely to vote.
It’s that old curse: May you live in interesting times. We live in interesting times. People are very interested in politics and hence they are very concerned with elections.
WOLF: In the 1880s, the US had almost 80% participation. You could argue that the higher turnout signals a red flag for democracy in some ways.
MCDONALD: You would hope that people are engaged for altruistic reasons, that they want to be good citizens, weigh their options carefully, and come to a reasoned determination of who to vote for.
There have been some people who look back at a political science report that was done in the 1950s and lamented that there was no difference between the political parties, we were collapsing, we were headed for a decline of democracy in the United States unless we fixed the parties.
Look, you have to be careful what you wish for because the parties are stronger in the electorate than they’ve ever been in modern times, and now people are thinking, well, maybe this is too much.
What is the happy medium of an electorate that is engaged, but not so inflamed by partisanship that, in some cases, they want to take violent action because they think politics matters so much?
WOLF: You’re well known for tracking early voting data. What can he really tell us before election day?
MCDONALD: I first started tracking early voting in the 2008 election for the exit poll organization. They wanted to know the size of the early polls so they could properly weight their surveys.
And like a string, I posted it online. A million hits later on a website I built like a pit and I knew I had done something different and special somehow. And if you look at a lot of the data journalism that’s happening today, it’s more in the spirit of what I do, which is to take some administrative data and tell a story with it in some way.
To answer the question about where we are in the early voting … what you want to do is take all the information that you can put together and try to get a picture of where we are. So I don’t think early voting alone shows the picture, just like I don’t think polling alone shows you a definitive picture of where the election is going.
Polls are flawed. Early voting has its nuances and measurement issues.
WOLF: What are some of the things you see in early voting?
MCDONALD: It’s not just that they’re given a ballot or have the opportunity to vote a ballot. They have to really want to vote on that ballot, and we certainly see a lot of interest in voting, especially in those really high-stakes, high-stakes elections that are going on for the U.S. Senate or some of the gubernatorial races. These seem to draw voters.
What we are seeing in these states is high levels of early voting. We see a lot of democratic engagement.
What we would typically see in a midterm election is that the incumbent party would be penalized in some way. For whatever reason, people find a reason to be outraged and concerned about something the administration has done.
But we’re not seeing a kind of referendum on the Biden presidency in these races. In fact, look at the polls: People who strongly disapprove of (President Joe) Biden still say they’ll vote for the Democratic nominee. What’s happening here is that the election has turned into a choice between candidates rather than a referendum on Biden.
If you look elsewhere in the country, we don’t see the same level of commitment. Absent that commitment, the election becomes more of a referendum on Biden, and that’s where we could see a divisive result, as many of the polls indicate.
If Democrats lose the House, it will likely be at least in part because their constituents simply haven’t found a reason to vote in a state like California.
As we enter this final week of early voting, that’s the challenge for Democrats. How do you energize your base to vote at the same level that Republicans are in places where you don’t have this high-profile race that drives people to the polls?
WOLF: Can we now assume that because of the high turnout in some states and because so many people used early voting, that some of these concerns about restrictive new voting laws were unfounded?
MCDONALD: I’m going to give you a stupid and completely ridiculous answer to that. But there is a point to this. Do you know what this election is? I see massive voter suppression in this election.
I look back at the 2020 presidential election and turnout is down in every state. There was massive voter suppression in this election.
Of course, you think this is ridiculous. It’s funny because people vote at higher rates in presidential elections than midterms.
And just because you have an interesting race that draws people to vote in a state like Georgia, that doesn’t mean that SB 202, which is the law that was passed in Georgia, somehow made it easier for everyone to vote. the State. This is not to say that there are certain communities that have not been left behind.
A good example of that, if you look at Georgia, is that even though we’re seeing record in-person voters, early on, we’re seeing mail-in ballots drop by about half. And you can say, okay. People who would have voted by mail are just going to vote in person, or they’re going to vote on Election Day or early.
There may be some people who, for whatever reason, are at home and cannot get to a polling station and must vote a postal ballot. And for those people, it may be that they can’t participate to the same degree that other people in Georgia have.
I’m not going to say that just because there’s a high turnout in early voting in Georgia, that means the law hasn’t had a repressive effect on any particular community in Georgia.
LYKOUS: Another…
title: “What Early Voting Data Can And Cannot Tell Us " ShowToc: true date: “2022-11-21” author: “Dana Lisby”
A version of this story appeared on CNN’s What Matters newsletter. To get it in your inbox, sign up for free here. CNN —
When Democrats won the House in 2018, they did so with the help of a big increase in turnout that achieved the largest voter turnout for a midterm election in more than 100 years.
However, half of the voting population did not take part.
This year, early voting has increased in some of the key states, but when I spoke with Michael McDonald, the University of Florida political scientist known for tracking early voting data, he predicted that turnout would fall below that level. 2018.
McDonald has a new book out that analyzes the huge achievement of the 2020 presidential election, when nearly 67% of the eligible voting population cast a ballot. There’s more about the book and tracking early voting at his US Elections Project website.
We talked about what people should take away from the last election and what he’s seeing as he tracks early voting data for the current election.
What follows is an abridged version of our longer phone conversation.
WOLF: You’ve written a book about this amazing democratic achievement of voting during a pandemic. What do you want people to take away from this research?
MCDONALD: We have to give a lot of credit to the election officials, the volunteers who staffed the polls and the voters themselves who participated in the highest turnout presidential election since 1900.
There was no one alive who voted in the 2020 election who voted in the last election where we had a higher turnout. This is truly a great achievement. We managed to do something that was historic under exceptional circumstances. This is the very positive news.
Unfortunately, the other takeaway from the book is the relentless attacks on the vote that were made during the election, coming from the rhetoric with (former president Donald) Trump, and then just going through that party. This is broken in democracy, and we can see it happening in real time with the 2022 election.
WOLF: You mentioned the highest turnout in 100 years in 2020. I saw in the book that the turnout for the 2018 midterms was the highest since 1914. We’re seeing both more people questioning the integrity of the election and more turnout. What do you think about this?
MCDONALD: The last time we had extremely high turnout was in the late 1800s, and that period was also characterized by strong polarization. We don’t have survey data, so we can’t go back and ask voters if they were polarized, but we can guess that what was happening among our elected officials in the federal government also reflected what was happening among voters.
And so we have entered a period of higher polarization, and you can point to the culprits for that. But whatever the cause, we’ve certainly gotten to a point where people really think it matters who runs the government, and it really matters that their side is running the government.
When people perceive this difference between parties and the importance that policy differences have in their lives, they are more likely to vote.
It’s that old curse: May you live in interesting times. We live in interesting times. People are very interested in politics and hence they are very concerned with elections.
WOLF: In the 1880s, the US had almost 80% participation. You could argue that the higher turnout signals a red flag for democracy in some ways.
MCDONALD: You would hope that people are engaged for altruistic reasons, that they want to be good citizens, weigh their options carefully, and come to a reasoned determination of who to vote for.
There have been some people who look back at a political science report that was done in the 1950s and lamented that there was no difference between the political parties, we were collapsing, we were headed for a decline of democracy in the United States unless we fixed the parties.
Look, you have to be careful what you wish for because the parties are stronger in the electorate than they’ve ever been in modern times, and now people are thinking, well, maybe this is too much.
What is the happy medium of an electorate that is engaged, but not so inflamed by partisanship that, in some cases, they want to take violent action because they think politics matters so much?
WOLF: You’re well known for tracking early voting data. What can he really tell us before election day?
MCDONALD: I first started tracking early voting in the 2008 election for the exit poll organization. They wanted to know the size of the early polls so they could properly weight their surveys.
And like a string, I posted it online. A million hits later on a website I built like a pit and I knew I had done something different and special somehow. And if you look at a lot of the data journalism that’s happening today, it’s more in the spirit of what I do, which is to take some administrative data and tell a story with it in some way.
To answer the question about where we are in the early voting … what you want to do is take all the information that you can put together and try to get a picture of where we are. So I don’t think early voting alone shows the picture, just like I don’t think polling alone shows you a definitive picture of where the election is going.
Polls are flawed. Early voting has its nuances and measurement issues.
WOLF: What are some of the things you see in early voting?
MCDONALD: It’s not just that they’re given a ballot or have the opportunity to vote a ballot. They have to really want to vote on that ballot, and we certainly see a lot of interest in voting, especially in those really high-stakes, high-stakes elections that are going on for the U.S. Senate or some of the gubernatorial races. These seem to draw voters.
What we are seeing in these states is high levels of early voting. We see a lot of democratic engagement.
What we would typically see in a midterm election is that the incumbent party would be penalized in some way. For whatever reason, people find a reason to be outraged and concerned about something the administration has done.
But we’re not seeing a kind of referendum on the Biden presidency in these races. In fact, look at the polls: People who strongly disapprove of (President Joe) Biden still say they’ll vote for the Democratic nominee. What’s happening here is that the election has turned into a choice between candidates rather than a referendum on Biden.
If you look elsewhere in the country, we don’t see the same level of commitment. Absent that commitment, the election becomes more of a referendum on Biden, and that’s where we could see a divisive result, as many of the polls indicate.
If Democrats lose the House, it will likely be at least in part because their constituents simply haven’t found a reason to vote in a state like California.
As we enter this final week of early voting, that’s the challenge for Democrats. How do you energize your base to vote at the same level that Republicans are in places where you don’t have this high-profile race that drives people to the polls?
WOLF: Can we now assume that because of the high turnout in some states and because so many people used early voting, that some of these concerns about restrictive new voting laws were unfounded?
MCDONALD: I’m going to give you a stupid and completely ridiculous answer to that. But there is a point to this. Do you know what this election is? I see massive voter suppression in this election.
I look back at the 2020 presidential election and turnout is down in every state. There was massive voter suppression in this election.
Of course, you think this is ridiculous. It’s funny because people vote at higher rates in presidential elections than midterms.
And just because you have an interesting race that draws people to vote in a state like Georgia, that doesn’t mean that SB 202, which is the law that was passed in Georgia, somehow made it easier for everyone to vote. the State. This is not to say that there are certain communities that have not been left behind.
A good example of that, if you look at Georgia, is that even though we’re seeing record in-person voters, early on, we’re seeing mail-in ballots drop by about half. And you can say, okay. People who would have voted by mail are just going to vote in person, or they’re going to vote on Election Day or early.
There may be some people who, for whatever reason, are at home and cannot get to a polling station and must vote a postal ballot. And for those people, it may be that they can’t participate to the same degree that other people in Georgia have.
I’m not going to say that just because there’s a high turnout in early voting in Georgia, that means the law hasn’t had a repressive effect on any particular community in Georgia.
LYKOUS: Another…
