News from the Votemaster

Georgia Judge Rules against Registering Voters

Judge Christopher Brasher yesterday declined to force Georgia Secretary of State Brian Kemp (R) to process all the 100,000 mostly minority voters that civil rights groups had registered. As a result, some of them will not appear on the voting rolls next week and will have to cast provisional ballots, which are sure to generate more lawsuits. Civil rights groups accused the Republican-appointed judge of playing politics with people's rights.

Five States That Might Hold Surprises

Jonathan Bernstein wrote a piece about the states whose polling results may not give the true story. Roughly summarized, here are his arguments.

Georgia. Most likely the race between Michelle Nunn (D) and David Perdue (R) will end in a runoff on Jan. 6. Asking people how they will vote on Jan. 6, with 2 months of intense, vicious attack ads on both sides between now and then is a bridge too far for most voters. Also, the composition of the runoff electorate is likely to be very different from the general election electorate. In the past, runoff turnout tended to be about 55% of general election turnout, with Republicans turning out in much greater numbers than Democrats. But if control of the Senate hinges on this race, both sides will have a massive get-out-the-vote operation.

Alaska.The state is hard to poll, with fewer landlines than other states, a highly transient population, and a lot of natives living in small villages on the coast who don't always vote. Sen. Mark Begich (D-AK) had improbably large leads in two polls this week, but most likely they are flukes or bad polling.

Kansas. A Republican state with an unpopular Republican governor and an elderly, out-of-touch senator who doesn't live in the state running against an ambitious young independent is hard to judge. Many people may not really have committed themselves yet.

Colorado. In 2010, now-senator Michael Bennet was expected to lose and didn't. The polls got it completely wrong then and could miss again. The state has many Latinos and if they vote in large numbers, Sen. Mark Udall (D-CO) could eke out a victory.

South Dakota. Three-way races tend to be unstable and there are effectively two Republicans and one Democrat running, so although Mike Rounds (R) was the favorite from the start, either of the others could pull off an upset victory.

On the other hand, Eric McGhee argues that polling averages are better than ever because there are more polls. However, our observation is that a large number of them are highly partisan and so a good average either has to discard them altogether (as we do) or correct them for bias, as some other Websites do.

Republicans Close Polling Place To Suppress Student Vote

Strict voter ID requirements are one technique Republicans are using to suppress the vote of Democratic-leaning constituencies, but those are not the only ones. Another technique is closing polling places on college campuses. One such incident that made the international news was in North Carolina, the site of a bitterly fought Senate race. There, local Republican officials closed the polling place at Appalachian State University in the foothills of the Great Smoky Mountains even though the students there make up about 1/3 of the county's voters. The students did not take to this decision well and went to court. The judge ruled that the decision to close the polling place was simply political and forced the county to reopen it.

When news stories like the BBC story linked to above begin to circulate internationally, it tarnishes America's image abroad as people cease to think of the U.S. as a shining example of democracy and more as a third-world country with rigged elections.

McConnell May Get His Wish--and Regret It

Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) may well win his reelection bid and may even get to be majority leader, possibly with 51 or maybe 52 members of his caucus. Then the hard part begins. At least three members, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX), Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY), and Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL), are planning to run for President in 2016. They may want the party to move sharply to the right so they can boast of their conservative credentials in the primaries. On the other hand, a host of tea party senators who were elected in the low-turnout 2010 election are going to be up in 2016 and will want to move towards the center to have a chance to be reelected in a high-turnout election.

McConnell, a sly old fox with a lot of experience, will have his hands full managing the process. If he wants to show people that Republicans can govern, he is going to have to get bills passed. But with 51 or 52 seats, he has little margin for error. If he moves too far to the right, the endangered tea party senators or Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) may balk. If he moves too far to the left, the presidential candidates may block him. He may soon be sorry he is majority leader.

Obama Made a Rare Campaign Appearance for Mary Burke

To a large extent, President Obama has been hiding in the White House, afraid to campaign for Democrats for fear of hurting them. But yesterday he went to Milwaukee to campaign for Mary Burke (D), who is in a virtual tie with Gov. Scott Walker (R-WI) in the Wisconsin gubernatorial race. Basically, Obama is counting on raising turnout among blacks enough to more than offset the likely increase in the turnout of Republicans who hate him (and probably will vote anyway, appearance or no appearance). If Walker wins, he will probably run for President in 2016. If he loses it's history's dustbin for him.

Dance for DCCC Chair is in Full Swing

While Senate Democrats are falling all over each other to become DSCC chair in 2016 (because the Democrats are likely to pick up multiple seats), chairing the DCCC is a horse of a different color. Democrats might pick up a couple of seats, but not enough to put on your resume. Nevertheless, there is some competition already for the job and lots of diversity. Candidates include Rep. Donna Edwards (D-MD), a black woman, Rep. Jared Polis (D-CO), a wealthy gay man, Rep. Jim Himes, a wealthy former Goldman Sachs banker who was born in Peru, and Rep. Lois Frankel (D-FL), the Jewish former mayor of West Palm Beach who now represents a very wealthy district.

Today's Senate Polls

State	Democrat	D %	Republican	R %	I	I %	Start	End	Pollster
Alaska	Mark Begich*	50%	Dan Sullivan	42%			Oct 24	Oct 26	Ivan Moore Research
Georgia	Michelle Nunn	45%	David Perdue	48%			Oct 24	Oct 27	SurveyUSA
Hawaii	Brian Schatz*	55%	Cam Cavasso	29%			Oct 16	Oct 19	Merriman River Group
Iowa	Bruce Braley	45%	Joni Ernst	44%			Oct 21	Oct 24	Loras College
Kansas			Pat Roberts*	42%	Greg Orman	44%	Oct 22	Oct 26	SurveyUSA
Louisiana	Mary Landrieu*	46%	Bill Cassidy	50%			Oct 22	Oct 23	Rasmussen
Massachusetts	Ed Markey*	57%	Brian Herr	32%			Oct 22	Oct 25	MassINC
Maine	Shenna Bellows	27%	Susan Collins*	67%			Oct 15	Oct 21	Pan Atlantic SMS
Oregon	Jeff Merkley*	49%	Monica Wehby	30%			Oct 26	Oct 27	Elway Poll
South Dakota	Rick Weiland	31%	Mike Rounds	45%	Larry Pressler	19%	Oct 24	Oct 27	Monmouth U.
Virginia	Mark Warner*	47%	Ed Gillespie	35%			Oct 20	Oct 25	Roanoke Coll.

* Denotes incumbent

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---The Votemaster