Miami Herald: “Early voting surged to its highest levels yet in Florida’s biggest counties on Saturday, giving Democrats new hope for a ‘blue wave’ that could catapult Andrew Gillum to the governor’s mansion and keep Bill Nelson in the U.S. Senate. Miami-Dade, Broward, Palm Beach, Hillsborough and Orange, the five biggest ‘blue’ counties, all reported their highest one-day early voting totals of the 2018 campaign.”
Kemp and Abrams Prepare for Possible Runoff
“As voters and campaigns around the country get ready for Tuesday’s climactic midterm elections, the candidates for governor of Georgia are already preparing for four weeks of overtime… Under Georgia law, if no general election candidate secures a majority, the top two finishers advance to a runoff, which would take place on December 4 for this year’s governor’s race,” Politico reports.
“There has never been a general election runoff for governor in Georgia. But while both Abrams and Kemp have stubbornly maintained that they are focused on winning outright on Tuesday, behind the scenes, their campaigns are already laying groundwork for an extra 28 days on the trail — assembling legal teams for potential legal fights over Tuesday’s vote and stockpiling money to jumpstart a runoff campaign.”
Republicans Think They’ll Lose the House
Playbook: “The general consensus among Republicans is that they will lose the House, and end up in at least a five-seat minority — that would correspond to a 28-seat loss. Senior Republicans tell us that even in a worst-case scenario, they do not expect to lose 40 seats. A prescient prediction or famous last words? Only time will tell. We spoke to several senior Republican lawmakers yesterday, and only one made the case that the GOP will keep the House.”
Democrats Hold Big Lead In Generic Ballot
A new CNN/SSRS poll finds Democrats continue to hold a double-digit lead over Republicans in a generic congressional ballot among likely voters, 55% to 42%.
“That’s a slimmer edge than the party held in CNN’s final poll before the 2006 midterm elections and similar to the Republicans’ 10-point advantage just before the 2010 midterms.”
For comparison, the FiveThirtyEight polling average shows Democrats ahead 50% to 42%.
Democrats Ahead In Florida Races
A new NBC News/Marist poll in Florida finds Andrew Gillum (D) leading Ron DeSantis (R) in the race for governor, 50% to 46%.
in the U.S. Senate race, Sen. Bill Nelson (D) leads Gov. Rick Scott (R), 50% to 46%.
McCaskill Just Ahead In Missouri
A new NBC News/Marist poll in Missouri finds Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-MO) leading challenger Josh Hawley (R) in the U.S. Senate race, 50% to 47%.
GOP Braces for House Loss
“Republicans would have to sweep virtually all of the 22 races currently rated as toss-ups to hold onto their House majority — a nearly insurmountable challenge — according to a new Poliico analysis.”
“Democrats have pulled ahead in nearly enough races to claim a majority of the 435 seats up for grabs in the first national election of Donald Trump’s presidency, with Politico’s final race ratings showing 216 seats in the Democratic column — those are either solidly Democratic, likely Democratic or at least leaning Democratic.”
Early Voting Points to Youth Wave
“Youth turnout rates in the midterm early vote are up by 125 percent compared to 2014, according to Catalist, a voter database servicing progressive organizations — an eye-popping and historically high figure, say strategists on both the left and the right,” the Washington Post reports.
“Young Americans ages 18 to 29 who say they are definitely voting tilt leftward, according to polls. But the data also shows young Republicans are bubbling with enthusiasm headed into tomorrow.”
White House Prepares Major Shake Up
Washington Post: “The Trump administration is bracing for a massive staff shake-up in the weeks following the midterm elections, as the fates of a number of Cabinet secretaries and top White House aides are increasingly uncertain heading into a potentially perilous time for President Trump.”
‘Trump Has Hijacked the Election’
“Speaker Paul Ryan got President Trump on the phone Sunday for one final plea on behalf of anxious Republicans: Please, please talk up the booming economy in the final hours before Election Day,” Politico reports.
“But Trump, unsurprisingly, had another issue on his mind. He boasted to Ryan that his focus on immigration has fired up the base.”
“Two days out from an expected Democratic takeover of the House, Republicans focused on the chamber are profoundly worried that Trump’s obsession with all things immigration will exacerbate their losses.”
Said one senior GOP aide: “Trump has hijacked the election. This is not what we expected the final weeks of the election to focus on.”
Trump’s Apocalyptic Attacks Reach New Level of Falsity
“President Trump is painting an astonishingly apocalyptic vision of America under Democratic control in the campaign’s final days, unleashing a torrent of falsehoods and portraying his political opponents as desiring crime, squalor and poverty,” the Washington Post reports.
“As voters prepare to render their first verdict on his presidency in Tuesday’s midterm elections, Trump is claiming that Democrats want to erase the nation’s borders and provide sanctuary to drug dealers, human traffickers and MS-13 killers. He is warning that they would destroy the economy, obliterate Medicare and unleash a wave of violent crime that endangers families everywhere. And he is alleging that they would transform the United States into Venezuela with socialism run amok.”
“Trump has never been hemmed in by fact, fairness or even logic… But at one mega-rally after another in the run-up to Tuesday’s midterm elections, Trump has taken his no-boundaries political ethos to a new level — demagoguing the Democrats in a whirl of distortion and using the power of the federal government to amplify his fantastical arguments.”
Trump Would Lose to Every Possible Woman Candidate
A new Axios/Survey Monkey poll finds President Trump would lose the 2020 presidential election against every woman mentioned as a possible Democratic opponent.
“Trump is underwater with women voters (64% of women view him unfavorably), and particularly among white suburban women — a group that will be critical in 2020. Look for Democrats to turn to their top 2020 female candidates after Tuesday’s election. A record number of women are running and a record number of women are expected to vote and win come Tuesday.”
Bloomberg Will Appear In New $5 Million Ad Buy
“Michael Bloomberg, the billionaire former mayor of New York City who is considering a 2020 presidential campaign, took another step closer to that possibility Sunday with a $5 million national advertising effort that encourages voters to support Democrats in Tuesday’s midterm elections — and offers Bloomberg’s centrist politics as a counter to President Trump,” the Washington Post reports.
“Bloomberg’s 2-minute television ad, which features him speaking directly to the camera and standing before an American flag, will first air Sunday during CBS’s 60 Minutes.”
This Midterm Election Is National
Dan Balz: “Tuesday’s midterm election is about many things. It’s about health care and immigration. It’s about the economy. It’s about power and who will hold it, both in Washington and in the states. Above all, it’s about something more elemental: what kind of country Americans see today and want to see in the future. That makes these midterms unlike any in the recent past.”
“It is that unsettling, and unsettled, issue that has generated the record amounts of money raised and spent, and the remarkable outpouring of volunteers never before active who are walking precincts and making calls in these final hours — as they have been for months. It is what has motivated record numbers of people in many states to cast ballots ahead of Election Day. Together, those indicators have stamped this campaign as a once-in-a-generation event.”
Kemp Engaged in Banana-Republic Voter Manipulation
Rick Hasen: “In perhaps the most outrageous example of election administration partisanship in the modern era, Georgia Secretary of State Brian Kemp, who is running for governor while simultaneously in charge of the state’s elections, has accused the Democratic Party without evidence of hacking into the state’s voter database. He plastered a headline about it on the Secretary of State’s website, which thousands of voters use to get information about voting on election day.”
“It’s just the latest in a series of partisan moves by Kemp, who has held up more than 50,000 voter registrations for inconsistencies as small as a missing hyphen, fought rules to give voters a chance to prove their identity when their absentee ballot applications are rejected for a lack of a signature match, and been aggressive in prosecuting those who have done nothing more than try to help those in need of assistance in casting ballots.”
“But the latest appalling move by Kemp to publicly accuse the Democrats of hacking without evidence is even worse than that: Kemp has been one of the few state election officials to refuse help from the federal Department of Homeland Security to deter foreign and domestic hacking of voter registration databases.”
Trump Says His Focus Has Been the Senate
President Trump said downplayed his campaigning on behalf of House candidates while noting that his “primary focus” in campaigning has been on the Senate, CNN reports.
Said Trump: “I think we’re going to do well in the House but as you know, my primary focus has been on the Senate and I think we are going to do really well in the Senate.”
He added: “With so many people in Congress, with so many people in the House, it’s very hard to make those stops. But I’ve made a number.”
Militia Groups Head to Border After Trump’s Call to Arms
Washington Post: “Gun-carrying civilian groups and border vigilantes have heard a call to arms in President Trump’s warnings about threats to American security posed by caravans of Central American migrants moving through Mexico. They’re packing coolers and tents, oiling rifles and tuning up aerial drones, with plans to form caravans of their own and trail American troops to the border.”
Final Forecasts Don’t Really Tell Us Much
CNN issues its final election “forecasts” of the midterm election campaign.
House forecast: Democrats will win 226 seats (and the House majority) while Republicans will win just 209 seats. A Democratic win of 203 seats and 262 seats is within the margin of error.
Senate forecast: Republicans will hold 52 seats (and maintain control of the Senate) next Congress while Democrats will hold just 48. Anything between Republicans holding 48 seats and 56 seats is within the margin of error.
