5 Thoughts on Last Night's Elections

Well, it is Wednesday, and you know what that means-it's an election night recap.  Last night, amid the coronavirus (so a predominantly absentee ballot-driven election...make sure you have yours requested!), we saw special elections in California & Wisconsin, and primaries in Nebraska (both presidential and congressional).  The big ticket item was in California, which we'd written about on Monday, so let's start there.

Mike Garcia (R-CA)

1. This is Good News for the Republicans

It is always dangerous the day after the election to call a race in California, particularly for a Republican.  California is light years ahead of most other states when it comes to an electorate prepared to vote from home, and they are also notoriously bad at counting their ballots quickly (partially because you can still vote absentee on election day, so it's probable we've got a bunch of ballots come today and tomorrow.  Voters will have several days now to have their ballots counted if they mailed them yesterday received, but last night was not a promising sign for the Democrat, Christy Smith.  While she will certainly lessen the 12-point gap, and Democrats have come back from similar odds before (TJ Cox did in 2018, as the AP remembers since they called the election for his opponent), that was in a general election, not a special election held during a pandemic.  It is probable that Mike Garcia (R) won last night, and will therefore become the first Republican running for federal office to win a seat Hillary Clinton won since Donald Trump became president.  That's a big deal, and the Republicans will (correctly) trumpet this as a big loss for the Democrats.

Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA)

2. Don't Read Too Much into the Results Here

That being said, there's a couple of reasons for Democrats to not read too much into this for November.  For starters, it's still a pandemic, it's still a special election, and that will affect turnout in ways that the GOP can't emulate in November.  We saw just last month the Democrats win Wisconsin by 10-points against a Republican incumbent-that wasn't a bellwether, neither is this.  It's still probable that Wisconsin will be a slim margin for either Biden or Trump, and CA-25 is probably going to go to Joe Biden in a few months.  What this was, though, was a failure on the part of the DNC/DCCC to take a seat off of the table.  We'll talk about Smith's chances in a second, but I'd argue that this would have been in the same territory as Katie Porter's district had Smith won-there's no reason to give Garcia money in November if he couldn't even win a special with everything aligned for him.  I know in a normal situation Smith would have been able to do events with Biden, Pelosi, Julian Castro, and Kamala Harris to drum up enthusiasm around a lesser candidate, but still-the Democrats will now have to spend millions in November on this race, when it probably could have been had for much cheaper in the past month had they gone full-court press to elect Smith.

State Rep. Christy Smith (D-CA)

3. Smith Has a Very Good Chance in November

Smith & Garcia have already won the nominations for the general election.  This is a good insurance policy for Smith as she certainly would not have gotten the nomination again after her performance in the special election (losing, even though she'll bring it into the single digits in the next few days, is an unacceptable sin in a district that Hillary Clinton won...though it's worth noting that the Democrats are rerunning candidates in two other Hillary-won districts, with only PA-1 seeing a new challenger).  While it's hard to tell how much Biden will win by, and California voters have historically (pre-2018) been fine splitting their ticket, Garcia will instantly become one of the most vulnerable Republicans in Congress as soon (assuming if) as he's sworn in.  Trump is wildly unpopular in California, and he will be (after John Katko) representing the bluest seat currently held by a House Republican.  I still rate this seat a tossup, as Garcia is now the incumbent, proven he can win, and perhaps more crucially Smith has proven she can lose.  But as a host of Republicans in California found out last year, Golden State voters don't seem friendly to the idea of splitting their tickets anymore.  If that's not a fluke, Smith has a strong chance at redemption in November.

Amy McGrath (D-KY)

4. Democrats Should Focus on Plausible, Not Wish-Seeking, Reach Seats

Looking at Christy Smith's campaign coffers, perhaps there's another thing that's telling about this race-Democrats didn't invest in it the same way they are doing for other races.  Smith did out-raise Garcia, but not by much (only about $20k according to OpenSecrets), which pales in comparison to some of the other Democrats running in California swing districts.  Josh Harder in the 10th district has out-raised his opponent 6-times over so far this cycle.  Harley Rouda has a million dollars more than his GOP opponent, while Katie Porter has $5 million more than her opponent.  It might not be fair to compare Smith to sitting-incumbents, but it's hard not to imagine what Smith might have done with an extra $500k advantage, particularly since her problem appears to have been turnout in blue, low-income portions of LA County (which an expensive GOTV effort could have solved).  A dirty secret of campaigns is that candidates with a strong enough cash-advantage can frequently parlay that into some extra votes via turnout or defining their opponent...provided that the districts demographics show it to be winnable.

Which brings me to the Kentucky & South Carolina Senate races.  These are states that are going to Donald Trump.  Period.  There is no amount of money that can change that.  But our Senate candidates are stocked with cash.  Amy McGrath (KY) has raised nearly $30 million while Jaime Harrison (SC) has $14 million.  In a lot of ways this reminds me of the movie Moneyball, where you should be investing in runs and on-base percentage rather than players.  McGrath & Harrison theoretically could win if the stars align perfectly, but that's a blue moon, chance-in-hell, once-in-a-lifetime situation.  That money could have, however, gone to getting Smith elected.  It's not as sexy as beating Mitch McConnell or Lindsey Graham, but it's winning a seat that we actually have a shot at, and it adds one more vote to the majority (which is, 5 minutes after we'd get over the thrill of beating McConnell or Graham, all McGrath or Harrison would end up being-backbencher freshmen in seats that will be impossible to defend, as opposed to Smith who would become a backbencher representative from a district that we don't have to invest much in to keep).  That $44 million could go to not just Smith, but also Democrats like Jon Ossoff, Theresa Greenfield, and MJ Hegar, whom polling shows are in states Biden could win, and polling shows them gaining, but they're all underfunded compared to their opponents.  Democrats frequently get caught up in silliness when it comes to beating a specific person, when really control of Congress is a numbers game.  The GOP is hurt a lot more when you beat three Republican senators you've never heard of rather than one famous one.  And underfunding a candidate can matter, which not only Christy Smith can attest to but, also...

Kara Eastman (D-NE)

5. Kara Eastman & the DCCC-A Change of Heart?

The only other noteworthy moment of last night, for me, was in Nebraska's congressional primaries.  The second congressional district nomination, which is competitive at a presidential level and was certainly competitive at a House-level last midterm, went to Kara Eastman in a blowout.  Eastman ran a fascinating race last cycle.  She was one of the few progressives to beat a DCCC-backed candidate, and actually came within two-points of winning.  Similar to my conversation above, she lost because of money, and a perceived lack of interest from the DCCC; she also was an unfortunate byproduct of the NYT Upshot polls, which vastly underestimated her standing in the general (her fundraising surely took a hit as a result).

What's noteworthy here is that Eastman, out the bag, has been trumpeted by the DCCC.  They came out yesterday with a poll showing both she and Biden up in the election, and Eastman, who has been backed by figures like Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, quickly called the DCCC a friend in hopes of creating unity.  This is smart on both their parts.  NE-2 is a tough hill to climb (Don Bacon seems solidly fitted for the seat), but ticket-splitting isn't what it used to be, and so if Biden is able to win here, Eastman has a shot, especially if she's willing to play the game and link herself quickly to Biden's presidential campaign (the DCCC tweet is an indication that she isn't too concerned that her preferred POTUS candidate isn't the nominee).  If Eastman does that, the DCCC could win a seat they probably would had had two years ago with unity.  And Eastman's embrace of the party machine is a smart acknowledgement to big-ticket donors that she knows she can win, but will need major investment nationally (and from those big-ticket donors) to get across the finish line.  The quick rally rather than any protracted bitterness like two years ago might pay off if Biden/Eastman can help drive out the different factions of the party they represent in Omaha.