MT-AL: Rob Quist (D) vs. Greg Gianforte (R) vs. Mark Wicks (L), May 25

[GeorgiaModerate]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LsMlhdrz7nE
Quist likes guns and doesn't like TVs

Not my kind of guy!

Lol, chill. He will vote for gun restrictions, etc. once he is in Congress. This is part of the shtick, we saw this with Tester and Kander as well.

Quist is not a moderate, and neither is Gianforte.

Tester? I can't find his NRA rating... some left-wing sources claims he has an A-? I know he voted for background checks, but didn't support some of Obama's proposals.

Tester's web site says he has an A rating from the NRA.  http://www.jontester.com/issues/protecting-gun-rights/

[GeorgiaModerate]

  Lets assume the Emerson poll is somewhat off and Gianforte is in fact ahead in the high single digits. Shouldn't the race be closer than this based on what we've seen in Georgia and Kansas?

In Kansas Brownback has a 15% approval rating and the Democrats dumped millions into georgia only to match Clinton's performance

The point about Kansas is well taken, but the jury is still out on Georgia.  Comparing an 18-person jungle primary to a final election is apples and oranges.  Let's see whether Ossoff beats Clinton's percentage in June before making judgments on this one.

[GeorgiaModerate]

Emerson is a weird poll, like really weird, but it's not good.  The good news I guess is that it seems dems have been over performing their polling, but probably not enough to overcome high single digit leads. 

Emerson is the McDonald's of the polling industry. For $600, they'll poll anything

But do you get fries with it?

[GeorgiaModerate]

Wow, this thread has turned really, really bad. Posters on a political forum which is dedicated to analyzing and tracking elections as well as political demography and trends should never use the term "socially libertarian state" in any context at all. Just because a state has mountains doesn't make it libertarian or whatever. Same goes for the term "elastic state".

Anyway, Planned Parenthood has launched a serious GOTV effort in the state, and Hollywood actress Alyssa Milano campaigned with Quist in Bozeman today, LOL.

In case anyone wants to watch the first debate between the two candidates, here is the link.

Didn't Alyssa Milano also do some campaigning for Ossoff in Georgia? Potential dark horse VP?

Yes, she did, including helping transport early voters to the polls.

[GeorgiaModerate]

Cant Betwixt the Quist!

Can't Twist the Quist sounds better IMO.

Can't Resist the Quist.

[GeorgiaModerate]

Where did the moderate Republicans go?

I grew up as a moderate Republican.  The party left us behind long ago.

[GeorgiaModerate]

   I'm wondering whether having a pollster include a candidate who isn't on the ballot, nor even running as a write in candidate as a response possibility represents a new low in the industry.

Well, PPP polled Harambe in the Presidential race last year, and I'm pretty sure he wasn't running.

[GeorgiaModerate]

I don't see how the rental thing is a campaign-ending scandal.

He let his son live in a refurbished barn that was classified as a barn and not an apartment! This is the kind of stuff that sinks campaigns!

This should get the sympathy of everyone who didn't shut the door and was asked: "Do you live in a barn?" 

[GeorgiaModerate]

For 65+, the numbers add up to about 120%.

[GeorgiaModerate]

Cook has moved this from Likely R to Lean R: http://cookpolitical.com/story/10350

[GeorgiaModerate]

Mitt Romney was the first Republican presidential candidate to be endorsed by the Des Moines Register since 1972.

Guess who won Iowa.

Hillary Clinton was the first Democrat ever endorsed by the Cincinnati Enquirer.

Guess who won Ohio.

Chickenhawk is right, newspaper endorsements don't matter. Not to regular people, anyway. Though they may be indicative of larger trends.

If they were indicative of larger trends, Clinton would have won with a 1984-level landslide.

[GeorgiaModerate]

From Eric Erickson:

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[GeorgiaModerate]

Not sure if this has been reported yet, or if will have any meaningful effect: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/gianforte-lafargeholcim-isis_us_591c710be4b0ed14cddb53fa?wgo

"Montana GOP Candidate Owns Stake In Company Accused Of Paying Off ISIS"

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[GeorgiaModerate]

A Drmocrat with less skeletons with a much better campaign than Quist, but also the same folksyness as Quist, would likely be leading by a health margin with even without all this.

That being said, can we at least wait until the election is over before analyzing why Pianoforte lost? Republicans could still win this, even if it's a pure Tossup.

Still not convinced he won't win.

You're not the only one.  I still think this is Tilt R at least.

[GeorgiaModerate]

Sanders adviser says 4000 people are at the Quist/Sanders Missoula rally:



https://twitter.com/AriRabinHavt/status/865988723720286208

Isn't that half the state?  (I kid, I kid.)

[GeorgiaModerate]

Are there any new Google polls coming out before the 25th?

As of right now, I'm planning on putting one into the field this weekend.  I might not if we get a credible poll between now and then.  But, that's doubtful, given we haven't seen a good poll yet.

Are you still planning on doing that poll cinyc?

Yes.  It will go into the field very late tonight or tomorrow afternoon.  The sample size will likely be 566, which hopefully gets us 400 useable respondents.  And I'm going to tweak the question a little because some people may have already voted absentee.

New wording (assuming it fits the character limit):

Many Montanans will go to the polls on May 25 to vote for a new U.S. Congressman. Others may have already voted or will vote absentee.  For whom would or did you vote?

Cool! Do you think you can give us some updates as the responses start to come in? Like at 100 responses/300 responses etc

I usually try to wait until the poll is completed before giving updates.  The problem with a very early update, like at 100 responses, is that the poll isn't reliable with 100 responses.  I've seen leads change before with that few responses.  I might drop a few hints if someone's lead seems stable.

For example, I purchased a very small 60 sample size Google poll for the Montana race, there's only 26 responses in, but Quist leads Gianforte beyond the margin of error that google displays.

With 26 responses out of 60 in, the result so far is:

Rob Quist 46.2%

Greg Gianforte 11.5%

Undecided 30.8%

Won't vote 7.7%

When I look at the floor/ceiling that google shows me of Gianforte and Quist's support, Quist leads so much that his floor based on the margin of error is basically tied with the ceiling of Gianforte's vote share.

The ceiling of Gianforte's vote share is 28.9%, the floor of Quist's vote share is 28.8%. So would that indicate that the worst outcome for Quist is a 0.1% Gianforte lead?

Can you please educate me about this? I'm really interested

The link for the poll (it's still in progress): surveys.google.com/reporting/survey?survey=jaxfdpd3rxotdiygpxubxdp4c4 (can't post links yet)

26 responses isn't nearly enough to be a reasonable sample.  Regardless of what it says about MoE, you can't really draw any kind of conclusions at this point.

[GeorgiaModerate]

When is the pending Gravis poll supposed to be released?

[GeorgiaModerate]

I insist that we resist and persist by assisting Quist who will hopefully deport the Gianfort. (I had to leave off the e from his name otherwise it would not have worked as well. Surely if people can corrupt it to Pianoforte, I can just drop an e...)

Desist!

[GeorgiaModerate]

The beads came unstrung from their abacus.

[GeorgiaModerate]

I have no clue what's going on, but I'm still sticking with an R-win by 2-6 points.

Me too, but I'm now thinking it's going to be on the lower end of that range.  Here's my final prediction:

Gianforte 49
Quist 47
Wicks 4

[GeorgiaModerate]

Can Quist really win Flathead County

If anybody can it's him. It's his home county.

This Google Poll seems to think he can - but the number of respondents from there was only 16.  That's too small a sample.  And my poll is likely crap.

If I have time tonight, I might try to look at all the Google Polls we have so far to see if the Quist-Flathead trend continues throughout.  I only started county crosstabs with this poll.

These polls are much appreciated, but I have to think that you'd never make it as a professional pollster.  You actually admit it when your polls are likely crap.

[GeorgiaModerate]

Why do so many people on the left here think Quist will win? Outside of (very) dubious google polling, we have actual firms showing +15 (emerson), +14 (gravis), and +7 (change).

This isn't GA-6 where trump won by only 1.5, this is a statewide election where trump won by 20.

Is there any evidence that quist will win here? At all?

Consider the Republican Candidate, A candidate for Governor in 2016 who voters may be weary of, who has flipped on the AHCA, an unpopular bill, has been subject to numerous attacks not only in this race but also in the Governor's race, and the fact that Quist has a decent campaign with a number of high profile and popular names campaigning with and backing him, in addition to numerous donations from small donors.  Quist won't win that's for sure, but he's made it far closer than anyone expected, in no small part thanks to Gianforte being a sub-par candidate.

Yes, exactly.  And if Gianforte wins narrowly, which is what I expect, the GOP will probably try to spin it as the voters rejecting Democratic liberalism.   But if the margin is in single digits, that should be a huge warning sign to the GOP.

[GeorgiaModerate]

Every week, I become a little more convinced that we're all living in a badly-written VR scenario.

[GeorgiaModerate]

     So a state with only a million people is a slow-as-molasses counter. Sad!

Hopefully it will be quicker since it's the only thing on the ballot.

If ballots in America are counted by machine in most places, shouldn't it not really matter how many ballot items there are?

It's the part that comes after that creates a bottleneck.  For example, here in Georgia, Fulton County (which contains most of the city of Atlanta plus some suburbs) is notoriously slow to report.  Among other things, this is because the machine counts are tabulated at the precinct level and then sent to the county election board via modem.  And the county servers are running some antiquated version of Windows, which probably doesn't help.

[GeorgiaModerate]

Exactly tied. Down to the actual vote.

That would be great.  I've always wanted to see another one like this: https://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/minute/Closest_election_in_Senate_history.htm