From 2018 To Beyond: Starting with Detailed 2018 Election Night Coverage

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

OK, I am going to try my hand at writing one of these timelines.

My main goal is a plausible and realistic story (insofar as this is possible for a hypothetical), with a combination of setbacks and victories for everyone, with a little bit of light humor here and there. That doesn't mean being "fair and balanced" just for the sake of it, but I mean to convey that this is not going to be a timeline in which either Democrats or Republicans get a huge unchecked landslide, get everything they want, everyone loves it, and everyone rides away into the sunset.

Although I have some rough ideas, I do not have any sort of preset plan as to what exactly will happen, who will win what elections, who in particular will be elected as the next President (or in what year exactly that happens) and what outside events will occur and have a significant impact on politics. Any input from readers about plausibility will be taken into account as we go along.

Our story will begin on the morning of November 6, 2018 (election day), and then we will have detailed election night coverage of results as they come in.

It will take a while to get through election day, so after we are done with that, I will probably go back and fill in some detail on what happened between now (late Sept 2018) and election day. Hopefully by the time we get to that, what happens in reality will have filled in some important details, such as what happens with the Kavanaugh confirmation fight, and perhaps some more developments that might shed light on where the Mueller investigation is going.

Then we'll start moving through into 2019 and eventually start up the 2020 Democratic presidential primary.






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I had a few people interested in how I was generating these election results (for potentially using something similar their own timelines or whatever else) sending me PMs about it. So, for anyone who is interested and wants to try it out, I basic version which takes out anything that will directly (or even indirectly, very much) reveal what the results are likely to be for the rest of this timeline. I will also add this in the 1st post of this thread.

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[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

THE BEGINNING...

The morning of November 6, 2018: ELECTION DAY, Leesburg, Virginia



It was raining in Northern Virginia.

Jared S., a low level Republican White House staffer who worked in communications, jumped across a puddle that had collected at the entrance to the driveway of 203 Maplewood. Thud - he landed partly in the water, and suddenly his shoes were soaked even more than they already were.

He was knocking on doors for Barbara Comstock. He wished he had taken that bus to Richmond to help in VA-05 instead. At least it wasn't raining in Richmond, and Dave Brat, as much has Jared disliked him, at least had a better chance to win. He didn't really believe, in his heart of hearts, that Comstock would win. But oh well, someone had to fight the good fight. And who knows - in 2016 he didn't really think that Trump would win either! And maybe this rain, as horrible as it was for him, would also depress Democratic turnout.

15 seconds after Jared's finger hit the doorbell, 43 year old Margaret W, a white college-educated suburban mother of 3, answered the door and saw Jared's Comstock T-shirt. "Comstock, huh? She's the Republican, right?," she asked. Jared started to respond, "Yes Ma'am. I'm Jared, I..." But Margaret interrupted him before he could finish his sentence: "I ****ing hate Trump's guts. I already voted first thing this morning for Wexler. Go away and never come back!!!" The door, wet from the rain, slammed and sprayed drops of water onto his face.

Jared sighed quietly to himself. His list was only supposed to have strong confirmed Republicans, but this was yet another angry woman voting for a Democrat, the fourth in the last 2 hours. Although he'd spent half an hour at the campaign office sifting through Comstock's opposition research on Wexler, he'd barely gotten to mention any of it to voters. So many voters wouldn't even listen to what he had to say. It seemed like this was a lost cause, and he was ready to go get some lunch. Anything for a break from this hellish rain.

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

I feel bad for Jared even though he is fake

Things will turn around for Jared sooner or later. Probably not in terms of the election results in VA-10 in 2018, however

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

ELECTION DAY TURNOUT REPORTS



The afternoon of November 6, 2018: ELECTION DAY, Orlando, Florida
ABC 13 local news

Reporter: "I'm here at Louis Armstrong Middle school in Orlando here, Charlie. I've just be talking to the polling place workers, and they are saying that turnout here is higher than they expected. This is a heavily African American precinct, and they have already had 200 more people voting than at this time in 2014. So that's probably good news for Andrew Gillum, who is really trying to turn up African American turnout."



The afternoon of November 6, 2018: ELECTION DAY, Tallahassee, Florida
ABC 13 local news

Reporter: "I'm here at the Trinity Baptist Church in Tallahassee, Sarah. I've just be talking to the polling place workers, and they are saying that turnout here is lower than they expected. This is a heavily African American precinct, but they say turnout is no higher, and maybe even a bit lower, than at this time in 2014. So that's probably bad news for Andrew Gillum, who is really trying to turn up African American turnout."




The afternoon of November 6, 2018: ELECTION DAY, Ottawa, Kansas
CNN

Wolf Blitzer: "And we're going to Kansas now, we have some turnout reports. Who is voting? Who is voting today?"

Reporter: "Hi Wolf. I'm here in Ottawa, Kansas, in the middle of the hotly contested 2nd Congressional District where Democrat Paul Davis and Republican Steve Watkins have been running a hard fought, very expensive race to fill this open seat left by retiring representative Lynn Jenkins. Now, I was talking 5 minutes ago with the local election administrator here in this heavily Conservative and Republican part of the district. He said that he has never seen turnout like this. Conservatives here are apparently really motivated to vote this year. Lots of excitement here with the Congressional race and the Governor's race. Despite this being a largely rural area, they have had people lining up out the door to vote in precincts across Franklin County. On the other hand, I was just in Chanute, which is in Neosho County, earlier, and the election administrators there were saying that turnout they have been seeing is nothing out of the ordinary so far, and they are not expecting an increase in turnout."

Wolf Blitzer: "Well, well, well. A mixed bag there, a mixed bag. I guess we'll just have to wait until the votes come in to hear what the voters will say. But wait, we will have exit polls soon, some preliminary results can be released in about an hour. Stay tuned on CNN."

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

LIVE LOOK AT THE US ELECTION ATLAS FORUM ELECTION DAY MEGATHREAD

The afternoon of November 6, 2018: ELECTION DAY, on the internet

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

EARLY EXIT POLLS SOON...



November 6, 2018, 4:55 PM EST: ELECTION DAY, CNN Headquarters, Washington D.C.
CNN: THE SITUATION ROOM

Wolf Blitzer: "WELCOME TO THE SITUATION ROOM, and I'm WOLF BLITZER.

Wolf Blitzer: "I want you to focus only on the information I'm delivering, and never on the man delivering it. I’d prefer to be unnoticed, unconsidered: a bearded, bespectacled source of trustworthy news and nothing more. I don’t want you to know if I'm a Democrat or a Republican (I probably don’t even vote, or do I?). I only want you to know that I will report all sides of any story. Even my voice seems perfectly balanced: a little husky, a little nasal, not too high, not too low, not too fast, not too slow—always calm and collected. I'm so straight-laced and normal that, when you think about it, I actually seem quirky. New York magazine once called me “resolutely humorless.” I'm often invited to appear in movies and TV shows (and now, timelines). I always play myself, delivering the daily news—specifically cast to make a work of fiction feel more realistic and advance a storyline while not distracting viewers."

Wolf Blitzer: "Nevertheless, I am REPORTING FROM THE SITUATION ROOM, AND THIS IS A CNN EXCLUSIVE. It's election night in America. HYPE!!!"

Wolf Blitzer: "It's almost five o'clock eastern time and we're about to be able to release preliminary findings from our exit polls. We won't be able to tell you yet exactly who voters are voting for, that's embargoed still because millions of people are still voting and we respect the electoral process, but we will be able to look at some exit poll data on what issues were important to voters and how they are feeling today about President Trump, Mitch McConnell, and Nancy Pelosi, and also what they thought of the Kavanaugh hearings."

Wolf Blitzer: And we'll have our MVP John King at the magic wall to break it all down for us."



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Wolf Blitzer: "But first, this commercial break."

Commercial Break: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HSRieuzms24

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

EARLY EXIT POLLS

November 6, 2018, 5:00 PM EST: ELECTION DAY, CNN Headquarters, Washington D.C.
CNN: THE SITUATION ROOM - CNN'S ELECTION DAY HEADQUARTERS

Wolf Blitzer: "We’re now ready to release the first results from today’s exit polls of voters all around the country. Our Chief National Correspondent John King has been reviewing all the data. What are you seeing there, John?"



John King: "Wolf, we’ll give you a glimpse first of what’s on the minds of voters nationally as they go on the polls, and then we’ll zero in on some of the key early battleground races."

John King: "No surprise here. 50% of voters say the most important issue facing the country is the economy. Now a bit later when the polls start closing, we'll show you how these voters broke down. We can't do that right now because the polls are still open across the country. But 50% said the economy, that's issue number one, 25% said health care, 19% said immigration. So, personal economic issues dominating the electorate. Only 6%, Wolf, saying foreign policy is the most important country."

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John King: "So, personal economic issues dominating the electorate. Only 6%, Wolf, saying foreign policy is the most important country."

John King: "Next, how do the voters feel about Donald Trump? 20% strongly approve of the job he is doing as President, 24% somewhat approve, 13% somewhat disapprove, and 42% strongly disapprove. So 43% approve, 57% disapprove."

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John King: "But also very favorability ratings for Democratic and Republican leaders in Congress. Very bad approval ratings for Nancy Pelosi. Only 31% have a favorable opinion of her, 59% unfavorable."

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John King: "But look at this, Mitch McConnell, also with horrible favorable ratings. 27% favorable, but 58% unfavorable."

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John King: "The voters don't like President Trump, Wolf. And they also don't like Congress. And they don't like either the Republican leaders or the Democratic leaders in Congress."

Wolf Blitzer: "Interesting, John, interesting. The voters are not happy with how things are going in the government. What about the Kavanaugh confirmation hearings? Those were some controversial, controversial hearings, John. And the Mueller investigation?"

John King: "Well, Wolf, you see an interesting split here. A clear majority, 61% approving of the Mueller investigation, but 39% disapprove."

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John King: "And exactly the opposite for how Congress handled the Kavanaugh confirmation hearings. A clear majority, 61% disapproving of the Kavanaugh hearings, but 39% approve."

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John King: "Now, at 6 o'clock, just a little under an hour from now, the polls will close in Kentucky and Indiana. And when they do, we'll be back at the magic wall to look at the exit polls and the results. We will have some key, key results from the Indiana Senate race and the 6th district in Kentucky. Those could. Democrats don't have other top targets for house seats in Kentucky and Indiana, but if they pick up or do well in any other seats, it could be a sign that they are having a good night. Or if Republicans can win the targeted Senate race and/or the Kentucky's 6th district, it could be a sign that Republicans are going to have a good night."

John King: "But for now we'll go to our panel for some meaningless drivel about the entirely unsurprising fact that most voters so far disapprove of Trump, McConnell, and Pelosi while we wait for polls to close so we can come back to the magic wall. Over to you, Wolf."



Wolf Blitzer: "Panel, the voters hate everyone. Are you surprised?"

Republican Talking Head: "Blah de blah blah blah."

Democratic Talking Heaad: "Blah da blee blee bleh."

"Independent" Talking Head: "Bloo doo blih blah bluh."

Republican Talking Head: "Blah de blah blah blah."

Democratic Talking Heaad: "Blah da blee blee bleh."

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

I love this timeline and I love the insight of the panel

Yup, that's what the panel is paid for.

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

PRESIDENT TRUMP ELECTION DAY CAMPAIGN RALLY



November 6, 2018, 5:27 PM EST: Billings, Montana
TRUMP - Rosendale rally

President Trump: "Make America great folks, make America great again!"

Crowd cheers

President Trump: "You know, why would anyone vote for John Tester? John Tester. The guy is kind of creepy. You know, he has been horrible in Congress. A huge disappointment. Never votes to get things done, always a pain to deal with. What was wrong with you people in Montana to elect this guy in the first place? You've got to get rid of him. Vote in Matt Rosendale instead. He'll be SO much better."

Crowd cheers

President Trump: "Tester treated Admiral Jackson so unfairly. So unfairly. Jon Tester’s statements on Admiral Jackson were not true. There were no such findings. A horrible thing that we have had live with, just like phony Russian Collusion. Tester should lose the race here in Montana. He's very dishonest and sick!"

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/990307626784362496

Crowd cheers

President Trump: "He's so creepy and sick. He could probably be a child molester, who knows? What a sick guy. Many people have been saying that, they suspect it. We don't know for sure yet, but there should be an investigation. You can see it right in his name. Tester the Molester, right? If the Democrats want to investigate Russia, we should investigate this. They said Roy Moore was a molester. That wasn't true, that turned out not to be true when they investigated it. But maybe for Tester, it could be true. What a sick guy. The guy is worse than Bill Clinton. Why hasn't the FBI started an investigation yet? Where is the Justice Department? They're AWOL right now. You have to do something about it, vote the guy out."

Crowd cheers

President Trump: "Well, have you people voted yet? You know, you have got to go vote this guy out. If you are here at this rally and you didn't vote, and then sicko Tester the Molester wins, it will be all your fault. Your fault. And if I get impeached because of it by the phony Democrats Mueller investigation witch hunt, you did it. You did it. I have the best condominiums, you know."

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CNN BREAKING NEWS ALERT

November 6, 2018, 5:29 PM EST: ELECTION DAY, CNN Headquarters, Washington D.C.
CNN: THE SITUATION ROOM - CNN'S ELECTION DAY HEADQUARTERS



Wolf Blitzer: "I'm sorry panel, I have to interrupt. We have breaking news, over to Anderson Cooper."



Anderson Cooper: "President Trump at a rally in Montana has called Senator Jon Tester a Molester. We have absolutely no evidence to confirm this. We're going live to the rally."

CNN switches to live feed of TRUMP - Rosendale Election Day Rally

President Trump: .................... ybe for Tester, it could be true. What a sick guy. The guy is worse than Bill Clinton. Why hasn't the FBI started an investigation yet? Where is the Justice Department? They're AWOL right now. You have to do something about it, vote the guy out."

Crowd cheers

President Trump: "Well, have you people voted yet? You know, you have got to go vote this guy out. If you are here at this rally and you didn't vote, and then sicko Tester the Molester wins, it will be all your fault. Your fault. And if I get impeached because of it by the phony Democrats Mueller investigation witch hunt, you did it. You did it. I have the best condominiums, you know."

CNN cuts back to Anderson Cooper



Anderson Cooper: "We have absolutely no evidence of what President Trump just said. We have reporters following up with the White House Press Office to see if they have any information or any comment. Again, we are not aware of any evidence to support what President Trump just said."

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

Hold on, what?

It (probably) doesn't have any particular significance for the timeline. Just a latest-Trump-controversy interlude.

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

CNN BREAKING NEWS ALERT

November 6, 2018, 5:38 PM EST: ELECTION DAY, CNN Headquarters, Washington D.C.
CNN: THE SITUATION ROOM - CNN'S ELECTION DAY HEADQUARTERS



Wolf Blitzer: "And we have a statement from the White House Press Secretary, Sarah Huckabee Sanders. Anderson."

Anderson Cooper: "The statement says:"

(Anderson Cooper reads the statement on air)

White House Statement:

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Wolf Blitzer: "Over to our panel. What do you think about these developments? What impact will they have, if any, on the election?"



Republican Strategist: "You know, I think this is a shame. Why is the media latching on to these comments like that and misrepresenting them?"

Democratic Strategist: "These comments are utterly shameful, and have no place in our politics. President Trump should be ashamed of himself and apologize immediately to Senator Tester, and Matt Rosendale should denounce these comments. This is just another example of President Trump going off the rails, and shows why we need to elect Democrats to put a check and balance on Trump."

"Independent" Panelist: "President Trump likes to talk, and sometimes the wrong words come out of his mouth. But you know, we have seen this sort of thing before, and it never sticks. Most people have already voted by now, and people expect these sorts of controversies at this point. This is nothing new, and I doubt it will have much impact. And anyway, pretty soon we will start to get results from Indiana and Kentucky."

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

LIVE LOOK AT THE ATLAS FORUM MONTANA SENATE MEGATHREAD

November 6, 2018, 5:43 PM EST: ELECTION DAY, on the internet

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

Question to readers -

I am trying to make this feel realistic, and at least my perception is that Trump often says crazy things. So my intention with this last part was just to capture that aspect of reality. Whether I captured that well or not, I don't know. In this particular case, I thought this has some similarity to the ways that Trump said that Bill Clinton was a rapist in the 2016 campaign, for example.

I don't intend for this to have any further substantive impact, just another daily controversy that will probably be forgotten in a few days (and certainly overshadowed by the election results) - of course, maybe it has an impact in Montana (or maybe not, like the Greg Gianforte incident).

Was this good, or would you prefer if I not try to simulate Trump craziness (perhaps influenced by my own biases)? I said at the beginning that I wanted to listen to any input from readers, so just let me know what you think about my general approach so far.

Likewise I intend to have periodic intervening events such as various disasters and random events of the sort that occur in reality. However, you shouldn't think that everything like that has a big impact on the timeline itself - my goal is just to make it feel realistic, similar to how in real life unexpected events, disasters, and developments will often occur.



We will, however, get to the election night results soon. I have a script I am working on that generates election results with partial reporting, so I will be posting result updates on something every 10-15 minutes (of election-night time, not of real time). It will take a bit more time to finish that, but once it is done it should be good.

The intention is to try to capture some of the uncertainty, tension, surprises, and excitement that you get on an actual election night.

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

Great TL. Shame Beto will inevitably lose given who the author is, but looking forward to seeing the results regardless. Seems very well done and realistic!

I'm actually using a probabilistic model to generate the election results. So while Cruz is favored, Beto does actually have a chance in this (and not just an entirely negligible one, either). This should make it more interesting - the results will be more unexpected that way. To make sure I am not tempted to re-run the simulation if I don't like the results, when I am running the simulation that I use I'll post here, and then I'll be mentally committed to using that particular simulation run.

Note - I have already run the simulation for House results, but the house is large/complicated enough that I did make some manual tweaks to it. But for the Senate and Governor's races, I think I can just do it purely randomly relying entirely on the model.

The other thing is that from the actual results, I also have randomly generated exit polls, which have both a systematic error component (i.e. all the exit polls could overstate Dems or all could overstate Reps), and also an idiosyncratic error component (an error just for that individual race). So we will have exit polls which will be reflective of the actual results, but biased/inaccurate to a random/varying degree. This way, part of the fun with looking at the results come in will be trying to figure out how much and in what way the exit polls are off.

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

What's the simulator?
And will you manually stop crazy things like Angus King or Tim Kaine losing?

It's my own model that I made for fun. The variances aren't high enough for something as crazy as King or Kaine losing to have anything more than an infinitesimally small chance.

I think what I want to do, though, is set it up so that I myself won't know the final results at least for the Senate/Gov races until you do.

I've done a good number of practice runs and am checking it over, and I don't think anything crazy on that level will happen, but if it does I will either invent a scandal after the fact to justify it, or else if it seems just too crazy, then maybe we will change it manually. But we should be able to cross that bridge when (if) we get there.

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

OK, here goes nothing. I am running the simulation one time now, and I am going to use whatever result I get on this run. I have set it up so that I won't see the results until I am ready to copy/paste into a post. So that means that I will not know in advance the Senate and Governor results any more than readers do, although I will already know of the House results.

There will be updates every 10 minutes through election night (of timeline time, not of real time), and I am thinking of doing 2 updates per day. At that pace, we should get through election night by roughly mid-late October, depending on how long it takes for the last few closest races to come in and to be called.

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

And the simulation is done. So soon we will start to get results, when I write up a post.

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

6:00 PM EST: POLLS CLOSED IN INDIANA AND KENTUCKY



November 6, 2018, 5:59 PM EST: ELECTION DAY, CNN Headquarters, Washington D.C.
CNN: THE SITUATION ROOM - CNN'S ELECTION DAY HEADQUARTERS

(Methodological note - to make things easier for simulating results coming in, my model assumes that polls in each state all close at the same time. That is not true in reality in Kentucky and Indiana, so this is slightly unrealistic, but makes things much easier).

Wolf Blitzer: "Just one minute from now, polls will close in Kentucky and Indiana and our election results coverage will begin! We will have exit polls for the Indiana Senate race, a hotly contested race between incumbent Democratic Senator Joe Donnelly, and Republican challenger Mike Braun. And we will have preliminary exit polls for the House national popular vote. In addition, for the first time ever, CNN has conducted EXCLUSIVE exit polls of all 435 individual House races across the entire United States. In particular, we will be looking at the Indiana Senate race and the 6th Congresssional District of Kentucky, the two most competitive races in Indiana and Kentucky, for early results and clues about how the night is going for Democrats and Republicans."

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(Methodological note -

Although in real life there are no exit polls for individual House races, I decided to include them just for fun since I can generate them just as easily as for other races, and this is essentially no additional effort.

All exit polls are randomly generated based on the actual final results in each race. Senate, and Governor, and the House National Popular vote exit poll all include both a systematic random error (shared by all of those) and an individual random error for each exit poll. Because of the systematic error, it is possible for exit polls to be systematically wrong (on average), across the board.

The exit polls for individual house races, on the other hand, have a separate systematic error for each state. So, for example, the House exit polls in Kentucky will have a different systematic error from the House exit polls in Indiana, and both of these systematic errors will be different from the national systematic error that .  I made individual House races in each state use a different systematic error so that it wouldn't be too easy to figure out what (if any) systematic national error there is in the exit polls, at least until a significant number of votes have actually come in. This means that you shouldn't necessarily read too much from one type of exit poll into another. It is possible that different types of exit polls can be off in different directions.

There is, however, generally some relation between the actual House vote in each state and the actual Senate/Gov vote in those states, though this relationship is not necessarily strong and there are certain states/races where Senate/Gov candidates are more likely to overperform/underperform the House vote.)

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Wolf Blitzer: "And it is 6 Eastern Time! Polls have just closed in Kentucky and Indiana, and we can now make some characterizations and release exit poll results from those states."



Wolf Blitzer: "Based on our exit polls, we can make a characterization of control of the House of Representatives. Control of the House of Representatives is TOO EARLY TO CALL."

Wolf Blitzer: "Based on our exit polls, we can make a characterization of the Senate race in Indiana. The Senate race in Indiana is TOO CLOSE TO CALL."

Wolf Blitzer: "Based on our exit polls, we can make a characterization of the House race in Kentucky's 6th District. Kentucky's 6th Congressional District is TOO CLOSE TO CALL."

Wolf Blitzer: "And now we'll go to John King and our panel. Our exit polls are now also posted on CNN.com, so go log in and take a look for yourself!"

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House Exit Polls:

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Senate Exit Polls:

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[/quote]

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John King: "Wolf, well those are some interesting early characterizations. Panelists, what do you make of this?"

Democratic Talking Head: "My gosh, I am looking here at the early House exit poll, and it has Democrats up 58-40 in the House National Popular Vote! If that's accurate, this could be a landslide in the House like we haven't seen since at least 1974. And on the Presidential level we haven't seen landslides like this in decades - not since Reagan in 1984 or LBJ in 1964."

John King: "Keep in mind that is just an early exit poll. Millions of people are still voting, and this is based on ballots cast so far. It is still early especially in the West, and we are estimating the vote especially in the West coast, partially based on what we know from an exit poll of early voters there."

Republican Talking Head: "But look at the Indiana Senate race. Sure, it is too close to call, but Braun is up in the exit poll 52-47. And in KY-06, Andy Barr is up in the exit poll 53-47. This is a race that Democrats really wanted to pick up, they thought they had a great candidate, Amy McGrath with her viral video flying a fighter jet. But if that exit poll is right, she will fall short. And as far as the House Popular Vote goes, even if that early exit poll were accurate, elections are held district by district."

John King: "The question is how does the popular vote translate into seats, when Republicans have drawn strong Congressional maps and Democrats are 'naturally' packed into urban areas."

Democratic Talking Head: "It had better translate into seats, and I think it will. We have a lot of great candidates, starting with Amy McGrath in Kentucky. Don't count her out before the votes even come in."

Wolf Blitzer: "That's right. And we are getting word that some results should start to come in at around 6:10."

Democratic Talking Head: "But look at those House exit polls in Indiana. Democrats are up in IN-02 and IN-05. Neither of those are races Democrats were really expecting to be competitive, other than in our wildest dreams. And those good exit polls there are consistent with the great National Popular Vote exit poll. This could be a fantastic election night for Democrats."

"Independent" Talking Head: "You all make some good points. It's too early to tell. We just need to wait for some votes to come in to see what is really happening."

John King: "Yeah, we'll just have to wait for some votes to come in and see how they line up with the exit polls. And we should start getting results in pretty soon!"

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

I got a PM asking for some more details about how I am calculating the election results/exit polls. So I will post my response here, to provide more background/information for any interested readers.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

6:10 PM EST: THE FIRST VOTES COME IN



November 6, 2018, 6:10 PM EST: ELECTION NIGHT, CNN Headquarters, Washington D.C.
CNN: THE SITUATION ROOM - CNN'S ELECTION DAY HEADQUARTERS

John King: "And it looks like our first results have just come in."

Wolf Blitzer: "We had better send you over to the magic wall, John. We have some results from KEY HOUSE RACES in Indiana and Kentucky."

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(Methodological note - Races that have been called are designated with a star (R* and D* means called for R or called for D, respectively. Races are called automatically, and should never be called incorrectly. Races can only be called after at least some votes have come in, and are only called in a very conservative manner when it is sure of who will win).

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House Results:

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Senate Results:

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[/quote]

(Methodological note - There is no relationship between # In in different races in the same state. So for example, above there is still 0% reporting, whereas there are votes reported in IN House races. Although that is not perfectly realistic, it was easier to do this by making the results come in entirely randomly. Every 10 minutes a random amount of results are reported from each races, and there is also a chance that no results will be reported for that 10 minutes. In the case above, IN-SEN was randomly selected to not have any results reported. But there will (probably) be results in the next 10 minutes. Of course, we will have to wait and see!)

John King: "In KY-06, we have only 3% in so far, and Andy Barr, the Republican incumbent, has pulled ahead to a bit under a 10 point lead. However, it is still very early, and these first few precincts don't include anything from Lexington, where the Democrat Amy McGrath expects to do very well."

John King: "Nothing yet from IN-SEN, but so far the Republicans are ahead in IN-02 and IN-05, where the exit polls surprisingly had the Democrats ahead. Still a lot of votes to count in those races, and none of these votes so far in IN-02 and IN-05 are from South Bend or Indianapolis, the main Democratic strongholds in those two districts. Maybe if the Democrats can get good margins there, they could win these districts. And although President Trump won Hamilton County in IN-05 by 20 points, it is full of suburban, college educated voters who swung to Clinton in 2016. There are some similarities here to the 12th district of Ohio, where Democrats came very close to winning in a special election a few months ago."

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

I'm sorry but these exit polls don't make a ton of sense (Indiana Senate and KY-06 vs everything else). Looking forward to the actual results, though!

Odd exit polls, but very excited to see how this goes.

Yeah, clearly some of the exit polls have to be off. The question is just which ones, and in what way they are off.

Possibly I may have made the random variation in exit polls a bit too large, but I think we may just have gotten a bit unlucky. Since there is both a systematic error and an ideosyncratic error, you can get comparatively large overall errors if both of those types of error happen to be biased in the same direction.

As we get more results in, it should eventually become clearer what sort of systematic error is in the exit polls, and then you can interpret the remaining exit polls in light of that, as they come in.

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

Note, I edited the 6:10 results to include a map of house races that have been called so far. From now on I will include an updated version of this map for each 10 minute update.

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

6:20 PM EST: FIRST RESULTS FROM THE INDIANA SENATE RACE



November 6, 2018, 6:20 PM EST: ELECTION NIGHT, CNN Headquarters, Washington D.C.
CNN: THE SITUATION ROOM - CNN'S ELECTION DAY HEADQUARTERS

John King: "We are now starting to get some results in from the Indiana Senate race. This is one of the major hotly contested races that will determine who controls the United States Senate. Democrats currently hold it, and are looking to keep it. Republicans want to take it, and Indiana is a conservative state and Joe Donnelly, the Democrat, has been regarded as vulnerable."

Wolf Blitzer: "Republicans currently have a 51-49 majority in the United States Senate. It is balanced on a knife edge. To gain control of the Senate, Democrats would have to pick up at least 2 seats. But Republicans are trying to expand their majority, and the first place they are looking to do that is Indiana."

John King: "So far, Joe Donnelly has pulled into the lead, about an 8 point lead with 11% in. But we still have a lot of votes to count, so we'll see if he can maintain that lead."

John King: "And in the House, it looks like we just got a big dump of votes from Lexington in KY-06. McGrath, the Democrat, now has a big lead of more than 30 points. But Andy Barr, the Republican, is expected to do better in rural parts of the district. And so far, Republicans with big leads in IN-02 and IN-05, where the exit polls had Democrats slightly ahead."
...

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Senate Results:

Senate seats called: 0 D --- 0 R

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[/quote]

Wolf Blitzer: "Exciting stuff, exciting stuff."

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

LIVE LOOK AT THE US ELECTION ATLAS FORUM ELECTION NIGHT RESULTS MEGATHREAD

November 6, 2018, 6:20 PM EST: ELECTION NIGHT, on the internet



(Note - I am taking the liberty of making up some quotes for artistic purposes - the below users did not necessarily say these things )

Jesus god that margin. If that holds up, the Republican party is beyond ed.

Jesus god that margin. If that holds up, the Republican party is beyond ed.

In Indiana, I think the vote in so far is mostly from Dem areas. Braun could come back and the Senate exit poll can still be right.

In Indiana, I think the vote in so far is mostly from Dem areas. Braun could come back and the Senate exit poll can still be right.

No way, look at the House popular vote so far. Republicans are only winning the House popular vote by 2% in Indiana and Kentucky! Looks like the House national popular vote exit poll may not be that far off.

Odd exit polls, but very excited to see how this goes. I don't see how Barr makes up that margin in KY-06.

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

6:30 PM EST: FIRST SIGNS OF A WAVE? OR EVEN A TSUNAMI?



November 6, 2018, 6:30 PM EST: ELECTION NIGHT, CNN Headquarters, Washington D.C.
CNN: THE SITUATION ROOM - CNN'S ELECTION DAY HEADQUARTERS

Wolf Blitzer: "Let's go to Anderson Cooper, who is with our panel now for some reaction to these early results."

...

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Senate Results:

Senate seats called: 0 D --- 0 R

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[/quote]

Anderson Cooper: "How are these results so far looking to you?"

Democratic Strategist: "So far, this is just about the best that Democrats could have hoped for. Remember that this is Indiana and Kentucky we are talking about here. Kentucky voted for President Trump by 30 points, and Indiana voted for President Trump by 19 points. And right now, Republicans are only winning the House popular vote in those two states by 4.4%!!! Joe Donnelly is ahead in Indiana by 14 points. Amy McGrath leads in KY-06 by 20 points. Right now, this doesn't look like a wave. It looks like a tsunami. If you are a Republican, it is time to start running for high ground."

Republican Strategist: "Hold your horses there, just a minute. We need to be looking at where the vote that is in so far is coming from. Now look at Kentucky. Most of the vote in KY-06 so far is from Fayette County  - Lexington, where even Hillary Clinton managed to win. And in the Indiana senate race, those votes that just came in and brought Donnelly up above 56%, a lot of that was from Monroe County - Bloomington, home to the University of Indiana. Monroe County is already at 67% reporting. So look, I don't know if it will narrow enough, but there is no way Joe Donnelly is going to win this race by 14 points. And Andy Barr is not going to lose by 20 points. These races are going to get closer than this. Republicans on the West Coast out there, you still need to go vote. This isn't over yet."

John King: "OK, I've got to cut in here. According to some our reporters we have on the ground, it looks like we are about to get a big vote dump. Let's go over to..."

... (to be continued) ...