7 Days Out

To:                   Friends, countrymen, Florida Man

From:              A tired, 46-year old hack on his third Presidential questioning his life and career choices

Date:               March 239, 2020

Re:                  One week to go – and a bye week for the Jaguars

As we enter the bye week in the Jaguars schedule, two things are dominating the mind of your average American:  with 30 million unemployed, how do Doug Marrone and Todd Wash still have a job in Jacksonville when literally any two random people would give the Jaguars a better chance at winning, and what is happening in Florida in the election?

Honestly with a week out, I probably have a better answer for the first question than I do the second.

Before we get into things, I want to remind the World of the ole Twitter dot com of four facts:

• In the current political alignment of battleground states, Florida is not only the biggest, it is actually the closest.  If you add up all the people who have voted for President since Florida entered the coterie of battleground states in 1992, roughly 51 million ballots have been cast in the last seven elections (1992-2016) – and the total pot of Democratic and Republican votes is separated by just under 20,000 votes.
• Florida had seven statewide elections between 2010-2018 decided by less than 1.2% -- three of which were decided by 0.4% or less.
• Republicans have more voters who are certain to show up cycle to cycle.  Democrats have more who have sporadic history. 
• I am writing most of this after midnight, so please be extra forgiving of my already only marginal use of the English language.

The point is this:  Florida is close.  It will be close in 2020, and absent a shift in voter attitudes within one of several demographics, it is likely to remain close for the next few cycles. Florida is going to -- always, pull a Florida.

It is also important to understand why Florida is close – literally the dumb luck of population trends and demographic shifts that have led things to just cancel each other out.  These dynamics essentially have created a state that is structurally very close – where the smallest of shifts sometimes matter – and sometimes get cancelled out by an equally sized small shift another direction.

A great example of this is Orlando.   George Bush beat Al Gore in the Orlando media market by nearly the exact same margin (2.9%) that Trump beat Secretary Clinton (3.3%) – but the wins couldn’t have looked more different.  Bush’s win was mostly evenly distributed across the market, whereas Clinton crushed in the urban counties, and Trump crushed in the coastal and exurban counties.  The shifts in urban Orlando – diversification and growing Democratic support among college-educated whites was cancelled out by Trump’s strength among white seniors and non-college whites outside of the urban area.

I know this is obvious to the 11 readers of my blog (who I do appreciate – truly), but I think it often gets lost elsewhere – Florida is just never going to be easy, for either side.  It will always be a slog.  The reason both sides fight so hard here is simple:  Republicans have to win it for their math – and Democrats know that, and the goal is the ole land war in Asia helps make the rest of the map smoother.  

One other thing before we dive in – I haven’t written as much this cycle for two reasons:  one, I just haven’t had as much time, and two, we are watching voting trends change in real time, so I’ll be honest, I’ve been intentionally cautious.  For example, readers of the first blog piece will remember I was pretty careful in characterizing the early VBM leads as a sign of things to come – because of the aforementioned GOP advantage in more certain voters yet to come.  

Now that you have read 600 words or so, if you are reading this because you want Steve’s prediction on the race, you can now return to your regular programming.  This note, like all the other ones, is to try to add some context to raw numbers – some things I like, some things I don’t.  If you are looking for this memo to allow you to tweet “See, Schale says it is awesome - boom, this thing is over” or “Man, Schale sounds depressed - MAGA” – unless you are tweeting about my depression as a Jaguars fan, that is not what this memo will say.

That being said, as bad as we've been the last 25 years - at least we haven't been as bad as the Cowboys (we have nearly twice as many playoff wins). 

Now for the main attraction.

Floridians are voting.  It is really remarkable.  As of this morning, more than 50.6% of Democrats have voted – and overall, turnout is 44.5%.   (GOP is 46.2% and NPA is 34.2%)

In total 6.45 million voters have voted. By comparison, the total who voted before Election Day in 2016 was about 6.6 million voters.  There is a decent chance by the time I hit send on this memo, the state will pass that number.   I now believe turnout will be north of 11 million people – which is roughly 76%.  How much north of 11?  Ask me in a week.

For comparison, Florida hit 77% in 1980, 79% in 1968, and 83% in 1992. It was 75% in both 08 and 16. Overall, I fall on the side of thinking that the higher the turnout, the better it is for my team – and while this isn’t a hard and fast rule, higher turnout in a state that is getting more diverse should mean an electorate that is overall younger, and more diverse than a typical election – and even if that doesn’t change the overall R vs D make-up – because so many younger voters of color register as NPA, this should be good.  Again though – no guarantees in life.

As of this morning, Democrats hold a 302K voter margin.   The Democratic lead is all in vote by mail returns.  The Republican advantages come entirely from in-person early voting.  This is the cats and dogs have switched places side of this election.  It is like when the Jaguars are good, and nothing seems normal.

As you may have noticed if you follow me on twitter, I haven’t gotten into the day to day reporting – not when the Dem advantage was climbing in early returns, and not as the GOP has chipped away at it – because neither number really tells much of a story – because of voting trends.  

What I am watching is more basic:  who has actually voted – who has not voted that we know will vote – and who is voting that we didn’t or might not expect to vote.

So, let’s look at this a little.

Among Democrats:  85% of those who have voted showed up in 2016 and/or 2018.  

Among Republicans, it is 81%

Among NPA’s, it is 79%

To look at this a different way, among the universe who showed up in 2016 and/or 2018, Democrats have seen 59% of their vote already cast, Republicans 48% and NPA 47%.

I basically assume in a massive turnout election; these people will show up. If only these people show up – the voters who voted in 2016 and/or 2018, Republicans will have an advantage among all voters.   Can Democrats win if the GOP has an advantage?  Yes, if one or both of these conditions are true:  more Republicans split off for Biden than Democrats for Trump, and/or, Biden wins the NPA vote.  The scale of both of these things will determine how much of a GOP edge in registration Biden could overcome.

Here is a little math on this.  Let’s say for arguments sake NPA voters make up 24% of the electorate – and the GOP has a 1% advantage in turnout (it was 0.6%) in 2016.  If both sides got 90% of their own vote – meaning the opposite gets 10% (I know there are third party candidates – just play along, please) – Biden would need a 6% margin among NPA voters to win the state by just outside the margin of a recount.   Let’s say the NPA split 50-50, then Biden would need to get 12% of Republicans compared to Trump getting 10% of Democrats to win by the same margin.

The one condition that would give me a high confidence that Democrats win Florida:  one where turnout is basically at parity when everything is counted. To get there, Democrats need to turn out more infrequent voters.   To date, Democrats have more new and infrequent voters who have voted – but a larger share of the GOP vote so far comes from infrequent and new voters.  That is one of the main story lines to watch over the next week

Let’s look at a few things a week out that I like, and a few that I would like to see get better.  For people over on the ole hellsite dot com, when I say things “I would like to see get better,” this does not mean flashing siren – Schale is freaking out - nor when I say "I like this" does it mean I am supremely confident about the outcome.  The words mean exactly what I write - this is what I think.  I know I shouldn’t have to waste words typing these things, but if you lived with my mentions, you would understand why I have to do that (and why I question my decision of ever setting up a twitter account).

Things I like as a Democrat:

• Turnout.  Y’all are killing it.  I did not think over 50% of Democrats would have voted with still five days to vote in-person, and seven days until Election Day.  This number is good for a lot of reasons:  the obvious one, but also you all have made the job of Biden organizers far easier, as now they can focus on an ever increasingly smaller funnel of voters – and they can focus on broader universes of sporadic voters.  If you live in Florida and you have not read this – and you want my guy to win:  do your local organizer a favor, and go vote, so they can take you off their list.

• Duval.  Duval Dems are guarding the house like they are those Jags fans when the Seattle Seahawks’ Quinton Jefferson threatened to climb into the stands in the whatever that stadium is called now.  Duval Democrats have a roughly 12-point advantage among people who have voted (compared to a 6% voter reg advantage) and are leading in both VBM and in-person voting.   Unless something really goes south, Joe Biden is going to win Duuuuval.  

• Dems in red counties:  Turnout and VBM return rates have been very strong in places where Democrats need to cut the margins.  If Clinton had maintained anything close to the Obama 2012 margins in red counties, she would have won.  A Biden win requires both doing well in base communities, and keeping margins close elsewhere.  

Things I want to see improve:

• Continued increase in turnout in communities of color.  The upside is Black and Hispanic shares of the electorate are higher at this point in the cycle than they were four years ago – meaning more are voting earlier.  That being said, both Black and Hispanic turnout are lagging white turnout.  For example, turnout among White Democrats is 58%, Black Democrats 44%, and Hispanic Democrats 42%.   That being said, to show just how important the higher than average at this point turnout among Black Democrats is to the math:  Whites make up 65% of all votes so far, and Republicans have a 542K advantage among these voters.  Black voters make up 12.4% of all voters so far, but the Democratic advantage is 676K.  In fairness, a lot of history suggest these voters are more likely to vote closer to the election and on election day. 

• Democrats returning their ballots:  Come on now.  196K more Democrats have ballots sitting on their kitchen tables than Republicans.  If you are reading this and you can see your ballot, immediately close this screen, and look up the nearest drop box.  Every day you wait just means some organizer has to call you when they should be calling someone else.  Don't be that person.

One additional note – Dade County.    It is important to remember for those who are tweeting at me about Dade that is basically a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma, stuffed into a empanada, doused with hot sauce, and barreling down I-95 at 90mph in a Honda Civic in the emergency lane with the driver leaning out the window holding a couch that is tied to nothing yet somehow balancing on the car roof in a driving rain storm with no windshield wipers, or functioning turn signals.   Yes, I am still not sure how I survived that one time when Caputo took me to the Miami airport. 

I get the concern about Dade from Democrats.  I also get it is a place that beats to its own drummer.  The bad news:  GOP turnout rates are higher than Democrats.   The reality:  that doesn’t overly worry me as a single data point.  The GOP machine is very good in Miami – and particularly in the Cuban community, there is a real effort to get people to vote by mail and vote early.  And Democrats tend to catch up over time.  

Keep in mind a few things:  there are more Republican Hispanic registered voters than Democrats.  I think folks often forget this.   Both parties are turning out a fairly equal percentage of new and sporadic voters – so a lot of their advantage is just a function of their voters voting earlier – just like that is benefiting us elsewhere.  Also, I looked at some similar data from 2016 later in this same week – and the registration spreads between the two parties were pretty similar.  So yes, I would like to see turnout increase – and yes, we need improvement.  

Couple more thoughts.  People keep comparing this to 2016, and I beg of you:  stop.  

First, there is very little rhyme or reason to the voting trends compared to earlier cycles, nor is there some magic number for Democrats to be ahead for me or anyone to feel comfortable.  

Secondly, every race is different.   That race was rocked by the Comey memo that changed the trajectory of the race nationally – which obviously impacted things here.  Everything broke towards Trump late – including virtually every late decider – as arguably happened late in 2012 with Obama, where if nothing else, all Romney momentum stalled.  The race this time is far steadier and has been for months.  I will also say this – sure there might be a “secret” Trump vote (I don’t really buy this – I think there were a lot more people who just didn’t care for either candidate and they all broke Trump  late) – I would remind folks than in 2012 – the polls thought Romney was going to win. There is no guarantee either will happen this time.  In other words, focus on turning out our vote.  That is how we win.

Two final things – One: Remember the limited predictive value of these voting trends.  The Romney folks and most Republicans thought the early voting numbers spelled doom for Obama in 2012.  Most Democrats, including me, thought Clinton was in a good place going into 2016.  Maybe because I am old and tired, I’m not trying to read tea leaves this year – and again, am focused more on trends.  Honestly, notwithstanding all of the analysis provided here and by everyone on-line, I don’t think Florida will be an outlier this year.  In other words, if the home team does well in the upper Midwest, I think Florida falls our way as well.  If Trump turns it around up there, I think he also wins Florida.  Just my hunch. 

And secondly, if Republicans weren’t still worried about the state, Trump wouldn’t have visited Pensacola, Ocala, and The Villages in the last week – and if Democrats didn’t think Florida was winnable, Biden and Obama wouldn’t be on their way here this week.  The most valuable commodity on a campaign is time – and campaigns have far better data than us – or even twitter – so keep that in mind. 

For Democrats, I get this state causes heartburn – trust me, I live it.  I know people want certainty – well, you aren’t going to get it from this memo, other than my confidence that the Jaguars will continue to suck.

My plan is to take another look at the end of the week (meaning probably the weekend), and once more on Monday.  On Monday, I will lay out what I am looking for in certain counties for Tuesday as a viewing guide.

Also, as a fair warning, I may not be as active on Election Night trying to dissect Florida as I was in 2016.  I will try, but as a reminder, I run an organization who is currently active in a number of battleground states, so I may or may not be in a place where I can focus entirely on Florida at exactly 7:03 PM.  I will try though.  More to come. 

Thanks, as always for reading.  And again, thank you to everyone who will point out where I missed a comma.