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Updated, 3:55 PM, 11/5/24

Good afternoon again, blog mates.

I'll post the latest numbers I have collected, with extra Clark votes and no recent reporting from Washoe and the rurals. Headline is that indies are having record turnout, will have about a third of the vote by the time all is said and done.

The GOP ballot lead is now 45,000, or 3.6 percent. 1.25 million have voted, so we will easily get past 1.3 million and so many mail ballots are out there or being put in jammed dropboxes that 1.4 million seems likely.

Clark has already blown by its 2020 turnout and unlike four years ago, Dems are ahead of Repubs (by about 4K in most recent numbers). Washoe also will exceed its 2020 turnout, but Dems are losing them to the GOP by 1,700 ballots.

Indies remain the story. 374,000 have been tallied, so I think it gets beyond 400,000. If Harris is going to win, those Clark mail ballots we don't know about yet and indies breaking her way -- not by as much as we might have thought she needed if the number of raw ballots gets very big.

If the Clark mail is really large, too, this could change the dynamic in the Legislature, too. Too early to tell.

The chart:

More later, but maybe only on Twitter or go on The Indy site.

Updated, 12:30 PM, 11/5/24

Good afternoon, blog mates.

The latest numbers:

Reminder: This does not include mail ballots from yesterday or today.

GOP lead is back up to just under 44,000 ballots, but now below 4 percent (3.7 percent). Caveat: Clark numbers are ahead of Washoe and rurals, so may be a little bigger.

It's hard to get a handle on what these numbers mean until we get a sense of the number of mail ballots out there.

But keep an eye on the rural firewall. It's at almost 58,000 now, could get above 60,000. Suppose Trump is getting 80 percent of those -- I don't think it will be that high, but maybe. There will be about 40,000 indies in the rurals, and he will get about two-thirds at least, I'd say. So: Trump winning the rurals by 75,000-80,000 seems right.

That's the hill the Dems need to climb, and it's all about the indies, especially if they end up losing Washoe, which would make it very difficult.

More later....please donate if you can.

Updated, 11:55 AM, 11/5/24

Good morning, blog mates.

I'll try updating you with numbers and analysis all day, when I can.

This chart shows what we have so far -- Clark is more up to date than the other counties :

I'll take a dive into the partisan numbers when I can, but the Dems have a slight lead on Repubs in Clark but indies are the plurality and now are above 30 percent of the vote in Clark. Repubs still beating Dems in Washoe ballots, and of course the rural landslide continues.

The expected turnout numbers in the chart reflect what happened in 2020 in the rurals. As I told you, I think Trump will do better there this cycle than in 2020.

More when I can...and follow me on Twitter @ralstonreports for more updates.

Updated, 7:25 PM, 11/4/24

Good evening, blog mates.

ICYMI, I made my predictions and I feel confident about exactly none of them. (But I can fake it.) Why? Have I mentioned the is The Unicorn Election?

Here’s where we are:

Some Clark mail ballots (11,500) have been added and along with a small batch of Washoe mail and the rurals just posted at 6 PM. The GOP statewide lead is 41,800, or 3.9 percent. Just under 1.1 million Nevadans have voted, or 53.7 percent.

If turnout gets to 1.4 million, 78 percent of the vote is in. If it is closer to 1.3 million, then more than 84 percent is in. By the way, the higher the turnout, the better for Dems, so I’ll keep an eye on that.

This is a good news/bad news update for the Dems as they try to make gains.

Good news: In this latest batch of Clark mail, the GOP share fell below 20 percent and the Dems won by almost 2-to-1 over the GOP. Indies were the largest cohort at 40 percent. Nonpartisans are voting in Clark, making up a tick under 30 percent there and a tick below 29 percent statewide. If the Dems are doing well with them, the larger that number grows, the better.

Bad news: 11,000 is not that many ballots. There are now 372,000 mail ballots in the file from Clark. I think they need to get that number up close to 500,000, but at least up to what it was in 2020 (467,000). Long way to get there, but it’s not impossible.

If it continues at 2-to-1 or so for Dems, here’s what it looks like under various scenarios, from worst-case to best-case:

There are now 315,000-plus indie voters in the books. If that gets to 400,000, the Dems will be happy. If indies keep being the plurality in every mail dump AND on Election Day, that should easily happen. But, unicorn year, etc….

The Clark Dem firewall is now almost 21,000, after being nothing the past fortnight. The Dems have almost a 3 percent lead in Clark , still only half their registration edge.

People have said if Trump takes the state that the huge rural margin will be key, and it will be important. That firewall for the GOP there is up to 54,000 (!) votes, and if the GOP gets turnout there up above 80 percent, big trouble in blueland. Reminder: Trump won rural Nevada by 70,000 votes last time; it could get to 75,000 this time, maybe 80,000.

The Dems also need Washoe to be a wash, and they are still down almost 9,000 ballots there. Will the 52,000 indies there so far break enough their way – along with those still to vote – to do that? A point or two in Washoe could decide this thing.

State of play:

It’s really hard to game out what is going on in Clark because the turnout pattern is so weird, and no one can quite figure out why there are not more mail ballots counted yet. (It's down from 2020 and 2022.) If turnout in Clark is only 70 percent – it’s at 52 percent now, so that seems reasonable – that means there are still more than a quarter million votes to be cast in the South. The lower the Clark turnout, the more the rurals matter.

You can see from the chart above that if only half of those are mail, that would be 30,000 more Dem ballots than Republican ballots. And if the indies break the Dem way in Clark, that’s a serious pickup, no matter how many rural votes are left.

One way to look at this: Dems gets Washoe to a wash (not guaranteed by any means), so it’s just rurals vs. Clark.

Let’s say Trump does win the rurals by 80,000 votes – I think 75,000 makes more sense – but let’s go to the upper limit.

Can Harris win Clark by 75,000-80,000 votes?

It’s possible, but she would need the turnout to be big down here AND for Election Day to be a wash, or slightly favoring Dems. I still think she will need to win indies by at least 5, too. It’s a heavy lift still, but not an impossible one.

We may not know who won until the last mail ballot is cured a week from today. Think about THAT. If Nevada doesn’t matter in the electoral college, it will just be a curiosity. But if we do matter….

More tomorrow unless Clark surprises again and updates mail this evening...

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Updated, 3:15 PM, 11/3/24

Good afternoon, blog mates.

The clock is ticking down towards…my predictions. Oh, and the election, too. One will come late tonight or early AM Monday and the other will come Tuesday and…beyond.

So where are we?

Snapshot:

The R lead is 4 percent statewide, or just under 43,000 ballots. Almost 1.1 million votes have been posted. That’s 53 percent.

If turnout is 1.4 million, that means we are approaching 80 percent of the vote being in. I think it could be a little more, but it’s still a bit unclear with slow mail count.

So I’d say there are at least 300,000 more ballots out there, give or take. Here’s a max scenario – I think turnout in Clark could be a bit lower, rurals a bit higher and Washoe probably what it says here:

If Trump wins Nevada, it will be the rurals that win it for him. This is the opposite situation as we go into Election Day than what we have seen in the past: Instead of Dems building a big ballot lead, it’s the Rs in The Unicorn Year. And the question is: Can the Ds come back with mail ballots, crossover votes and making Election Day a wash?

There has not been a lot more mail posted since I last blogged. So it’s hard to give you more information than I already have.

I can tell you that both sides expect a Dem comeback in the next 48 hours. Both sides believe Election Day will not be as big for Rs as it usually is – they have been fine old cannibals – and both sides think it will be close.

Let’s go through some scenarios.

Let’s suppose the Rs have about a 30,000 raw vote lead right now. I think this is a reasonable assumption because the Rs have a big lead among indies in the rurals, but the Ds are ahead in the urban areas among indies by a solid margin. Something like this: Both candidates hold 90 percent of their bases, and the Ds have a 2-point lead overall with indies. Something close to this:

So can the Ds overcome a 30,000-vote lead? As I have said this is about at the edge of what’s doable for them, and could be slightly too much to overcome.

I still think it could be very, very close. But that depends on the assumptions about crossover votes and indies especially helping Harris.

I said there are probably 300,000 ballots out there. But let’s look at a range and what the Dems would need to do with indies to win if the Rs have a 30,000 raw vote lead. This includes all votes, including Election Day:

Those margins would make the race super-close. If there are too few ballots left, fewer than Dems hope, I don’t see them winning indies by double digits. (For what it’s worth, the NYT/Siena poll released today in Nevada had Harris winning indies by 9, although that poll showed Harris up 3 overall, which seems unlikely. It’s usually a high-quality poll, but so many votes are in and I am not sure if it captured the correct electorate – it says R+2 and it’s R+4 right now. Possible R+2 with D flood, but not sure it will happen.)

I would show you comparisons with 2020 and 2022, but I don’t think they necessarily apply because one was a COVID cycle and the other was an off-year. For what it’s worth, there were 457,000 Clark mail ballots in 2020, but that was COVID time, so could there be fewer this cycle?

There are 361,000 mail ballots in right now in Clark. Let’s say there are somewhere between 80,000 (low) and 140,000 (high) Clark mail ballots out there. And let’s say trends hold and Dems win them 2-to-1, as they have in the past. Let’s say they win the raw vote in that universe overall, with indies, by 25 points. Here’s what that looks like.

There’s a big difference between a lower mail return and a larger one, as you can see. I think 80K is too low and 140K may be too high. If it gets to six figures, Dems have a shot, but probably needs to be near the upper range above.

Don’t forget: The Ds will lose more votes in the rurals, as many as another 20,000, and I think the Washoe mail will create a virtual wash there, give or take. (Biden won Washoe by 12,000 votes, so the margin for D error grows smaller if Washoe is a wash or they lose by a little.)

So what does this all mean?

Hell if I know.

I kid. It means that the Dems need a large turnout between now and the final bell – there’s still essentially a week left, but we will know a lot by Wednesday.

If turnout doesn’t get to 1.4 million, I don’t see how Dems do it. But if it gets past 1.4 million, they have a chance.

More later, and my predictions are coming once I find my magic 8-ball…

Email me with your thoughts, your math, your money. Thanks for reading and supporting The Indy.

Updated, 4:45 PM, 11/2/24

Good afternoon, blog mates.

Lots of stuff here, including down-ballot update.

I’d still rather be the GOP than the Dems, but the 30,000 mail ballot dump overnight makes me think it’s not over yet. The next couple of dumps will tell me if I should tell the fat lady to start warming up again.

(I’ll make my predictions Sunday evening or Monday AM.)

A morning SOS update did not change much:

GOP+44.3K, or 4.2 percent

1.06 million Nevadans have voted, or 52 percent. That means about 75 percent of the vote is in if final turnout is about 1.4 million. I think we are going to see a pretty anemic Election Day turnout this year, 10-12 percent of the total vote.

The electoral mix is starting to change, as I told you was inevitable. Clark is now 2 points under its share of voter registration while Washoe is a half-point-plus ahead and the rurals are coming back to Earth, now just a point and a tick above their reg numbers. (Note on this: An eagle-eyed reader caught a formula glitch, so I corrected this chart, added the small SOS update and rewrote this sentence at 7:40 PM.)

Take a look:

There are nearly 300,000 indies who have voted, and I still think that number gets to at least 400,000. I also think a little more than 400,000 voters will still cast ballots. Here’s what’s left:

So let’s look at what the final electorate could look like:

There are, I’d guess, about 50,000 rural votes left out there that will be counted. Let’s err on the high side because the point of this exercise is to show what the Dems would need to do to catch up. If so, that will add another 20,000 ballots or so to the GOP lead.

So (adding in the current lead): GOP+65K

Now let’s look at Clark. As you can see there are just under 300,000 votes left, probably. Let’s just look at mail for the moment. There are 350,000 mail ballots in so far in Clark. Let’s say they win the remaining mail by 20 points. Here’s what that would yield, depending on the volume:

100K mail: D+20K

150K mail: D+30K

200K mail: D+40K

Considering Election Day is not going to be robust and that maybe 100,000-120,000 voters turn out in Clark, I think 150K by mail seems reasonable, including dropboxes on Election Day and what comes after. If you look at what happened in 2022, the first non-COVID election with the new mail deluge and post-election deadlines, 20 percent of all ballots cast were mail ballots that were received after the end of in-person early voting. Extrapolating to this cycle, that would mean 200K is possible.

But let’s be conservative with the model and stick to 150K. That’s plus 30K for the Dems. So subtract 30K and that becomes: GOP+35K

Remember these are raw ballots we are tracking, not votes just yet.

That leaves Washoe, which seems to be tilting GOP, which is up by 5 points right now. There are about 70,000 votes left to be cast in Washoe. Let’s say the mail helps the Dems enough and Washoe becomes a wash, or thereabouts. So still, GOP+35K

This is just one possible scenario and I will have to adjust the model as mail comes in.

There are three variables that are harder to assess and they are Election day turnout (could be a wash or slight D advantage because of GOP cannibalization by frontloading their vote) crossover votes (and who that helps) and indies (which there is some consensus will help Harris because of the mix).

If an equal number cross over, there is no change. Under this scenario, that presents the Dems with Harris having to win indies by close to double digits to have a chance. That’s possible, but unlikely.

Remember this chart:

So: From what I know now, I’d still rather be the GOP than the Dems, but that big mail dump overnight had to hearten some of the blue team. Let’s see what’s counted today. If it gets to 200K after Friday, then Harris would have to win indies by 5 or 6 points, probably. All of this is moot, of course, if GOP beats the Dems significantly on Election Day, but the odds of that are less and less likely.

The Unicorn Year is confounding most insiders I trust, so I don’t feel as badly being a bit flummoxed. Some other data points to be aware of from partisan analysts on both sides:

----In Clark, 81 percent of high propensity D voters have cast ballots while 74 percent of the same cohort of R voters. Statewide, the Dems have 4.4 percent more of their high propensity voters in the bank.

----The numbers differ a bit among analysts, but there is some GOP cannibalization going on. And this, too. Another dataset from the 2022 election shows nearly 39,000 GOP voters moved from Election Day to early vote since 2022. If they were voting on Election Day, that GOP ballot lead would be almost erased, although Election Day GOP turnout would be higher, of course.

----On Friday, the last day when the Dems had their best day, it was also the youngest and most non-white of any day in the early vote period. The under-30 cohort exceeded the proportion of the Over 65 cohort for the first time by 7 points. Whites also made up only 61 percent of the voters. And indies had more voters in Clark than either of the majors. Anomaly or harbinger of what’s to come?

I have no idea when the mail drops will come, but I will keep checking.

As for the down-ballot outlook after two weeks of early voting, courtesy of NevaData (Paul Selberg is doing a great job, so check out the site):

CONGRESS

CD1 (Dem Rep. Dina Titus vs. GOP challenger Mark Robertson):

Dem ballot lead of 4,000 or almost 2 percent (up a bit from last update)

CD2 (GOP Rep. Mark Amodei vs. indie challenger Greg Kidd):

Repubs have nearly half the ballots in this race (status quo)

CD3 (Dem Rep. Susie Lee vs. GOP foe Drew Johnson):

Repubs have a 10 -ballot lead, or less than 1 percent (minor uptick)

CD4 (Dem. Rep. Steven Horsford vs. GOP opponent John. Lee):

Dems have a 4,800-ballot lead, 2 percent percent (moved D way by 3 points since last update)

My take: Horsford seems to be pulling away, but need more data. Titus should be stronger and Lee remains close. Indies are key. Calling it for Amodei, I Kidd you not…

STATE SENATE

SD5 (GOP Sen. Carrie Buck vs. Dem. Jennifer Atlas):

Repubs have a 2,900 -ballot lead, or just under 5 points (slight uptick)

SD11 (Dem Sen. Dallas Harris vs. Repub Lori Rogich):

Ds have a 950-ballot lead, or a point and a half (slight uptick for Harris)

SD15 (Open GOP seat--Dem Angie Taylor vs. Repub Mike Ginsburg):

Dems have a 2,700 -ballot lead, or 5 points (slight downtick)

My take: Ginsburg is flipping, Buck is strong and Harris is moving the trend away from Rogich, but far from over.  If you want to see what the strong GOP turnout has done, Majority Leader Nicole Cannizzaro’s district now has a 970-ballot edge for Dems, moving towards her. Supermajority here still looks like a solid bet, but I wouldn’t risk all of your money.

ASSEMBLY

AD4 (Open GOP seat--Repub Lisa Cole vs. Dem Ryan Hampton):

Rs have a 2,500 -ballot lead, or 8 percent (1 percent drop)

AD21 (Dem Assemblywoman Elaine Marzola vs. GOPer  April Arndt):

Ds have a 163-ballot lead, or so it’s a tie (about the same, but turned towards the incumbent a little)

AD25 (Dem Assemblywoman Selena La Rue Hatch vs. GOPer Diana Sande):

Dems have a 800 -ballot lead, or 3 percent (ticked down a point)

AD29 (Open Dem seat--Dem Joe Dalia vs. Repub Annette Dawson Owens):

Dems have a 700-ballot lead, or 2.5 percent (ticked toward Ds)

AD35 (Open Dem seat--Dem Sharifa Wahab vs. Repub Rebecca Edgeworth):

Rs now have a 670-ballot lead, or 2 percent (down a point)

AD37 (Dem incumbent Shea Backus vs. GOPer David Brog):

Repubs have almost a 600-ballot lead, or 3 percent (ticked down about a point)

AD41 (Dem Majority Leader Assemblywoman Sandra Jauregui vs. GOPer/ Rafael Arroyo:

Dems have a 478-ballot lead, or 2 percent (up a half-percent)

My take: The Rs are still very much in most of these seats, even if some have begun to turn a bit. It will be interesting to watch what the Clark mail does. Also, is Max Carter a possible uspet winner no one was watching? If you were wondering about the other leader, Speaker Steve Yeager has a district with a 262-ballot lead for the Dems, up to a percent now. Supermajority still shaky but not impossible. The Dems could do it or lose 3-5 seats. The indies/mail may save them.

More later. Please check my math, email me your thoughts, criticism and kudos becasue I won't see it in Muskland. If you like, give me a penny for your thoughts.

Updated, 8:45 AM, 11/2/24

Good morning, blog mates.

Quick update because Girls Youth Basketball championships beckon:

First significant Clark mail dump (30K) was 6K in Dems favor. Add in rural and Washoe and state of play:

GOP has 44K lead statewide, or 4.2 percent. That ain't nuthin'. (This is true data analysis.)

Clark Dem firewall up to 17K, but really interesting data point is indies are at 30 percent of Clark (218K votes) and...,that ain't nuthin'', either.

I still think Washoe is key, right now a problem for Dems with GOP+9K.

Gotta run to hoops. Go Valkyries! (That's her team.)

Detailed post coming this afternoon. Patience. Please throw a few pennies The Indy's way.

Updated, 5 PM, 11/1/24

Good afternoon, blog mates.

Before we get the last day of early voting stats in later tonight, a reminder of what it has looked like: Dems won the last day in 2020 after losing most of the first 13:

The current state of play in The Unicorn Year is this:

The Dems added a few more votes when Washoe mail was updated, but Rs still lead by 44,400, or 4.6 percent. The GOP lead has been slowly growing, but as it has slowed, its percentage lead has been cut by about a point from its apex.

At the risk of stating the obvious, you would rather be the party ahead by 44,000 ballots. So let’s see what that really means. Let’s give the Dems the best of it and say by tonight’s last mail dump of the in-person voting period, the Rs lead by 40,000 ballots. More than 1 million voters will have cast ballots by the end of today, more than 70 percent of the vote will be in.

The Democrats need to cut that margin in half, I’d guess, by Election Day, which I think is going to be very different this year because the GOP will have a much smaller advantage because Republicans are cannibalizing at least some of their vote. (One data guru tells me 82 percent of the GOP firewall right now were Election Day voters two years ago. There’s something happening here…)

There would seem to be a lot of Clark mail ballots still to come, which will help the Dems over the next few days, including the day after the election, I’d guess. (They can count until four days afterwards, but the overwhelming majority afterwards will come in Nov. 6, if past is prologue.)

Before tonight’s dump, 321,000 mail ballots have been posted by Clark. In 2020, the final number of mail ballots was 457,000; some think it could get to half a million. But let’s assume 450,000 for this modeling.

Let’s assume Dems win those extra 130,000 ballots by 20 points; that’s 26,000 additional ballots in their favor, which will translate into about as many votes. So it is quite possible they could cut the GOP margin in half after all is said and done. (It’s unclear how much in mail will be gained in Washoe and perhaps lost in the rurals, although the Clark number will be much, much larger.)

Let’s assume the Rs have a 20,000-25,000 raw vote advantage after Election Day. If it gets much beyond that, the chances for a Dem win get slimmer. I think Nov. 5 could be closer to a wash than the past two cycles because of the GOP frontloading. (No one really knows but I doubt it’s more than 10 -12 percent of the vote based on what we have seen.)

Let’s also assume that indies are just under 30 percent of the 1.4 million we forecast will turnout – could be a little lower. So let’s say 400,000 of them.

Here’s a look at how many votes the Dems would net with various advantages (I am assuming about 4 percent go to other candidates or none of the above, could be less or more but not by much):

So you see the Dems will need to win indies by at least 5 points and maybe 6 or 7. Is it possible? Sure. But it’s a heavy lift.

I want to be clear about something else, too: If the Clark mail underperforms 2020, that will be a huge problem for the Dems. They will not cut into the GOP raw vote lead as much and have to win indies by that much more. I still think the indie share of the vote is a key metric to watch, too. Every tick it gets above 30 percent almost surely would help the Dems because they skew younger and many are Dem voters. We will know a lot more about mail and indie share this weekend.

I want to show you what this looks like by region, too, so you can see how many votes are left and we can make certain assumptions:

It’s also instructive (perhaps) to compare the margins right now in 2024 to what they were in each county four years ago. To wit:

You can see the top six rural counties, which have most of the rural votes, are pretty close in most cases to their 2020 numbers – some a bit better, some a bit worse. Trump won the rurals by 70,000 votes in 2020.

What may be an issue for the Dems – although we don’t know until more mail comes in – is Washoe. Dems have run strongly there the last few cycles, and they won Washoe by 4.5 percent (12,000 votes) in 2020. They may need those votes this year, and they are losing by the same percentage in ballots right now.

Which brings me back to Clark, where the votes are. And it makes the case again that for the Dems to make this a race, they need mail to approach the volume or exceed the volume of 2020.

The Dems also will need to reverse the gender mix (hi, you manly rurals!) that Target Smart (well behind in votes) has identified here. And they need to hope Election Day is different from 2020, when Rs crushed them and had 16,000 more voters out of 156,000 votes cast. It seems unlikely that will happen because of the GOP frontloading, and those 150,000 (or fewer?) voters on Tuesday could make the difference.

This is a problem with several variables – Clark mail, indie split, Election Day turnout -- and we can’t predict quite yet how they will come out. But my poker-playing pal Matt Brooks, who heads the Republican Jewish Coalition, had a great analogy: The Rs have a made hand – Queens – and the Dems have Ace-King and now the Rs, who are clearly ahead, have to sweat out five cards and hope none of them are an Ace or a King. (If you don’t know Hold ‘Em, look it up.) Coincidentally, we have five days of major ballot volume left.

(As I am posting this, the official reg figures from the SOS for October posted, showing the Rs registered 10,000 more voters than the Ds last month. Harbinger? We'll see.)

I’ll update later. Donate if you can, seven figures preferred but I'll take anything...

Updated, 9:45 PM, 10/31/24

Good evening, blog mates.

Latest is GOP+47, 300, or 5.1 percent

Small Clark mail drop (4K) more than offset by in-person and another rural rush for the GOP.

Clark was essentially a tie. rurals and washoe both came in big for GOP.

Should be another Clark mail drop late tonight -- it was 16,000 last night -- that will boost the Dems and take the GOP lead below 5 percent. How much? I'll tell you tomorrow.

Last day of early voting coming up.

Details:

This is a lot of work, folks. Don't forget to donate. Thank you.

Updated, 4:45 PM, 10/31/24

Good afternoon, blog mates.

I have turned off mentions to my Twitter feed because of the volume of vitriol, taking a chance I am missing the rare attaboy – this on the advice of my wise wife. But I imagine there are those in Muskland screaming at me Sam Kinison-like: “JUST SAY IT’S OVER. SAY IT’S OVER!. SAY IT!”

Spoiler alert: It’s not over. And for those of you who have followed this blog for many cycles, I rarely declare it over this early, even when Dems have had large firewalls in Clark County.

This year is different in many ways, but most obviously in that for the first time in The Reid Machine Era (2008 and forward), the Republicans are the ones banking votes in a presidential year, establishing a firewall to try to fend off a Democratic comeback and put themselves in the best position since W won the state in 2004. So the analysis is the opposite of what it usually is: Can the Dems overcome the deficit and what would that look like in the models?

The Dems held their own, even won Clark County for the first time by a little Wednesday. But can they, as they traditionally do, fare well in the last two days of early voting and will the postman, who has been running twice every day, have an overflowing satchel of mail? The share of the vote held by indies also keeps increasing, which should help the Dems, but is it enough?

My gut and the data/history tell me it could be close. But I tend to agree with GOP operative Jeremy Hughes, who posits that if the final GOP ballot lead gets much over 25,000, big trouble for Dems in trying to turn around this battleship (he used cruise ship, but I like mine better because most people on cruise ships are happy and who is happy right now?).

With that preamble, here’s what I will do in this post:

1. State of the data
2. What do the models/extrapolations look like?
3. What is going on down-ballot?

State of the data

More than 876,000 have voted, or 43 percent. I may revert to my original prediction of 1.4 million, which means that 63 percent of the vote is in. Republicans have a 42,000-ballot lead.

The Republicans have a substantial turnout advantage of a whopping 8 percent statewide (57-49) and approaching 10 percent (57-47) in Clark County. The GOP statewide lead, though, is just under 5 percent, 38.9 percent to 34.1 percent – the first time it has fallen under 5 percent in awhile and possibly a start of a Dem comeback trend. Possibly.

The Clark Dem firewall is now up to 8,600, but the GOP advantage in Washoe remains robust at 6,700 votes. The GOP rural firewall is now just shy of 44,000 votes.

Some facts to remember about this electorate so far:

Even if the current crop of indies is going plus-10 for Harris, she is losing by 12,000 votes right now, assuming no base hemorrhaging by either. She would need Trump to be losing at least 5 percent more of his base for her to eke it out.

The GOP cannibalization is real: 52,000 GOP voters who last voted on Election Day have voted early (after encouragement from Trump and local GOP officials) but only 19,000 in the same Dem cohort have voted early. In Clark, it is 33,000 Repubs and 14,000 Dems.

The indie vote, which makes all of this less predictive in The Unicorn Year (or is it an elephant year?), 236,000 indies have now voted, boosting their share of the electorate to 27 percent. It seems likely to grow a little more, maybe eclipsing 30 percent. (I am keeping an eye on this because the larger the volume of indies, the less percentage win the Dems would need to close the gap. And they seem confident they will win them decisively because of the makeup of that electorate.)

The rural GOP firewall may be at 44,000, but it’s probably significantly larger. Traditionally about two-thirds of those go to the GOP candidate, so it’s probably closer to 60,000. That’s a big number to offset with just Dem ballots – impossible with just Dem ballots. So you see the need for indie votes. More in the models below.

Speaking of indies, here’s a provocative data set shared with me: AAPI voters have cast about 120 percent of the amount of ballots now compared to 2020 (26k to 22k), whereas Hispanics are at 113 percent of their 2020 volume (27k to 24k). Blacks are at 109 percent (12k to 11k), while White voters are at 106 percent (166k to 156k).

Here's another interesting data point shared by one guru:  13 percent of votes cast were from 18-29 year-old voters and 15 percent Hispanic over the past few days (10/26-10/28), compared to 6 percent 18-29 (+7 points) and 10 percent Hispanic (+5 points) the previous weekend.

To distill: The GOP has built a large ballot lead, but the Dems are showing signs of life with six days of voting left and the day after Election Day usually providing a significant number of mail ballots. (Also we will have cured ballots and same-day registrants, which favored the GOP last cycle but not sure what will happen this time.)

Here's the chart of the vote for those who like such imagery:

The models

Let’s first model the current electoral mix before it changes tonight – a few scenarios:

Even if Dems are winning indies by 10 percent in the current electorate – that’s a lot! – and both candidates are holding their bases at 90 percent, it looks like this:

If Dems are winning indies by 10 percent, and Trump loses 5 percent more off his base than the Dems, Harris ekes out a victory:

So the Dems have to change the electorate to have a chance. So what is likely to happen?

If mail ballots are the key, let’s take a look at what’s happening statewide, but especially in Clark:

About 440,000 mail ballots have been returned so far, and Dems are winning them by 10 points for a lead of 45,000 ballots. In 2020, the final number was 690,000; in 2022, that number was 523,000.

Let’s split the difference to be conservative and that number is 600,000 or so. (It could be greater if, like 2022, a third-plus come in after in-person early voting ends.) Dems won mail by 20 percent in 2020 and by 13 percent in 2022. Let’s be conservative and say it’s 15 percent this year.

That would be a D+90,000 ballots.

About 431,000 people have voted early in-person. Add about 100,000 for the last two days and say 530,000 people vote early. The Rs led by 15 points (2020) and 18 points (2022) in the last two cycles. Let’s say it is 18 again this cycle.

That would be GOP+95,000

That leaves two variables: How indies vote and what Election Day turnout will be. You can see it could be very close.

That’s one model. Let’s look at various turnout scenarios, with the GOP edge from 5 to 6 to 7 points and indies at 55 percent – and this has Harris winning indies by 4 percent:

I repeat: It is not worth modeling Trump winning indies because if he does, all of this is moot and he will easily win the state and there could be down-ballot carnage. (I don’t think a lot of people believe Trump winning indies will happen, but if it does, I have wasted a lot of time on my spreadsheets gaming this out.)

One more model before I get to down-ballot stuff:

I want to remind everyone how the regions went in 2020.

Clark: Biden+91,000

Washoe: Biden+11,500

Rurals: Trump+68,900

Total: Biden+33,600

Right now, Trump probably has a 60,000 or so edge in the rurals already. Depending on turnout, I think it could get up beyond 70,000 this cycle, maybe closer to 80,000. How high that margin gets could play a huge factor. There are still 118,000 rural voters out there, If even half of them vote, the firewall will be large.

Remember, also that the numbers so far don’t look great in Washoe, although indies could reverse that for Dems.

The Dems are going to need crossovers, a sizable edge with indies and a Clark mail deluge. Not sure all three aren’t possible – will know a lot more by the weekend – but they have a long way to go to turn the ship, whether it’s a battle or cruise.

Keep a close eye on the indies. If the Dems are correct that they have an edge there, as I said above, the greater share of the electorate will help them catch up. But if the Rs have too great a ballot lead, it may not be enough.

I’ll know a lot more and be able to extrapolate better by the weekend.

Down-ballot

CONGRESS

CD1 (Dem Rep. Dina Titus vs. GOP challenger Mark Robertson):

Dem ballot lead of 1,700 or just under 1 percent (down a tick from last update)

CD2 (GOP Rep. Mark Amodei vs. indie challenger Greg Kidd):

Repubs have nearly half the ballots in this race (status quo)

CD3 (Dem Rep. Susie Lee vs. GOP foe Drew Johnson):

Repubs have a 1,700 -ballot lead, or less than 1 percent (minor downtick)

CD4 (Dem. Rep. Steven Horsford vs. GOP opponent John. Lee):

Repubs have a 865-ballot lead, or just under 1 percent (slight downtick)

Same: I don’t sense the Dems are really worried – at least not yet. The Rs are not really building on their leads in CD3 and CD4, so if Lee and Horsford can survive the early GOP push, the mail ballots will save them. And that doesn’t include how they are doing with those 60,000 or so indies.

STATE SENATE

SD5 (GOP Sen. Carrie Buck vs. Dem. Jennifer Atlas):

Repubs have a 2,600 -ballot lead, or more than 5 points (no change)

SD11 (Dem Sen. Dallas Harris vs. Repub Lori Rogich):

Ds have a 250-ballot lead, or a halfpoint (Rs had a slight lead)

SD15 (Open GOP seat--Dem Angie Taylor vs. Repub Mike Ginsburg):

Dems have a 2,745 -ballot lead, or 6 points (same)

The Dems are going to flip SD15, which would give them a supermajority if they can hold SD11. Buck looks strong, but not over yet. If you want to see what the strong GOP turnout has done, Majority Leader Nicole Cannizzaro’s district has a 350-ballot edge for Dems.

ASSEMBLY

AD4 (Open GOP seat--Repub Lisa Cole vs. Dem Ryan Hampton):

Rs have a 2,300 -ballot lead, or 9 percent (1 percent drop)

AD21 (Dem Assemblywoman Elaine Marzola vs. GOPer  April Arndt):

Rs have a 7-ballot lead, or so it’s a tie (about the same)

AD25 (Dem Assemblywoman Selena La Rue Hatch vs. GOPer Diana Sande):

Dems have a 1,000-ballot lead, or 4 percent (same)

AD29 (Open Dem seat--Dem Joe Dalia vs. Repub Annette Dawson Owens):

Dems have a 475-ballot lead, or 2 percent (same)

AD35 (Open Dem seat--Dem Sharifa Wahab vs. Repub Rebecca Edgeworth):

Rs now have a 800-ballot lead, or 3 percent (down a point)

AD37 (Dem incumbent Shea Backus vs. GOPer David Brog):

Repubs have almost a 732-ballot lead, or 3 percent (same)

AD41 (Dem Majority Leader Assemblywoman Sandra Jauregui vs. GOPer/ Rafael Arroyo:

Dems have a 206-ballot lead, or 1 percent (up a half-percent)

If you were wondering about the other leader, Speaker Steve Yeager has a district with an 83-ballot lead for…the Dems.

Quick analysis is same: Supermajority possible but shaky. The Dems could do it or lose 3-5 seats. The indies may save them.

More later tonight and we will know whether the Dem turnaround is a trick for the GOP or a treat for the Dems…This is a long post, so let me know if you see errors but please help our non-profit to show your appreciation.

Updated, 5:50 AM, 10/31/24

Good morning, blog mates.

Clark mail overnight ((16,000 ballots) changed things a little:

GOP statewide lead cut to 42,000, or 4.8 percent. First time under 5 percent in awhile.

Clark firewall for Dems at highest point at 8,600, and indies growing in voter share, now 28 percent in Clark and 27 percent statewide.

But GOP still looking stronger than ever at this point in an election, with substantial ballot lead. The great unknowns are the same: Can the state get mail get above 500,000 -- it's at 300,000 right now in Clark and it was 457,000 in Clark in 2020-- as it did in 2022, which was an off-year? (Note: Corrected this from earlier. Need more coffee.) Total mail in 2020 was 690K. And how are indies breaking -- Dems seem to think they will break their way, which they will need to make it close. Mail is getting younger, which may signify a shift, but polling aside, the indies are a bit of a black box.

872,400 have voted, or 43 percent. If turnout gets to 1.4 million, that's 62 percent; if only 1.3 million, that means two-thirds of the vote is in.

More later. HAPPY NEVADA DAY!

Updated, 9:45 PM, 10/30/24

Good evening, blog mates.

GOP lead is up to 44,400 statewide, or 5.2 percent.

Dems finally eked out a win in Clark combined mail and in-person, but by a measly 10 votes. Not enough to fend off the ongoing rural landslides. And Washoe, which has a reported mail backlog, remains in GOP favor by about 5 percent.

Essentially the entire GOP lead is in the rurals, which are turning out significantly higher than Clark's 41 percent, except for Lyon, which also happens to be the largest rural vote source. The rurals continue to punch above their weight by more than 3 points while Clark is down 4 relative to voter reg and Washoe is up 1. This dynamic will change once the urban mail gets counted, but that is a substantial lead for the Repubs.

More than 856,000 voters' ballots have been posted. That's 42 percent of registered voters, but amounts to more than 61 percent of the turnout if it's 1.4 million, two-thirds if it's only 1.3 million.

Details:

More tomorrow. Sweet dreams, blog mates.

Updated, 10/30/24, 1:40 PM

10/30/24

Good afternoon, blog mates.

A bit pressed for time, but I am going to do a lot here, including:

1. State of the vote.
2. Modeling the rest of the vote

I will try to do a detailed down-ballot post later, but suffice it to say, the GOP lost a little ground in Clark on Tuesday but everything that was in play is still in play.

State of the vote

We are at 790,000 ballots recorded, or 39 percent of registered voters. So I’d guess about 60 percent of the vote is in, maybe a little less. We are going to get at least 75 percent of the vote in before Election Day and maybe as much as 90 percent because of how the GOP has frontloaded its vote.

In 2022, 79 percent of the vote was in before Election Day, and in 2020, it was 89 percent. I’d guess it will be somewhere in-between but I’ll keep close track of it.

The GOP’s 40,500-ballot lead (5.2 percent) is now solely a product of the rural firewall. The urban numbers are a wash – Dems up 6,300 in Clark and Rs up 6,300 in Washoe.

The worm turned a bit for the GOP on Tuesday, but just a bit. The Republicans still have a large turnout advantage – just under 8 percent statewide – and it is more than 9 percent in Clark., which continues to underperform its share of the electorate. (This has to change as the rurals run out of votes and Clark mail comes in. How much will be key.)

The Clark lead for the Dems is under 1 percent (!), which surely heartens Republicans. But Dems saw a slight ray of sunshine with the increased nonpartisan share of the vote and the younger voters therein.

The numbers:

Modeling the rest of the vote

With such a large percentage of the vote in, I can now start to model, with history’s help, what the rest of the vote might look like, within a reasonable range. I am not just guessing here, folks. Even though this year is a unicorn, even unicorns have to walk a similar path to past horse races. (Not thrilled with that metaphor, but leaving it.)

Let’s go region by region and extrapolate what the final vote counts could be:

RURALS

Trump won the 15 rural counties in 2020 by just under 70,000 votes. Let’s say he can get that number to 80,000, which current numbers suggest he could achieve, maybe even more depending on if rural turnout gets above 80 percent. Rural nonpartisans traditionally are about 2-to-1 for the R candidate, so let’s use that as a max number and say rural turnout is 80 percent.

Here’s a chart:

I think that 86,000 number may be a bit high, so let’s set the rural baseline at Trump+80,000. (Can always adjust one way or the other as votes come in.)

CLARK IN-PERSON

Figure about 100,000 more people vote in next three days (may be a little more or less). If past is prologue, Rs will continue to not do quite as well as they, Dems could win last day as they did in 2020. But, let’s be conservative and say GOP wins the in-person by 43-31.

See those extrapolated final numbers:

For the sake of this extrapolation, let’s say the final EV number for in-person in Clark is: Trump+40,000 (It could be significantly less if those indies are very D.)

CLARK MAIL

So far, we have 276,000 Clark mail ballots and Dems are winning them, 44-26.

Let’s be conservative and say they go 25K a day for next three days, so 75K more by end of EV. That’s 350,000. Could be a little higher.

In 2022, just under 2/3 of Clark mail had been received by the end of early voting. If that is the case this year, then we will have about 525,000 total. But let’s be conservative until we see a mail deluge, if one is coming.

Here’s what various scenarios look like if the mail percentages stay the same with a very small increase to a larger one – I will adjust this model if the 44-26 split appears to be changing:

So for the sake of this extrapolation, let’s say the total is 500,000 mail ballots and the Dems win them by 100,000. (This may be a rosy projection for them, or perhaps not.)

Yes, you GOP folks wondering where the extrapolations are with GOP winning Clark indies, I am not including them because if that happens, it’s game over for the Ds.

So adding numbers from the rurals, Clark in-person and Clark mail, we get: GOP+20,000

I think the rurals could be a little less for Trump and the Clark D advantage could be a little bigger, so this may be a worst-case for the Dems. Or not.

So, as always: It comes down to Washoe.

Could Harris win Washoe by 20,000 votes? Very, very unlikely, especially because Rs have a ballot lead now. Biden won Washoe by almost 12,000 votes.

If I’m off a bit on these projections – and I will adjust them in either direction as votes come in – Harris may not need to win Washoe by 20,000 votes. For instance, what if Trump does not win the rurals by 80,000 but by 70,000, as he did four years ago, and the Clark mail is even larger than it seems to be? Then every Washoe vote could count. And we will be here for weeks…

There are a lot of variables: How big will the GOP turnout advantage be? Can Clark get to more than 70 percent of the overall vote and drive down the influence of the rurals? And can Dems win indies by enough to help offset their losses in Clark in-person early voting and the rurals?

Still a long way to go. I’ll update the models every day.

Praise, criticize, donate, please.

More later….

Updated, 6:15 AM, 10/30/24

Good morning, blog mates.

Some Clark mail came in overnight, cut the GOP statewide lead to 40,500, or 5.2 points.

Overall Clark mail was nearly 26,000 ballots, which again lagged beyond the 30,000 who voted in the South in person. The Dems only gained 1,600 in Clark County on Tuesday when both methods are combined, so the GOP lead overall remains robust thanks to a strong Washoe showing and especially the rurals.

790,000 people have voted. About 60 percent of the vote is in.

In 2020, the Republicans won early in-person in Clark by 2,500 to 4,000 ballots every day of the second week except for the last when the Dems surged. The mail countered those and that was also in the bygone days of big Clark Dem firewalls (it's only 6,200).

Three days of early voting left, six days until the election.

More later...

Updated, 10 PM, 10/29/24

Late evening update, blog mates.

Bottom line: Still not enough Clark mail ballots to offset GOP in-person votes and rural tidal wave.

GOP statewide lead now: 42,800, or 5.6 percent

Clark GOP in-person win was lowest so far, only 9 points. But only 9,000 Clark mail ballots counted, which helped Dems gain 2,200, more than offset by Clark in-person. There are more Clark in-person votes (274,000) than Clark mail ballots (260,000). It seems impossible that will last. And those rural margins!

Pretty soon the ghost of Harry Reid is going to start haunting post offices...

I'll do a more detailed post in the AM, but we are closing in on 60 percent of the vote being in (774,000) -- and maybe already there. If the Dems are not doing well with the 200,000 indies who have voted (and they keep gaining in vote share) and the 200,000 more likley to vote, and if the low volume of Clark ballots does not change in the next week (it seemingly has to because it is only 57 percent of the 2020 overall total), the Dems will lose Nevada for the first time in 20 years.

Is it time for Dems to panic? No, no. Still time.

I'll tell you when.

Good night. Gimme your money.

Updated, 5:30 PM, 10/29/24

10/29/24

Good evening, blog mates.

Before tonight’s numbers get posted, here’s where we are at the end of 10 days and what to look for the rest of the week

I know smart operatives on both sides who still expect the presidential here to be close. From what I know, both campaigns think so, too, even if Team Trump is a bit more bullish because of the early returns. We know the GOP is frontloading its votes, cannibalizing Election Day to an extent and causing this unicorn turnout pattern.

The outcome remains all about how the indies split and if Clark mail comes in big. Perhaps Louis DeJoy is hoarding Clark mail ballots in his basement?

But, seriously:

At least half of the vote is in and the GOP has a 5.3 percent lead in ballots. The non-major-party cohort is now close to 26 percent of the vote, or 185,000 ballots. The Rs lead in both urban and rural Nevada:

Check out what the six rural counties with most of the non-urban votes are doing:

The rurals are still 3 points above their reg numbers while Clark is almost 4 below. If mail comes in to Clark as Dems hope, that will change. Tonight’s mail count will be interesting.

Let me also show you how many votes are left:

To distill: There are 960,000 voters left in Clark, 209,000 in Washoe and 137,000 left in the rurals. Clark is still the key.

Here’s where we are:

So we know where we are? What happens next?

Let’s first look at this point in the last two cycles:

2022:

The Clark firewall was at 21,000 or about 8 percent. It’s 4,600, or 1 percent now. And two years ago, Dems had enough of a registration lead to potentially offset any GOP gains on Election Day. Not so this cycle (GOP operative Jeremy Hughes says the statewide lead for the Dems is now under five figures.) I suggestedback then that panic was unnecessary for Dems but that there should be concern. (Remember how close those top two races were in 2022.)

2020:

The Clark firewall was 72,000 as the Dems offset a 3,400-early-vote loss on the second early voting Tuesday as they were plus-5,000 in the latest mail count. Broken record: Watch the mail.

The only other mystery besides the indie split and the Clark mail conundrum is what Election Day turnout will be. I still think 75 percent – and maybe more – of the vote will be in before Election Day. The Dems will need to cut the GOP lead to 20,000 votes or so – maybe 25,000 – to have a chance with a favorable indie split. Let me remind you again what happens in three scenarios where Republicans have a 5 percent turnout edge – it’s 7.5 points now, so Dems would need to cut that down (Reminder: That first number is the Dem turnout percentage, the second is the GOP turnout percentage and the third is the others turnout percentage.)

So if the GOP turnout edge is anywhere above 5 percent, Harris would need to win indies by 5 points or more, unless the crossover votes for her are huge. If the egde were to stay at 7.5 percent, where it is now, that would probably be a death knell.

Down-ballot:

CONGRESS

CD1 (Dem Rep. Dina Titus vs. GOP challenger Mark Robertson):

Dem ballot lead of 2,100 or 1.4 percent (down a point from last update)

CD2 (GOP Rep. Mark Amodei vs. indie challenger Greg Kidd):

Repubs have nearly half the ballots in this race (status quo)

CD3 (Dem Rep. Susie Lee vs. GOP foe Drew Johnson):

Repubs have a 2,300 -ballot lead, or 1.2 percent (minor uptick)

CD4 (Dem. Rep. Steven Horsford vs. GOP opponent John. Lee):

Repubs have a 1,300-ballot lead, or just under 1 percent (slight downtick)

I don’t sense the Dems are really worried – at least not yet. The Rs are not really building on their leads in CD3 and CD4, so if Lee and Horsford can survive the early GOP push, the mail ballots will save them. And that doesn’t include how they are doing with those 60,000 or so indies.

STATE SENATE

SD5 (GOP Sen. Carrie Buck vs. Dem. Jennifer Atlas):

Repubs have a 2,184 -ballot lead, or more than 5 points (more than a point added)

SD11 (Dem Sen. Dallas Harris vs. Repub Lori Rogich):

Rs have a 100-ballot lead, so it’s essentially tied (no change)

SD15 (Open GOP seat--Dem Angie Taylor vs. Repub Mike Ginsburg):

Dems have a 2,140-ballot lead, or 6 points (up a half-point)

The Dems are going to flip SD15, which would give them a supermajority if they can hold SD11. The Rs keeps extending their lead in Byck’s district, will be tough to change. If you want to see what the strong GOP turnout has done, Majority Leader Nicole Cannizzaro’s district has a 60-ballot edge for Dems.

ASSEMBLY

AD4 (Open GOP seat--Repub Lisa Cole vs. Dem Ryan Hampton):

Rs have a 2,200 -ballot lead, or 10 percent (no change)

AD21 (Dem Assemblywoman Elaine Marzola vs. GOPer  April Arndt):

Rs have a 13-ballot lead, or so it’s a tie (about the same)

AD25 (Dem Assemblywoman Selena La Rue Hatch vs. GOPer Diana Sande):

Dems have a 850-ballot lead, or 4 percent (same)

AD29 (Dem Joe Dalia vs. Repub Annette Dawson Owens):

Dems have a 370-ballot lead, or 2 percent (down a point)

AD35 (Dem Sharifa Wahab vs. Repub Rebecca Edgeworth):

Rs have a 800-ballot lead, or 4 percent (same)

AD37 (Dem Shea Backus vs. GOPer David Brog):

Repubs have almost a 750-ballot lead, or 3 percent (same)

AD41 (Dem Majority Leader Assemblywoman Sandra Jauregui vs. GOPer/ Rafael Arroyo:

Dems have a 41-ballot lead, or .2 percent (down a half-percent)

If you were wondering about the other leader, Speaker Steve Yeager has a district with a 32-ballot lead for…the GOP. Damn.

Quick analysis is same: No supermajority if this holds. The Dems could lose 3-5 seats if it does. (I doubt that, but…)

Concerned should Dems be, confident the Repubs are. But miles to go before the votes are counted, and if the ballot mix changes, the forecast changes.

Email me, donate, please.

Updated, 6:15 AM, 10/29/24

Good morning, blog mates.

Small Clark mail update overnight put small dent in GOP advantage. Latest:

GOP has 38,000 ballots more than Dems, 5.3 percent lead.

250,000 mail ballots in from Clark, but 457,000 received in 2020 after all said and done.

Dems: Waiting for Mail.

More later...

Updated, 9:15 PM, 10/28/24

Good evening, blog mates.

Monday's numbers gave another large boost to Republicans, increasing their statewide ballot lead over Democrats to 40,000, or 5.7 percent. This has never happened, not even close, in The Reid Machine Era.

700,000 ballots have now been posted, so at least half the vote is in, perhaps a little more. And some trends seem to be embedded after 10 of 14 days. Note: The Tuesday of the second week also has traditionally been a good day for Republicans in in-person early voting. Monday's followed the 2020 pattern , with a GOP+4,000 result (actually slightly better than 2020).

The Republican turnout edge is now almost 8 percent, almost 9 percent in Clark. The usually reliable Clark Dem firewall has all but evaporated (2,800), the rural GOP firewall is at 37,000 and Washoe is also going well for the Repubs (+5,800).

I know people want to keep comparing this year to 2020 or 2022, but at the risk of repeating myself: This is a unicorn year. We have never seen this.

The Clark mail numbers are very puzzling. Fewer than 5,000 were processed today, bringing the total there to 234,000 ballots, which the Dems continue to win by large margins. The latest dump had the strangest configuration yet with Dems getting half the mail, Repubs just under 20 percent and indies at 30 percent. Republicans are now third (26 percent to indies (29 percent) and Dems (45 percent) in Clark mail.

But 234,000 is just over half of the total Clark ballots from 2020. Where is the mail? If it continues at this relatively snail 's pace, whether it is USPS delay or it will simply be way down for another reason, the Dems will need a huge margin with all those indies. Double digits, which seems unlikely. Dems need the volume of Clark mail to increase at the nearly 2-to-1 margins and meet or come close to the 2020 baseline or Trump is going to win Nevada, even if the Dems do well with indies.

Still a lot of time, but Republicans have reason for confidence with this unprecedented turnout pattern.

Details:

More tomorrow...

Updated, 10/28/24, 4:30 PM

Good afternoon, blog mates.

Republicans being confident and Democrats being fretful is a dog bites man story at this point. If you look at the data as it exists today – and I will dive deeply into it in this post with a little help from my friends – you would much rather be the GOP. But if the past is prologue – and in this unicorn year I am not sure of anything quite yet – the Dems have reason to believe they can rebound by Nov. 5.

I’ll get to the data and the down-ballot stuff in a moment, but first the state of play on the 10^th day of early voting:

Almost 645,000 ballots have been cast, or 32 percent. That’s going to just under half of the total ballots cast, unless my original prediction of 1.4 million comes true. (Right now, I think it will be closer to 1.3 million.)

The GOP lead over the Dems is about 32,000 ballots, or just under 5 percent. The Republican turnout edge is 6.2 percent and 7.2 percent in Clark. If those numbers stay the same, very difficult needle for Dems to thread.

The rural GOP firewall is 33,000, and Dems are not even close offsetting it with a miniature Clark firewall (6,000) and they are losing Washoe by nearly 5,000 ballots.

Very strong numbers on the surface for the GOP – Harris would need to win indies by 10 and hold her base to make the race close under this electorate. But will the electorate change?

Here are the most recent numbers:

Some data points to keep an eye on, with help from Paul Selberg’s NevaData, a GOP operative tracking this stuff and a Dem operative doing the same:

----The GOP margin in early voting is slowing and the Dem margin in Clark mail is growing. Let’s see if that continues. Historically, the GOP does very well on Days 10-11 of early voting, though.

----Some have noted that the electorate so far has more males than females, unlike other battlegrounds. That has now changed, and females have a slight edge. Will that keep going up?

----A Dem operative tells me that about 20,000 Republicans in Clark are 2022 Election Day voters. It’s hard to measure what this means, but if they weren’t there this time, the Dem firewall would be much larger.

----The rising indie share could mean, if past patterns hold, that they end up being closer to 30 percent of the entire electorate. If Harris is winning them, which her folks fervently believes she is, the larger share they have, the more chance she has to win. So far, a large number of indies who have voted did not vote in 2020. Is that a good sign for Dems or a sign of a new Trump-loving cohort?

---Perhaps the best reason for Dem hopes is this, via that Dem operative: On Oct. 19, voters 65-plus consisted of about half of ballots cast, while voters under 30 consisted of 6 percent of ballots cast. On Oct. 25, voters 65-plus consisted of about a quarter of ballots cast while voters under 30 consisted of 13 percent of ballots cast. The electorate also appears to be getting more racially diverse as the early voting period has continued.

----Arguing against the demographics being Dem-friendly is the simple fact that the GOP continues to pick up substantial gains in Clark registration, which is going to be down to about 6 percent by Election Day. If Harris only wins Clark by 6 or even 7, it’s going to be a long night. (Reminder: Biden won Clark by 9 after having a large firewall. And he only won by 2.5 points.)

----The ballot margins I have seen, courtesy of one GOP data-diver, in age subgroups are interesting so far:

18-25: D+6, 5 percent of turnout

26-35: D+7, 8 percent of turnout

36-45: D+1, 11 percent of turnout

46-55: R+6, 14 percent of turnout

55-65: R+10, 21 percent of turnout

66-75: R+4, 24 percent of turnout

76-plus: R+8, 17 percent of the turnout

So you see the early vote not surprisingly skews old, and the Dems think their youngsters are still going to vote. We shall see.

----Those numbers above show why the current electorate is so favorable to the GOP. I’ll show you the large down-ballot effects taking place in a moment, but first consider:

Harris makes the race very close if she holds 90 percent of her base, Trump holds 85 percent and indies go for her by 10 points. That’s a lot to ask –probably impossible to ask, which is why Dems need to change the mix.

If she can change the electorate enough so the GOP only has a 5-point turnout edge after all is said and done, Harris can win if she takes indies by 5 points. Again, little margin for error.

----Another data point I found interesting about mail ballots in Clark: About 230,000 have been posted so far. Dems are winning that ballot contest, 45-26. Let me show you what the final totals were in the last two cycles:

Total Clark mail in 2020: 457,000, or 47 percent, Dems won by a little more than 2 to 1

Total Clark mail in 2022: 340,000, or half the turnout. Again, Dems won by 2 to 1

So Dems would need to double the mail ballots they have now in Clark and increase their margin, too, to equal 2020. Possible? Sure. Difficult? Absolutely.

----The impacts down-ballot are substantial in the first 645,000 or so who have voted. To wit: Many of the key legislative races that could lead to a Dem supermajority look good for the GOP now. And some races not thought to be in play look like they are. In those three southern congressional districts, the Dems might start getting nervous soon if things don’t change, even though the GOP abandoned all hope there months ago.

The latest:

CONGRESS

CD1 (Dem Rep. Dina Titus vs. GOP challenger Mark Robertson):

Dem ballot lead of 3,600, or 2.6 percent (down almost a point from last update)

CD2 (GOP Rep. Mark Amodei vs. indie challenger Greg Kidd):

Repubs have nearly half the ballots in this race (status quo)

CD3 (Dem Rep. Susie Lee vs. GOP foe Drew Johnson):

Repubs have a 1,800-ballot lead, or 1 percent (no change)

CD4 (Dem. Rep. Steven Horsford vs. GOP opponent John. Lee):

Repubs have a 1,600-ballot lead, or just over 1 percent (slight uptick)

The Rs are in the game in all three of those districts. If Dems are winning indies by 5 points or so, they will be fine. But they have to be nervous; they should be nervous.

STATE SENATE

SD5 (GOP Sen. Carrie Buck vs. Dem. Jennifer Atlas):

Repubs have a 1,300-ballot lead, or nearly 4 points (a half-point added)

SD11 (Dem Sen. Dallas Harris vs. Repub Lori Rogich):

Ds have a 67-ballot lead, so it’s essentially tied (no change, although first D lead)

SD15 (Open GOP seat--Dem Angie Taylor vs. Repub Mike Ginsburg):

Dems have a 2,000-ballot lead, or 6.5 points (up a half-point)

The Dems are going to flip SD15, which would give them a supermajority if they can hold SD11. Buck is not safe by any means, but she is in good shape right now, it seems. If you want to see what the strong GOP turnout has done, Majority Leader Nicole Cannizzaro’s district has only a 48-ballot edge for Dems.

ASSEMBLY

AD4 (Open GOP seat--Repub Lisa Cole vs. Dem Ryan Hampton):

Rs have a 1,900-ballot lead, or 10 percent (no change)

AD21 (Dem Assemblywoman Elaine Marzola vs. GOPer  April Arndt):

Dems have a 135-ballot lead, or just under 1 percent (same)

AD25 (Dem Assemblywoman Selena La Rue Hatch vs. GOPer Diana Sande):

Dems have a 800-ballot lead, or 4 percent (same)

AD29 (Dem Joe Dalia vs. Repub Annette Dawson Owens):

Dems have a 400-ballot lead, or 2.5 percent (down half a percent)

AD35 (Dem Sharifa Wahab vs. Repub Rebecca Edgeworth):

Repubs have a 800-ballot lead, or 4 percent (no change)

AD37 (Dem Shea Backus vs. GOPer David Brog):

Repubs have almost a 700-ballot lead, or 3.2 percent (same)

AD41 (Dem Majority Leader Assemblywoman Sandra Jauregui vs. GOPer/ Rafael Arroyo:

Dems have a 85-ballot lead, or .5 percent percent (down a half-percent)

If you were wondering about the other leader, Speaker Steve Yeager has a district with a 31 ballot lead for…the GOP. Damn.

Quick analysis: No supermajority if this holds. The Dems could lose 3-5 seats if it does. (I doubt that, but…)

That’s all for now. There is so much we still don’t know: GOP (or Dem?) crossover, indie splits, mail ballot deluge or trickle. So much. But I’m here for it all, friends.

Email me, show our appreciation, donate to The Indy. Please and thank you.

Updated, 10/27/24, 9:45 PM

SOS updated with in-person voting from Clark and Washoe -- rurals closed today.

Clark: GOP+2,000

Washoe: GOP+300

635,000 have been reported. That's 31 percent, probably a little less than half of all who will vote.

Repubs have a 33.500-ballot lead, or 5.2 percent.

Interesting to note that indies are now more than a quarter of the vote., or 160,000.

The GOP margin in early voting continues to decline, going under 2,000 in Clark for the first time. Watch the next couple of days. In 2020, the GOP began to increase its margin again starting on the second Monday of early voting.

Remember this chart:

More tomorrow...

Updated, 10/27/24, 11:45 AM

Good morning, blog mates.

Lots to come in this post, including updates on down-ballot races. Eight days of early voting in the books and here’s where we are:

More than 600,000 voters have cast ballots, or 30 percent. If turnout is 1.3 million, we are coming up on half the vote being in. If it’s 1.4 million, it’s more than 40 percent.

Republicans have increased their statewide lead to 31,000. That’s right at 5 percent. It had been 29,000 after Day 7, so the increase slowed down. But the Rs still have a 6.1 percent turnout edge over the Dems in a state where the Dems no longer have a substantial voter registration edge, so Dems must win indies to win Nevada. They need to win indies by about 5 points if the GOP turnout edge in the final electorate is 5 percent; if it’s 6 percent, that means they have to win indies by a couple more points.

So the Dems have to start changing the electorate more to have a chance, even if they are doing well now with indies. They don’t want to be trailing  by 30,000 ballots going into Election Day. Why? If the final balloting were to take place with the current electoral mix, the Ds would have to win indies by 10 points, even if Trump lost 5 percent more off his base than Harris did with hers.

Possible? Maybe, but pretty unlikely.

The GOP turnout edge in Clark is almost 7 points, so the firewall for the Dems there remains low: 6,600 votes. The Ds are leading in Clark, where they have more than a 6 percent lead is only 1 percent.

The starkest comparison for the Dems, albeit perhaps not as apt because I continue to believe this is a unicorn year:

In 2020, after eight days, the Clark Dem firewall lead was 66,000 voters – that is, 10 times what it is now. The Dems led statewide by 54,000 voters. It’s no wonder some Republicans are irrationally exuberant – or is it rationally exuberant?

We can talk about the makeup of the electorate and the Dems probably doing well with indies (remember Biden won them by 6 in 2020, according to exit polls), but this turnout pattern greatly favors the Rs. And there is almost no way to say anything other than that the Dems need to do a lot of heavy lifting to make this a race by Nov. 5 (and beyond).

Can they do it? It’s foolish to underestimate their ability to get out their voters after four straight presidential cycles of victories. They will make a comeback, but will it be enough? And even if they do, can they avoid down-ballot losses? Right now, would anyone bet on a Dem legislative supermajority?

Those 110,000 indies who have voted in Clark are the key to everything for the Dems. They are 71 percent of all the indies turning out. Because they will lose indies in the rurals – there are 19,000 so far – they will need to win the urban indies by a substantial margin to eke out a victory.

Remember this: Even in the best-case scenario for the Dems, smart Dems still believe it will be very close – and by close I mean 10,000 votes or so. That would be less than 1 percent. If that happens, especially if Trump is winning a by a little on Election Night, buckle up.

The rurals still have a disproportionate share of the electorate while Clark remains well down. Considering so many votes are left in the South and the rurals don’t have nearly as many, that will change. But by how much?

The actual numbers for those who are interested:

The Dems believe the mix is starting to change in Clark. But watch the next few days carefully. The rurals are closed today, so the Dems could make a move. For perspective:

In 2020, on the ninth day of in-person voting, the Rs won by much less than previous days but they still won, by 2,000 votes.

Keep an eye on the mail/in-person ratio, too. Mail is about 55 percent of the total, and Dems are willing by 10 points. In-person is 45 percent, and Rs are winning by 23 points (hello, rurals!). Dems need that mail percentage to hold and the volume to increase.

In 2020, mail was just under half the total vote when all the votes were counted. Election Day was only 11 percent and in-person early voting was just over 40 percent.

In 2022, mail was just over half of the overall vote when all was said and done, and Election Day was only 21 percent. In-person was 28 percent. Dems won mail by 14 points.

It is reasonable to assume that between 80 percent to 90 percent of the vote will be in before Nov. 5.

Bottom line: You’d rather be the Republicans now than the Dems. It’s inarguable. I repeat: Best case for Dems is they are going to win a large share of indies and make this very close. It could happen, but the aftermath will be brutal.

A look at down-ballot, which will surely be affected by what happens next, with info from NevaData and other sources:

CONGRESS

CD1 (Dem Rep. Dina Titus vs. GOP challenger Mark Robertson):

Dem ballot lead of 4,300, or 3.3 percent (down 1 point from last update)

CD2 (GOP Rep. Mark Amodei vs. indie challenger Greg Kidd):

Repubs have nearly half the ballots in this race

CD3 (Dem Rep. Susie Lee vs. GOP foe Drew Johnson):

Repubs have a 1,600-ballot lead, or 1 percent (no change)

CD4 (Dem. Rep. Steven Horsford vs. GOP opponent John. Lee):

Repubs have a 1,800-ballot lead, or just over 1 percent (slight uptick)

I repeat: So you see how the early GOP advantage is helping in CD3 and CD4. Clark mail should change this dynamic, but we will have to see by how much.

STATE SENATE

SD5 (GOP Sen. Carrie Buck vs. Dem. Jennifer Atlas):

Repubs have a 1,100-ballot lead, or 3.2 points (less than a half-point added)

SD11 (Dem Sen. Dallas Harris vs. Repub Lori Rogich):

Ds have a 100-ballot lead, so it’s essentially tied (no change, although first D lead)

SD15 (Open GOP seat--Dem Angie Taylor vs. Repub Mike Ginsburg):

Dems have a 1,700-ballot lead, or 6 points (down a point)

I repeat: So Dems looking good to take the GOP seat in play (SD15) but Repubs in the game vs. Harris and Dems have a chance against Buck. Some of the other races, including Majority Leader Nicole Cannizzaro’s, are close, but are likely not to be once the voting pattern changes. If it doesn’t…

REMINDER: Dems need to hold their own and take SD15 to pick up one and a supermajority.

ASSEMBLY

AD4 (Open GOP seat--Repub Lisa Cole vs. Dem Ryan Hampton):

Rs have a 1,800-ballot lead, or almost 10 percent (no change)

AD21 (Dem Assemblywoman Elaine Marzola vs. GOPer  April Arndt):

Dems have a 125-ballot lead, or just under 1 percent (same)

AD25 (Dem Assemblywoman Selena La Rue Hatch vs. GOPer Diana Sande):

Dems have a 700-ballot lead, or 4 percent (down a percentage point)

AD29 (Dem Joe Dalia vs. Repub Annette Dawson Owens):

Dems have a 430-ballot lead, or 3 percent (no change)

AD35 (Dem Sharifa Wahab vs. Repub Rebecca Edgeworth):

Repubs have a 700-ballot lead, or 4 percent (no change)

AD37 (Dem Shea Backus vs. GOPer David Brog):

Repubs have almost a 700-ballot lead, or 3.2 percent (down from 3.5 percent)

AD41 (Dem Majority Leader Assemblywoman Sandra Jauregui vs. GOPer/ Rafael Arroyo:

Dems have a 100-ballot lead, or just under 1 percent (no change)

I repeat: Obviously, the dynamics are different inside these districts and plenty of indies that could decide things. But Backus looks like the most likely D to go down if one does, although most of these races are in play and I know Rs are confident they can win the majority of the contested ones.

REMINDER: The Dems can’t afford to lose a seat or their supermajority is gone.

More when I have it, but definitely not until after the Bills game….

Updated, 10/26/24, 11:30 AM

Good morning, blog mates.

One week of early voting is done, and here’s what we know and here’s what we think we know:

The Republicans continue to turn out well, better than any previous presidential year relative to Dems:

Their 29,000-ballot statewide lead is unprecedented in a year in which Nevada matters. That’s almost 5 and a half points.

There have been 550,000 votes cast, or 27 percent of all registered voters. That would mean 42.5 percent of the vote is in if turnout is 1.3 million and just under 40 percent if it is 1.4 million.

Important to note: 1.4 million is only a 70 percent turnout, well under a regular presidential race turnout, which is usually closer to 80 percent. But it’s clear I was right (takes bow in front of computer) that many of the indies are zombies who were auto-registered and won’t vote. (Indie turnout is only 17 percent, less than half of Rs and Ds.)

Republicans have a turnout advantage now of 5.5 points statewide and 6 points in Clark.

Here are the actual numbers:

You can see the R lead is almost entirely because of the rural GOP firewall of nearly 31,000 votes. The strong showing so far by the GOP in Washoe has all but negated the Clark Dem firewall, which has been small all along.

The rurals are now nearly 5 points (!) above their usual share of the electorate:

That cannot last, or should I say, if it does, Trump will win Nevada and Sam Brown may make the Senate race interesting. If the election were held with this current electorate, even if Harris won indies by 10 points and Trump had 5 percent less of his base than she did, it would be a virtual tie. So the Dems either change the composition of the electorate or carnage ensues.

The key remains Clark mail and the indie vote. Let me show you how many votes are left:

D-413,000

R-370,000

O-682,000

Total: 1,465,000

So there are still a ton of votes to be had, especially in Clark. Here’s the actual breakdown of votes left by county:

The Republicans clearly are in the driver’s seat, but the Dems are hopeful because the makeup of the indie electorate seems to favor them – more young people and minorities whom they believe will turn out in the second week. The youth vote actually was strong Friday among indies, I’m told, and Dems are confident they will win indies by enough to overcome the GOP ballot advantage. No one I know who understands the data, though, thinks that it will be anything but close even if the Dems can change the electorate in the second week.

Let me give you some historical perspective, even though I don’t necessarily think 2020 is instructive because of COVID. But it is the last presidential cycle and the one where mail ballots suddenly were an important part of the mix.

2020 was the first year the turnout pattern switched and Republicans voted early more than Dems, who relied on mail. Here’s a chart that shows you what it looked like then and what it looks like so far in 2024:

You can see the Dems surged a bit in the second week – they did that in years in which they routinely were winning early voting – and they put out a huge effort on the last day to win, which also is the usual pattern. I have said 2024 is a unicorn, but if the Rs can reverse this second week pattern, the Dems have a lot to worry about.

One of the reasons the GOP is so optimistic is how the Dem firewall in Clark has been dropping precipitously since they recovered from the red wave in 2014 (when the GOP advantage in early voting presaged what would happen) and especially since 2020. This graph illustrates it nicely – the numbers for past elections are the final firewalls:

I should also note that GOP operative Jeremy Hughes has more updated statewide reg figures than I do – I have it at 14,000 for the Dems – so let me lift from his very useful Data Dive:

Current Statewide - D+ 11,068

At this point, it's a foregone conclusion that the Democratic voter registration advantage will be under 10,000.

The question is, how low will it go? 

As a reminder, in 2020, Republicans netted 1,911 through same-day registration on Election Day as well. 

So what’s going to happen?

Even though a substantial portion of the vote is in, the haphazard mail dumps in Clark make it difficult to predict. What is true – and my numbers may differ from others because it all depends when you download the mail file – is that the margins have been remarkably consistent in Clark: Dems have won by 17 to 19 points every day. The biggest change is that the indie mail has started to increase and was a third of the total Friday – if Dems are indeed winning indies, that’s a reason for them to be optimistic.

The early vote in Clark also has been pretty consistent, with the Repubs winning by about 20 points every day, although that dropped to under 15 points Friday. Something to keep an eye on.

Right now in Clark, mail is about 55 percent of the total. If that number does not increase, that is yet another warning sign for the Dems. One data analyst I know said he believes Clark will have 500,000 mail ballots – there are only 200,000 now, so that may be a total too far…

Keep an eye on that share of the vote in mail and between urban and rural Nevada: If that doesn’t shift by next Friday, that will be a strong signal that the Dems won’t have enough days left to do what they need to do. Lots of time and votes left, but lots of time and votes in, too.

One note on down-ballot – I’ll do detailed charts in a later post: Not much change as the Rs still have small leads in the key races for Congress and Carson City. But they have never looked this good in any presidential year in the Reid Machine Era, so I am sure they are very optimistic.

I still don’t think those congressional contests get competitive, but if the electoral mix does not change all that much, the Senate and congressional races could be in play and Gov. Joe Lombardo won’t have to worry about a Dem supermajority.

Rs may want to yell “Stop the count,” and Dems are singing this.

More later, and later may be Sunday so I can pretend to have a life for one day. Email me and please donate to our nonprofit if you are able. Thanks.

Updated, 3:30 PM, 10/25/24

Good afternoon, blog mates.

In this post, I want to do several things:

1. Show you exactly where we are, coming up on half a million voters having cast ballots. I now think turnout will probably be closer to 1.3 million than 1.4 million, but can always adjust. So we are at almost 40 percent of the vote in, maybe 35 percent.
2. Show you that, as even smart Republicans acknowledge, that the GOP turnout advantage, at 5 percent now statewide, will increase for a bit but will probably settle in where it is now as Clark mail comes in. That is, with all the votes counted, the GOP will have about a 5 percent turnout edge on the Dems, or about 18,000 ballots, give or take. I’ll show you what that means vis a vis Dems needing to win indies (Spoiler alert: by at least 4 points)
3. A deeper dive into where the congressional races and key legislative races are right now.

And away we go…

Here are the up to date totals (note there may be a few votes off in some of the rurals because of mail ballot rejections, but not significantly):

And here is what the turnout by region looks like vis a vis actual percentage of reg voters:

So the Republicans lead by more than 22,000 ballots, or 5 percent, almost solely because of 25,000-ballot rural firewall for the GOP. (Fun fact is that almost 21,000 of that GOP advantage in rural Nevada comes from just six of the 15 counties: Lyon, Douglas, Elko, Nye, Carson and Churchill.

The usually redoubtable Clark Democratic firewall is only at 5,500 voters as the GOP has a more than 5 percent turnout advantage where the most votes are. That is affecting every partisan race on the ballot here. (More on that coming.) Clark's turnout also is well below its registration share, and if that lasts, the GOP will do very well. It seems unlikely to, though, unless a whole bunch of mail carriers are kidnapped in Las Vegas.

It’s almost certain this disparity between the urban (Washoe is close, with GOP up by 3,000 votes, but there essentially is no urban firewall)) and rural firewalls can’t last much longer. (If it does hold, there will be a deep red wave here, but I don’t know anyone who understands this stuff who believes that will happen. The data will tell.)

What we are seeing is just an unusual and unprecedented (for a presidential year) pattern of how the votes are coming in: The GOP advantage will come early, where the Dem advantage used to, and the Dem advantage (thanks to urban mail) will come later. No one really disputes this. Why? Because we know Republicans have been encouraged to vote earlier and we know that turnout will be upwards of 75 percent for each party because it’s a presidential year.

I assume, until the data and common sense tell me differently, that the turnout mix is going to be at or around what it as in 2020 and 2016, where the Rs had about a 5 percent overall advantage. The huge difference is that the Dem registration edge usually gave them a cushion. This cycle, because the gap has closed, they have almost no margin for error and thus the indie split becomes critical. Let me show you.

If you take the half million votes already cast and model them, here’s what you get under a few scenarios – no need to model Trump winning indies because if he does, it’s over – to show you what would need to be happening for Ds to catch up:

Both Harris and Trump get 90 percent of their base and indies are a wash:

HARRIS	222,029	45.7%
TRUMP	241,066	49.6%
REST	23,110	4.8%
TOTAL	486,205
D/R difference	-19,037

Both Harris and Trump get 90 percent of their bases and Harris wins indies by 10 points (a lot!):

	90-5/5-90/55-45
HARRIS	230,434	47.4%
TRUMP	237,464	48.8%
REST	18,307	3.8%
TOTAL	486,205
D/R difference	-7,031

So she still loses under the current electoral mix even if she wins indies by 10. She could eke out a victory if she wins indies by 10 and Trump loses 5 points off his base. You see how difficult it would be.

But. But. But.

As I said, no one thinks this is how the electorate will look once all is said and done. It will be a rollercoaster like 2022 as mail ballots coming in late helped Catherine Cortez Masto retain her Senate seat and got Steve Sisolak close to now-Gov. Joe Lombardo.

So let’s assume a 5 percent GOP turnout advantage and that about half of indies turn out (that’s around 400,000 voters). One reason to assume indies only turn out at that rate is because so many are what I call zombie voters – auto-registered but uninterested. The early returns bear this out.

Here's what that electorate would look like, under three different 5-point advantage scenarios for the GOP – the first number is D turnout percentage, the second one is R percentage and the third is Others:

So the Rs are likely to have about an 18,000-voter margin when all is said and done, maybe a little bigger. So what does Harris have to do under those three scenarios:

Bottom line: Harris will need to win indies by at least 4 points and probably a little more to win. The Dems believe their indies are younger, likely to vote later and the children are their future. Even if Harris hits her indie goals, it will be close – and you all know what chaos could ensue after that (that’s why all the GOP lawsuits, poll watching checklists, etc.). It's not going to be pretty, and it seems highly unlikely this race will be over here on Nov. 5. If the presidential race is not called by late Election Night, Nevada could really...matter.

Of course the degree of difficulty for Harris becomes greater with every tick above a 5 percent turnout advantage that I am assuming for the GOP. So that’s why keeping an eye on that number is so critical for both sides. It’s Clark mail or bust for the Dems. Will the harvest be rich?

It is clear the turnout patterns have changed as Dems rely on mail and Repubs are trying to frontload the vote. The key may be Election Day, which Republicans usually win decisively but Dems don’t think they will this year because of the GOP frontloading.

I know some are comparing what has happened so far to other cycles, but I say again that is fruitless. We have to assume the puzzle will look the same when all the pieces are in place; they are just being put together in a different order.

It is as frustrating to me as it is to you, dear blog mates, that there is a haphazard way ballots are being reported, especially mail. But we will all get there in the end.

Finally, let me show you what’s happening in the congressional and legislative districts, courtesy of Paul Selberg and NevaData:

CONGRESS

CD1 (Dem Rep. Dina Titus vs. GOP challenger Mark Robertson):

Dem ballot lead of 4,400, or 4.4 percent

CD2 (GOP Rep. Mark Amodei vs. indie challenger Greg Kidd):

Repubs have nearly half the ballots in this race

CD3 (Dem Rep. Susie Lee vs. GOP foe Drew Johnson):

Repubs have a 1,400-ballot lead, or 1 percent

CD4 (Dem. Rep. Steven Horsford vs. GOP opponent John. Lee):

Repubs have a 1,300-ballot lead, or 1 percent

So you see how the early GOP advantage is helping in CD3 and CD4. Clark mail should change this dynamic, but we will have to see by how much.

STATE SENATE

SD5 (GOP Sen. Carrie Buck vs. Dem. Jennifer Atlas):

Repubs have a 750-ballot lead, or nearly 3 points

SD11 (Dem Sen. Dallas Harris vs. Repub Lori Rogich):

Repubs have a 51-ballot lead, so it’s essentially tied

SD15 (Open GOP seat--Dem Angie Taylor vs. Repub Mike Ginsburg):

Dems have a 1,700-ballot lead, or almost 7 points

So Dems are looking good to take the GOP seat in play (SD15) but Repubs are in the game vs. Harris and Dems have a chance against Buck. Some of the other races, including Democratic Majority Leader Nicole Cannizzaro’s, are close, but are likely not to be once the voting pattern changes. If it doesn’t…

REMINDER: Dems need to hold their own and take SD15 to obtain a supermajority.

ASSEMBLY

AD4 (Open GOP seat--Repub Lisa Cole vs. Dem Ryan Hampton):

Rs have a 1,400-ballot lead, or almost 10 percent

AD21 (Dem Assemblywoman Elaine Marzola vs. GOPer  April Arndt):

Dems have a 100-ballot lead, or just under 1 percent

AD25 (Dem Assemblywoman Selena La Rue Hatch vs. GOPer Diana Sande):

Dems have a 700-ballot lead, or 5 percent

AD29 (Dem Joe Dalia vs. Repub Annette Dawson Owens):

Dems have a 350-ballot lead, or 3 percent

AD35 (Dem Sharifa Wahab vs. Repub Rebecca Edgeworth):

Repubs have a 530-ballot lead, or 4 percent

AD37 (Dem Shea Backus vs. GOPer David Brog):

Repubs have almost a 700-ballot lead, or 3.5 percent

AD41 (Dem Majority Leader Assemblywoman Sandra Jauregui vs. GOPer/ Rafael Arroyo:

Dems have a 100-ballot lead, or just under 1 percent

Obviously, the dynamics are different inside these districts and plenty of indies that could decide things. But Backus looks like the most likely D to go down if one does, although most of these races are in play and I know Rs are confident they can win the majority of the contested ones.

REMINDER: The Dems can’t afford to lose a seat or their supermajority is gone.

More when I have it, friends. Email me if you see anything egregious (or a typo) and please donate to our nonprofit if you appreciate this blog.

Update, 10 AM, 10/25/24

Good morning, blog mates.

I have to do an NPR hit in a few minutes, so I will just give you the headline and the analysis, context, modeling coming later.

GOP has a 24K ballot lead statewide, or 5 percent, and it is having a trickle-down effect on down-ballot races. Whether this is all about a frontloaded GOP vote and the Dems will begin to change the mix is a question we can't answer yet. (Clark is only 67 percent of the vote while it has 73 percent of the registration.) I will show you later what the models show with various turnout scenarios. Here are the numbers:

Lots more to come...

Updated, 9:30 PM, 10/24/24

Good evening, blog mates.

No SOS in-person vote numbers tonight, I'm told. Will post in early AM. About 26K mail ballots posted, took 2K off GOP lead. But that will almost surely be offset by early voting numbers posted tomorrow.

I have some real news: The early returns are not good for Democratic Reps. Susie Lee and Steven Horsford. Both were considered near-locks because of weak opponents and national GOP not investing. But both could be in tighter races than everyone thought. Maybe.

(For those wondering, Rep, Dina Titus is well ahead.)

Data courtesy of the great NevaData site from Paul Selberg:

In both races, the Rs have more ballots -- 900 in CD3 and 250 in CD4. This could change as the turnout becomes more substantial, and the indies go for the incumbents. But Lee is trailing in a district Trump almost won in 2020, and Horsford has enough rural counties that his vote may be skewed against him now.

It may mean something; it may mean nothing.

More tomorrow. Good night.

Updated, 4 PM, 10/24/24

Good afternoon, blog mates.

With great blogging comes great responsibility, but I am not responsible for what partisans will use to spin the numbers I am providing. Republicans trying to create the narrative that Trump has Nevada clinched are either overconfident or trying to create the predicate for a challenge if Harris ekes it out here. Democrats who say the numbers don’t look as bad as they look are relying on four consecutive presidential cycles of doing what it takes to win, despite an early turnout pattern that looks ominous.

But: Data is the data, context is the context, projections are projections.

So what do the numbers say and what don’t they say:

Distilled – they don’t say it’s over but they also don’t say Democrats should brush off the GOP lead that has never before existed in presidential years during early voting.

Bear with me while I give you the latest numbers and then show why 2022 might actually be a better data point now than 2020.

After 16,000 or so Washoe ballots were added this AM:

425,000 have voted, or 21 percent, and the GOP has a 16,000-voter margin in ballots, or 4 percent.

The Washoe mail dump bumped up that county’s share of the vote to 18.5 percent, almost 2 points over its registration; Clark is now down 5 points relative to its 73 percent of the registration numbers – I wouldn’t think that can last, but if it does, Harris loses and that Senate race could be very close; the rurals are still punching above their weight at 13 percent of the vote, or 3 points above registration.

Republicans have a 3 point turnout edge statewide, 4.5 in Clark accounting for most of that because the Dems have minuscule turnout advantages by percentage in Washoe and the rurals.

The exact numbers for those interested;

In a very favorable scenario for Harris, if Dems are winninging indies by 55-45 and both parties are holding 90 percent of their bases, here’s what happens:

HARRIS	202,915	47.7%
TRUMP	206,381	48.5%
REST	16,030	3.8%
TOTAL	425,327
D/R Difference	-3,466

So it’s very simple: If the turnout pattern remains this way, Harris will lose Nevada.

But what are the chances it does? Therein lies the rub.

Let me show you some data points:

--16 percent of the GOP in-person vote so far is from those who voted on Election Day in 2022. That’s because GOP leaders are encouraging folks to vote early. Only 5 percent of Dem voters were Election Day voters two years ago. The net difference is about 14,000 votes, or pretty close to the GOP firewall right now.

--Because of the indie explosion, the partisan ballot lead is less predictive. (This is not a good development for us oracles, by the way.) The Dems firmly believe they are leading among indies who have already voted, and those skew older. Voters over the age of 60 are two-thirds of the indie vote so far; voters under the age of 30 are only 9 percent. (In 2020, voters under 30 were a fifth of indie voters. It could be higher this time with AVR (automatic voter reg). Voters of color are just under a third of the indie vote so far, already reaching the percentage from 2020.

---After five days of data, the Clark early vote and mail percentages have been remarkably consistent. The Repubs have been in the high 40s or at 50 percent in in-person and the Dems at highs 20s and 30s. In mail, the Dems have been in the mid to high 40s and the Rs in the mid to high 20s. About 58 percent of the turnout in Clark is from mail and 42 percent from in-person voting. Let’s see if these trends – and they are trends after five days of data – hold in the second week.

Frankly, as I have been telling you, I don’t think the old models make sense with this unprecedented turnout pattern. I will show you (again) the 2020 results:

I am not sure what that will be this cycle with Republicans having an epiphany that early and mail ballots are good, not a cause for suspicion unless they need them to be. So the Repubs may be doing what has served the Dems so well: Banking votes early to almost guarantee victory.

GOP operative Jeremy Hughes sifted this from the data -- his numbers on voters refer to general elections voted in:

...the problem for Democrats comes up when we look at the low propensity voters. 

GOP 2 of 4 voters - 25.3% Turnout

DEM 2 of 4 voters - 20.9% Turnout

Republicans have a nearly 4.5% turnout advantage among voters who had missed two of the last four general elections.

GOP 1 of 4 voters - 23.6% Turnout

DEM 1 of 4 voters - 18.6% Turnout

Amongst the infrequent 1 of 4 voters, Republicans open up their largest turnout advantage of nearly 5%.

Then, when you look at new voters and voters who have never voted in a general election, Republicans continue to dominate.

GOP 0 of 4 voters - 17.8% Turnout

DEM 0 of 4 voters - 13.9% Turnout

Now, after all of those numbers what does this mean? 

The Republican early vote lead will continue to grow. The GOP just has more active and interested voters and is pulling people off the couch who normally don't vote. 

This also means that Republicans will undoubtedly have a turnout advantage in this election, which, given the voter registration numbers, basically guarantees that more Republicans will vote than Democrats.

Hughes probably is correct about that, but the real question if he is right is this: How many more Republicans? If it’s tens of thousands, even a big win among indies for Dems almost surely won't be enough.

I said earlier that 2022, even though a non-presidential year and with lower turnout, may be more instructive. The Dem vote came in much later and  Election Day losses were offset by mail ballots dropped at election locations. Hello, Culinary Union and Democratically aligned nonprofits.

At least that’s what the Dems are hoping will be the case. My point is that we don’t know yet if that is what’s happening or will happen. I think there are still about a million votes to be cast.

So far about 57 percent of the votes have been cast by mail and 43 percent in person. The Rs are winning because they have a 25-point lead in in-person and the Dems only have a 12 percent lead in mail. As I said, if the Dems can’t change those margins and/or that mix, they are in big, big trouble. And they have to hope for maximum GOP cannibalization of Election Day voters vs what Hughes talked about: low-propensity GOP voters turning out.

Week One of the two weeks of early voting ends tomorrow.

In 2022, the Dems had a 21,000-ballot lead after Week One. In 2020, the Dems had about a 50,000-ballot lead after one week.

Instead, they are going to be well behind. The volume of mail ballots is down, too, which is either a concern or an opportunity for the Dems. About 450,000 mail ballots were cast in Clark four years ago – only about a third of that number have been counted so far, and the total could get to half a million this year. Or not. Need to keep an eye on those numbers.

The Dems almost always do better in the second week, and they need to in 2024, not to build an insurmountable lead, as they have in the past, but to stay in the game. I don’t know of any smart Dem who thinks this is going to be anything but a slog and a 50-50 race possibly decided by a few thousand votes.

What they don’t say is this: That may be a best-case for them at this point, to be that close.

More later…

Updated, 5:30 AM, 10/24/24

Good morning, blog mates.

Mail came into the Clark file overnight, with Dems gaining 4,000 votes overall in mail Wednesday. But not nearly enough to offset GOP in-person advantage. So:

Statewide GOP lead: 17,000, or 4.2 percent

Clark firewall: Just under 7,000, or 4.5 percent

Statewide overall turnout: 409,000, or 20 percent

If turnout is 1.4 million, nearly 30 percent of the vote is in.

More later. Coffee time!

Updated, 10:15 PM, 10/23/24

Good evening again, blog mates.

SOS is reporting today's ballots, and I now feel like I am in the upside-down world. In past cycles, I would be telling you how the Dems were slowly building a firewall in Clark (tens of thousands more ballots than Republicans). They have successfully done this in every presidential election since 2008.

But the opposite is happening: Thanks to a rural tsunami, the GOP has moved out to a substantial ballot lead:

18,500 ballots, or almost 5 points

The rural firewall, the R advantage in the 15 smaller counties:

21,000 ballots,

The Clark firewall is at 5,000, or just 2.5 points in a place where Dems have a nearly 7 percent registration edge.

In Washoe, the swing urban county, Rs have a 4 point lead, just above their registration advantage.

Nearly 400,000 people have cast ballots, or just under 20 percent of registered voters. If turnout is 1.4 million out of the 2 million registered voters, that means almost 30 percent of the vote is in.

There is no good news in these numbers for Dems, who are basing their hopes on a deluge of mail ballots coming in during the final days and perhaps the day or two after the election (They can be counted for four days after Nov. 5.) and a very favorable split among indies in urban Nevada.

There are about 100,000 non-major party voters in the mix, or 12 percent of their total – that’s substantially lower than the turnout by both major parties and part of the reason I think we should discount most Nevada polls. No one knows how they will break, although Dems are optimistic because they skew young, as Andy Bloch has pointed out.

But even if Kamala Harris has a 10-point lead among indies in the current makeup of the electorate, if Trump is holding his base, he is ahead by 6,000 votes or so. Not a lot, but a lead nevertheless.

Look at the urban/rural numbers:

The Rs have actually lost a few points off their rural lead – something to watch – but it’s still large enough (37 points) to produce a huge lead (21.000 votes). I still find it humorous that the Ds have a slight turnout advantage in the rurals but are still getting crushed because of the overwhelming registration disadvantage. In the urban counties, the Rs have a turnout advantage, including 5 points in Clark and just under a point in Washoe.

Details:

Clark is turning out at about 3 points under its share of the electorate while Washoe is about 1 point below and the rurals are now 4 points above their share. That explains the GOP lead pretty succinctly. Seems unlikely that will hold as Clark ballots pour in, but we shall see.

I expect another mail dump late tonight that will help the Dems, but the Rs will still have a big lead when we wake up tomorrow.

Email if you are so inclined, donate to our nonprofit if you appreciate all of this work.

Sweet dreams, blog mates.

Updated, 6 PM, 10/23/24

Good evening, blog mates.

A friend tells me that maybe I need to simplify things a bit, especially because so many new people are interested this year and I tend to get into the deepest of weeds. So here we go – let me know what you think of fewer data-heavy charts (I will bring some back.)

Before numbers drop tonight (if I can stay awake), let me get some basics out of the way for those just joining the chat.

The Clark firewall, defined as how many more Clark County Dems have cast ballots than Republicans, is usually about 40,000 or more by now. Before today’s voting, it was only 7,000 ballots, or 3 percent. The Clark Dem registration edge is just under 7 percent, so that is a danger sign for Dems in the early going.

I will say, though, as DC elites ludicrously whisper Nevada is gone to Trump after only four days of data (!) that that is a unicorn year, and it's not worth comparing it to any other. Yes, the GOP looks good right now, but how far can Repubs extend their lead and how many Dem indies can the Dems turn out?

About 17 percent of Clark voters have turned out, 61,000 of those are not registered with either major party. I have done some modeling on these indies – there are more than 80,000 who have voted statewide – and here’s what it shows:

If Harris and Trump tie with indies statewide and hold 90 percent of their bases, Trump would win the state by 10,000 votes. Even if Harris were to win indies by 10 points right now and they both hold their base voters at 90 percent, she loses by 2,000 votes.

This is because the 15 rural counties are turning out in larger than usual numbers – except for a couple, they are all near or above 20 percent and some are upwards of 25 percent. And the Dems are losing by almost 3 to 1 in rural Nevada. Can the rurals keep this up? Will Clark mail begin to help the Ds catch up?

Washoe County, the swing county in this swing state, also has moved toward the GOP. The Repubs lead there by 5 points, or 2,200 votes.

Rural turnout is only 13 percent of the total, but Rs are beating Ds there by 16,500 votes, or nearly 40 percent. 40 percent! So the rural firewall, the difference between Rs and Ds, is more than twice the size of the Clark firewall. Can that possibly last?

It’s clear when even state GOP Chair Michael McDonald says he is voting early for the first time and the Trump campaign is urging Republicans to vote early that they realize the error of their 2020 ways. This almost surely means their Election Day edge will not be what it has been.

One note about slow counts before I share a special treat: Washoe County has a backlog of thousands of mail ballots, as TV reporter/podcaster Ben Margiott reported, and there have been conflicting explanations. Not confidence-inspiring.

Meanwhile, Clark County’s early vote file is all messed up (thank goodness the SOS is getting the breakdowns for the data geeks) , labeling every voter as a nonpartisan and officials claiming it has always been thus. (Narrator: It has not always been thus.) Confidence-inspiring.

I’ll plug in numbers later if they come in and I have the energy, but a fellow data maven has managed to extract legislative data, so let me treat you how it’s going in a few key races:

State Sen. Carrie Buck: Rs have a slight raw ballot lead (200 out of 20,000 cast) in a district Dems want to flip and where reg is very close

In the Assembly, perhaps the Rs’ No. 1 target, Shea Backus, is down by 400 votes and turnout is already almost 30 percent.

Dems talked a big game about beating Assemblywoman Heidi Kasama, but she is ahead by 400 votes, or 3 percent so far.

Assemblywoman Elaine Marzola, another prime GOP target, is up by 200 votes, or 2 percent.

Another GOP target, Serena LaRue Hatch, is up by 250 votes, or 3 percent.

Dems have leads in most of the critical races as they try to hold onto a supermajority in the lower house, but they are generally close. Right, governor?

More later…

Updated, 5:45 AM, 10/23/24

Good morning, blog mates.

Another late-night mail ballot drop helped the Dems by a few thousand votes, so:

Statewide: R+12,000, or 3.5 percent

Clark firewall: 7,000

Rural firewall: 16,500

333,000 people have voted, or 16.6 percent. If turnout reaches 1.4 million, that means just under a quarter of the vote is in.

The mail pushed Clark County's share of the vote to just under 73 percent, or right at registration. Washoe is 14 percent, or almost 3 points below reg and the rurals are at 13.3 percent, or 3 points above reg.

Republicans have a 2.5 percent turnout edge.

Here's what happens if you plug the updated numbers into the extrapolator (remember first set of numbers is Dem breakdown, then R and then others):

So Harris needs to be winning indies by double digits to be winning if she and Trump hold their bases. Repubs usually win Election Day, so you would still rather be them right now, but the question remains by the end of early voting if Election Day looks very different this year because so many Repubs, especially in rural Nevada, are voting early.

More later. There is not enough coffee in all the world. Email me, donate.

Updated, 10 PM, 10/22/24

Good evening, blog mates.

Headline: Rurals matter.

Especially when they are turning out 3.5 points above their registration and producing landslide ballot wins (58-20) over the Ds. Consider that Other 22 percent will mostly go to Trump, too, and maybe we should be talking about the GOP firewall in the rurals this cycle. It’s up to 16,500 out of only 44,000 ballots cast -- and that's without allocating the indies.

R statewide lead: Almost 14,000

Clark D firewall: 5,000

Washoe D advantage: -2,200

Total voters: 320,000, or 16 percent of registered voters. Could be approaching a quarter of entire vote, depending on turnout.

Dems are only winning the urban Nevada ballot race by 1 percent – 38-37.

Repubs have a nearly 3 percent turnout advantage statewide. It’s 3.5 percent in Clark, less than a point in Washoe and Dems actually are turning out slightly more than Repubs in rural Nevada in percentage, but the reg is so overwhelming that it doesn’t help them.

The details:

Clark is about 72 percent of the turnout, a point under reg; Washoe is about 15 percent, or nearly 2 points under reg; and you know where the other 3 points go.

Latest mail vs. in-person:

Dems up 12 points in mail, which is 56 percent of turnout (holding steady). Repubs lead by 25 points in in-person voting, which is 44 percent of the total vote.

Here are the latest extrapolations under various electorate mixtures (if you forgot, the first breakdown is Dem voters, second one is GOP split and the third is others):

So right now, if Harris won indies by 6 and they both held their bases, she would lose by 7,000 votes.

The rural firewall. It’s a thing.

More tomorrow, send any questions, criticism, praise, typos to [email protected] and if you appreciate my work here, please donate to our nonprofit. We like recurring donations the best.

Updated, 4 PM, 10/22/24

Good afternoon, blog mates.

Here’s your stat for the day: In the 15 rural counties, in-person voting, which is about 37 percent of the rural vote, the Rs lead the Ds by 73 percent to 11 percent. I kid you not.

In rural mail ballots, the Rs lead the Ds by a wide margin, 46-28, but those in-person numbers are startling. They account for about 8,000 of the Rs nearly 12,000-votes lead in the rurals, which are punching above their weight with 13 percent of the vote (nearly 3 points above their percentage of reg voters).

The R lead in rural Nevada is more than double the D lead in urban Nevada:

So here’s what we know:

---After three days out of 14 days of early data, the Rs are happy. Some think this shows it is over, but that’s silly this early. But if this becomes a trend and not an anomaly, it will be over. The Clark firewall is only 6,500, about a seventh of what it was in 2020. I have been saying 2020 may be an orange, but I bet this apple tastes very sweet to Republicans right now.

---Here’s what it looks like if you plug the current data into my extrapolations:

So what does this mean? It means Kamala Harris has to win indies by close to double digits if this turnout scenario holds. That is, unless she holds her base several points better than Trump holds his, which is possible but not necessarily likely. This is how the Dems still, think they hold on: They believe a lot of the indies, especially in Clark, are their indies.

----Depending on what turnout is – and I think it will be at least 1.3 million and possibly as high as 1.5 million – about a fifth of the vote is in. A day or two more than we will be closer to a third, perhaps, and we can draw more conclusions about trends. But a quarter of a million votes ain’t nothing, and the numbers look pretty GOP so far, and that never happens in a presidential year.

----The Rs have a 1.5 percent turnout advantage right now at a time when the Ds usually have one. It's 2.5 points in Clark. If that gets larger, big trouble for Dems.

----The mail/in-person split is interesting. There’s a chart for that, too (note this is a few thousand behind on SOS site, but the numbers won’t have changed much:

Mail is 57 percent of the overall total. In 2020, when all was said and done, mail was 53 percent of the total vis a vis in-person. It’s clear there are more Republicans voting early and by mail, which raises the possibility that Election Day may not be as robust for the GOP. In 2020 on Election Day, the Republicans had 16,000 more ballots cast than the Dems out of 156,000 cast. I’ll keep an eye out for signs of cannibalization of votes on both sides.

Right now, Repubs are winning in-person by 24 points (52-28) and Dems are winning mail by 12 points (42-30). It’s only because of the volume of mail that Dems are within 2 points statewide – and that mail avalanche is what they hope keeps them close. They know how to get their people to vote, if past is prologue.

BUT: Let’s say 1 million people vote before Election Day and those percentages stay the same. If 570,000 vote by mail and 430,000 by early vote, it looks like this:

R—395,000

D – 360,000

O – 245,000

Those would be the ballots before Election Day if the percentages are static between mail and in-person (they are likely to move a bit but this is a good baseline for now to show what could happen).

You see how pivotal indies will be to this election.

More later when I have it.

Remember that none of this is free, so:

As always, please let me know if you see any errors or just want to praise me, and if you appreciate all the work being done here, just throw a small, recurring monthly donation to The Indy.

Updated, 6:10 AM, 10/22/24

Good morning, blog mates.

Some Clark mail added to the file overnight cut into GOP lead. Clark firewall at 6,500, GOP statewide lead is just under 6,000 for GOP or about 2 points.

Here is the latest:

More later...

Updated, 10 PM, 10/21/24

Good evening, blog mates.

The headline: Republicans lead statewide in Nevada after three days of early voting and mail ballot counting. This has not happened in a presidential year in The Reid Machine Era, which encompasses the races since 2008. This could signal serious danger for the Dems and for Kamala Harris here.

It's pretty easy to explain: The Clark firewall has all but collapsed (it's 4,500 votes) and the rurals are way overperforming their share of the electorate with what has been tabulated, nearly by 4 points -- almost all taken from Clark's share. The large mail ballot lead enjoyed by Dems has been erased and more by the GOP lead in in-person early voting.

The Rs lead by about 8,000 votes statewide, or 3 percent. Here are two charts that show what is happening:

The Rs have a nearly 2-point turnout advantage, and nearly 250,000 votes have been cast. That's probably not too far from a fifth of the total vote.

It's too soon to call it a trend, but this was a huge day for Republicans in Nevada (they are ahead in Washoe now, too, erasing a deficit). A few more days like this, though, and the Democratic bedwetting will reach epic proportions.

Far from over, too early to call, lots of mail still to come, but if Dems don't build that Clark firewall...

More tomorrow. Sweet dreams (at least for Republicans).

Updated, 4 PM, 10/21/24

Greetings, blog mates.

I have looked at the data for the first weekend and I have some analysis for you: Nobody knows nuthin’.

I kid. Mostly.

Here’s the first of a few charts I will post today, and I will post some thoughts below it:

So 188,000 votes is not nuthin’. If turnout gets to 1.4 million voters, that means 13 percent of voters already have turned out. It’s almost 2-to-1 mail ballots over in-person early votes, and Democrats have a 12-point lead with mail and Republicans have a 20-point lead in in-person early votes.

The Democrats have a slight turnout advantage so far -- ,2 percent – and remember the Republicans are likely to win Election Day and turn that in their favor. I want to stress that making comparisons to 2020 may not be very useful because of how COVID skewed behavior. And the GOP emphasized in-person and early voting a lot last cycle while decrying mail ballots – but they have seen the light. Or some light.

In case you have forgotten, turnout on Election Day 2020 was only 11 percent, and Republicans won by 11 points, or nearly 16,000 votes. That’s why the Dems building up a big statewide lead has been so important and helped them win presidential races for four straight cycles. Will the pattern hold this cycle? Will Election Day be a GOP landslide? Too early to tell.

(One interesting stat above: Dems are even beating the GOP in turnout percentage in rural Nevada, but the huge Republican registration edge means they are only losing by a lesser landslide.)

The all-important Clark County firewall is under 9,000 votes, about a fourth of what it was in 2020 at this time. (Apples to oranges warning, but that is a big change.) This is what I wrote at this time in 2020:

This year, after two days, 137,000 have cast mail and in-person ballots in Clark, and the lead is nearly double 2016 in raw numbers, although the percentages are not as different: 53 percent to 26 percent.

In 2024, after two days, the Clark total is not much different from 2020: 136,000 votes cast. But the percentages are much, much different: 40-34. Keep an eye on this.

Nonpartisans, the key to everything this year, only make up a quarter of the electorate so far. Let me show you what that means so far under various turnout scenarios. The various scenarios range from Harris and Trump getting 90 percent of their base and indies splitting evenly to slippage in bases and small leads among indies. The first number in each breakdown is Dem percentage and the second one is the GOP percentage. It should be self-explanatory.

You can see how close it is because the registration advantage for Ds has shrunk. Just a little base slippage or a small loss with indies could cost one or the other the race.

And if you figure what happens if the Rs do eventually get a turnout advantage (reminder that 4-5 points has been the norm in recent presidential cycles), you can see why the closing registration gap makes Republicans optimistic and Democrats skittish.

The best hope for Trump is that this turnout pattern holds and Election Day puts him over the top. The best hope for Harris is the indies break her way in Clark, and the Dem machine turns them out. (Joe Biden won indies statewide by 6 points in 2020, according to exit polls.)

The Dems are winning Clark by 6.5 points now; they lead by 6.8 points in registration. See why they need indies?

One thing to watch is if the Washoe numbers stay consistent. Dems have run well there the past few cycles, and while the GOP has a 2.5 percent registration edge, the Dems are up by 2 points and have a slight (1.6 percent) turnout advantage. Can that hold?

Another number to keep in mind is that while the Rs are up by 30 points in ballots in the rurals, probably two-thirds of indies there will go with Trump. So the actual vote lead may be much larger.

Bottom line: Somebody knows somethin’! What do I know? It looks very tight now, but the Dems need to increase that firewall to offset likely GOP gains on Election Day.

As I like to say after only two days: Definitely. Maybe.

As always, please let me know if you see any errors or just want to praise me, and if you appreciate all the work being done here, just throw a small, recurring monthly donation to The Indy.

Updated, 8:30 AM, 10/21/24

Quick update on busy morning:

Clark in-person early vote is in: Repubs won by 2,200 out of more than 17,000 cast, or by 12 points. So after the first weekend:

Statewide: D+3,000

Clark firewall: D+8,600

As the first week rolls on, keep an eye on this chart because, as have told you, the larger share the rurals have, the better for Trump, and the larger share Clark has, the better for Harris. It's all about at reg now:

I'll have context soon, but suffice it to say, this is below what D numbers were at the same time in 2020, although not sure that comparison is apt. All about the indies in Clark, folks. Which way will they go?

More later, I have a newsletter to put out, Indy meetings to have.

Have I reminded you lately to donate?

Updated, 6:30 AM, 10/21/24

Adding statewide results (w/o early vote from Clark yesterday), which is about 8 percent of registered voters casting ballots:

Updated, 6:05 AM, 10/21/24

Good morning, blog mates.

Clark mail dropped overnight. Dems won by 18 points; they had won by 19 in the first batch. Much smaller sample this time.

I don't have in-person early vote breakdown in Clark from Sunday, but there were 17,500 who turned out. The Clark firewall is at just under 11,000 without those numbers, so assume it's a few thousand less than that -- maybe 8,000 or 9,000 because GOP surely won in-person Sunday.

The chart for Clark:

More later, need coffee...

Updated, 8:45 PM, 10/20/24 (9:15 PM update to update with fresher Washoe numbers)

Good evening, blog mates.

No Clark numbers from today, rurals are closed, Washoe has posted its early voting numbers for today:

D-1,347 (31%)

R-2,049 (48 %)

O-909 (21%)

Total--4,295

Combined Washoe early and mail so far:

D --12,165 (39.5%)

R--11,489 (37.3 %)

O--7,053 (23.5%)

Total--30,800

Dems have a 676-vote lead in Washoe (2.2%), which has about a 2% GOP reg edge.

About 9% of registered voters have cast ballots in Washoe. If turnout is 80%, that means about 11 percent of the Washoe vote is in.

As for Clark, they had problems with their early voting file, which misled some and caused others to project inaccurately. Confidence-inspiring, too, but, I hope, just a glitch. SOS numbers I used earlier were theoretically accurate.

There have been multiple analysts who say the GOP mix of mail has more low-propensity voters, most of them conservative Republicans excited about the mix. But I take good data from either side, and it should not be discounted, even if the hype is.

I want to remind everyone that we are in uncharted territory here because while 2020 is the best comparison, it is not necessarily a completely apt one because of COVID and the first cycle with mostly mail ballots. Turnout patterns could be different, for instance. Election Day could be different.

We need more data to start drawing conclusions if we are seeing anomalies or trends. I have been told people are freaking out on Twitter in response to my posts, as they always do, but I blissfully do not see them. If a tweet falls in the forest and the person tweeted at is not looking, does it make a sound?

So:

Waiting for Clark.

More when I get it and -- you know the drill:

Please let me know if you see any errors or just want to praise me, and if you appreciate all the work being done here, just throw a small, recurring monthly donation to The Indy.

Updated, 9:30 AM, 10/20/24

Good morning, fellow data obsessives.

The Clark mail has posted: Dems won under 2-to-1, about 30,000-18,000. (I’ll round in the narrative part up here to make it easier to read, details in chart below.)

Dems have about an 1,800-voter lead statewide (this will change slightly with signature cures, but not by a lot). That is a huge difference from 2020, when the Dem lead statewide was 40,000 after one day.

If, as expected, there is a 5-point or so R turnout edge after Election Day, that means Dems (Kamala Harris) will have to win indies by somewhere around 5 points to win the state, all other things being equal. And they may not be: If each side does not hold 90 percent or so of the base votes – more Rs go for Harris than Ds go for Trump or vice-versa – the entire calculus changes. (Regular reminder: Biden won indies here by 6 in 2020, according to exit polls. But that was then; this is now.)

A few data points:

---The Dems have a 1.3 percent lead statewide. That’s slightly more than their reg edge. They have a 7.3 percent lead in Clark, again just a tick over their reg edge. In Washoe, Dems have a 5 point lead in a place where the Rs actually have a 2 percent lead in reg. The rurals are a landslide for the Rs.

---The Clark firewall, the bulwark the Dems try to erect to stave off losses in the rurals, is a little more than 7,000 votes. After one day in 2020, that number: 32,000 votes. Danger, Will Robinson! The difference in the Clark lead for the Dems in reg in 2020 – 150,000-plus – vs. 2024 – under 100,000 – is part of the reason for this. Reason for Rs to be bullish.

---Turnout so far is about 7 percent. Dem and R turnout are about the same – 9 percent. Others are about half that. The Rs will need to show their turnout advantage – remember Election Day usually substantially favors the Rs, but the question is whether they are cannibalizing their Election Day vote during the early period.

--Here’s a chart to watch:

Here’s why this could be important: Clark is turning out about 5 points under registration, Washoe is about a point above and the rurals are about 4 points above. If the rurals, where the Rs will have landslide wins, can keep that up, that is big trouble for Harris. Still early, of course, but worth watching.

Here's the megadata chart:

Please let me know if you see any errors or just want to praise me, and if you appreciate all the work being done here, just throw a small, recurring monthly donation to The Indy.

More later, maybe…

Updated, midnight, 10/19/24

It's late, blog mates, and it's been a long day, so I am going to do a quick post now with all the data. I will try to post a detailed chart every day with all of the information about votes cast, percentage of the electorate that has voted and is left and the partisan splits. It is a dense chart, and feel free to ignore it. I will post it at the end of every blog, and give you the highlights above it. To wit:

--We have no Clark mail yet, which almost surely will give the Democrats a big advantage in the biggest county. But for now, with every other county reporting., the Rs are ahead by 11,000 votes and 14 percentage points, 46-32. The Republicans won mail balloting by just a little (all those rurals offset a Democratic landslide in Washoe in mail) but by almost 2-to-1 in in-person voting, which was expected to happen (this was the pattern last cycle). When the Clark mail comes in, if it is not substantially to the Dems' advantage, that may be a warning beacon for them.

--Some of the rurals have pretty high early turnout when you combine mail and in-person. Nine of them are in double digits and a handful are approaching a fifth of their registered voters already. They may be cannibalizing in-person and Election Day voting, but it's too early to tell.

--So far non-major-party voter turnout is at 22 percent. The smaller that number is -- some thought it could get close to 30 percent -- the more the base votes for each party will matter.

--That's all for now because it's so late, but I will post the chart below. Let me know if you see anything that I missed and beware data entry errors at this late hour. Until I blog again...

Updated, 1 PM, 10/19/24

Some things to remember today:

I don't think 2020 is a direct correlation, but it's better than 2022, an off-year with much lower turnout. Democrats loved mail ballots in 2020 (and 2022), and they had big early leads. Early voting was a bit different.

Let me show you what I wrote about the first day of early voting in 2020:

Clark saw about 27,000 turn out on the first day and the Dems won by nearly 2,000 votes (44-37).

Back then, the Dem lead in Clark was almost 12 percent; it's now a little more than half of that (6.9 percent).

By this time in 2020, the Dems already had a huge mail ballot lead, which does not exist this time because Clark has yet to post. So no comparison.

As for 2022, which is an orange because turnout was so much lower, a little more than 11,000 turned out on the first day and because mail ballots had become ingrained, the Rs won 45-37.

Since I don't know the mail ballot totals yet, it's difficult to know what to make of today's results. But if the Dems already have a huge lead, the Rs could win early voting in Clark again. Volume also could be important.

More when I have it.

Broken record: Email me about anything at [email protected]. And if you appreciate the work I am doing here, please donate to our 501c3 nonprofit.

Updated, 7:45 AM, 10/19/24

Greetings, blog mates.

Early voting starts today in Nevada, and Clark may actually post its mail ballots (fingers crossed)!

The latest numbers:

Still less than 1 percent turnout statewide (that’s because almost nothing reported from Clark), and the GOP lead is expected in red rural Nevada. As I have said, the percentage of the vote from the rurals will be important – higher it is, better for Donald Trump. By the way, the rurals do seem to be using mail ballots more – time will tell – but eight of the 17 already are in double-digit turnout percentages. Also small numbers (.2 percent) from Washoe (Reno), and Dems have a small lead.

So about today:

Usually, Clark posts its voting file in the early evening. There is a new registrar, so we will see if that continues. A Clark official has told me they will also start putting mail ballots into the tally this weekend – there should be a lot returned already. No, dear readers, I don’t know what “a lot” means. But I will later.

One caveat: I will put the numbers in as much context as I can with every post, but judging anything from one day or maybe even one week will be difficult because 1. So many new indie registrants 2. 2020, because of COVID, maybe an orange to 2024's apple.

Also, the Dems always try to juice the first-day numbers and today will ne different, with Barack Obama here to rally the faithful. But I still won't read too much into the first-day numbers either way.

I plan to update the blog every evening, but no guarantees. Follow me on Twitter, too (@ralstonreports), but I rarely look at mentions, so DM me or email me.

Until later…

Updated, 8:30 PM, 10/17/24

Good evening, blog mates.

Latest numbers:

No real Clark numbers, very small Washoe sample (236-186, Dems), rurals are overwhelmingly GOP. Seven of the 15 counties already in double-digits, but this is just a fraction of the Nevada electorate.

Waiting for Clark.

Waiting for Clark.

Waiting for Clark.

More when I have it.

Updated, 8:15 PM, 10/16/24

Latest numbers are in:

Almost all rural numbers, mostly from Elko and Nye, two of the larger rural counties and both deeply red. Both are at about double-digit turnout already, three days before early voting starts.

In Washoe, Dems still lead, but very small number of votes: 181-132.

More tomorrow, maybe...

Updated, 7 PM, 10/16/24

Greetings, blog mates.

While we wait for another trickle of rural mail votes to come in, and Clark County won't give us any morsels until the weekend, I decided to start modeling turnout scenarios, with certain historical assumptions guiding me but with the caveat that the models may have to be adjusted when a significant number of votes are in.

Republican operative Jeremy Hughes beat me to the punch with his own analysis this week, which read:

Between the two major parties, Republicans will almost assuredly have more individuals vote in this election than Democrats. This will be the first time that’s happened in a Presidential year since 2004. 

Republicans have always had a higher percentage of their voters turnout over Democrats; the problem has been that the registration gap has been just too large to overcome. Which means the Democrats will having a lower turnout percentage still have more individuals vote.

In 2016 and 2020, the GOP statewide turnout advantage was 4.4% and 4.5%, respectively. As you can see, the advantage is relatively stable. 

The Democrats held a 47k turnout advantage in 2016 and won by 27k. 

Democrats held a 39k turnout advantage in 2020 and won by 33k. 

This election, Republicans will have at least 12k voter turnout advantage.  

While we all know nonpartisans will decide the race, if you’re in the Kamala campaign, you need to win nonpartisans by probably 3% to win the race. Interestingly, that is the exact percentage that Governor Lombardo and Senator Cortez Masto won Independents by in 2022. 

So is he right? Let’s take a look.

First, some more granular detail Hughes did not write about. In 2020, just under 77 percent of Democrats turned out, just over 81 percent of Republicans turned out and about 65 percent of nonpartisans/third-party voters turned out.

That translated into Dems making up 37 percent of the electorate, Republicans 34 percent and others at 26 percent. That’s because the Dems had just under a 5 percent statewide registration edge, or 86,000 voters, which offset the turnout disadvantage and they had, as Hughes notes, more voters turn out. That 3 percent share edge was close to what Joe Biden’s victory was in 2020 here.

That D voter advantage is, as Hughes, points out, unlikely to occur this cycle as the statewide edge is now down to under 20,000 voters, or less than 1 percent.

Kamala Harris can still win the state if Democrats win non-major-party voters, but the question is: How many will there be? There are more than 800,000 of them registered, and if 65 percent turned out, that would be about half a million voters. I see that as very unlikely, although not impossible, because the percentage is likely to be much lower as so many of those voters are zombie voters, who have no idea they were registered automatically at the DMV and/or have no interest in the election.

They may be a greater percentage of the electorate than in 2020, but surely not more than 30 percent. I would guess that half or a little more than half of those non-major-party voters will go to the polls.

So consider some possible scenarios -- the first number is the percentage of D turnout, the second is R turnout and the third is others:

Republicans, if past trends in turnout edge hold, will have anywhere from an 8,000 to 14,000 voter advantage. That means, as Hughes says, that Harris will have to win indies, assuming both bases hold.

But can she win them by 3 percent? Well, Biden won nonmajors by 6 percentage points in 2020, according to exit polling. Dems did a better job of finding theirs than the GOP did of turning out theirs.

But look at what happened two years ago – an off-year in which the GOP turnout advantage was –wait for it – 11 percent! And despite that disparity – the Dems had about a 3 percent registration edge two years ago – Democratic Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto eked out a victory and Gov. Steve Sisolak almost won. So the Dems clearly won indies two years ago.

They will need to do so again because they have less margin for error than at any time since 2008, when their string of presidential victories here began. And it’s the reason that Hughes and others are optimistic that the Republicans, from top to bottom, can do much better this year.

One other data point: I am revising (for now) after seeing the numbers above my estimate of overall turnout down to between 1.3 million and 1.4 million. Obviously I will adjust if it seems to be much higher (or lower, but that is unlikely).

More when I get it, and I'll update later if those rurual (and maybe some Washoe) numbers post. Tell me where I am wrong or right at [email protected]. And if you appreciate this blog and the work of the remarkable Indy staff, please donate to our nonprofit. Thank you.

Updated, 10:45 PM, 10/15/24

Hello, blog mates.

It's late, I've just returned seeing the Warriors crush the Lakers (preseason but still satisfying) and not much new to report, so here are the numbers:

Still not meaningful at just a half of a percent. I continue to be frustrated that an urban county such as Washoe and a bunch of rural counties can post mail numbers, but Clark County officials say they won't have the staff to do so until...this weekend.

Washoe has only posted a few hundred mail ballots, and Dems have a lead early, 149-114, with 73 non-major-party voters. Doesn't mean much.

Early voting coming Saturday, maybe then Clark will start posting returned mail.

As always, email me with questions, etc., I am not looking at mentions on Twitter. And please donate if you can.

Updated, 8:50 PM, 10/14/24

Another SOS update shows a few hundred more mail ballots from rural Nevada and some counted from Washoe (109-102, Dems, but that's a tenth of a percent of total voters, so don't get excited).

Nearly 40 percent of the almost 8,000 ballots so far have come from Nye County, a deep-red county in rural Nevada, where 9 percent of voters have already returned their ballots. Nye is a place where Trump won by 40 percentage points in 2020, and Republicans have a 44 percent to 27 percent edge right now, and the indies will break decisively in Trump's direction, too. Deep-red Elko also has a disproportionately high turnout so far (7 percent) as does tiny but deeply red Lincoln (10 percent). It will be interesting to see if Republicans continue to return mail ballots at a high rate in the counties where Trump needs high turnout.

The numbers:

Still can't tell much until Clark mail starts to post, but that may not happen until the weekend.

More when I get it.

Updated, 4:10 PM, 10/14/24

Greetings, fellow ravenous data types.

We probably won't have any serious data until this weekend, when early voting begins and mail ballots start to be catalogued in urban Nevada, where about 90 percent of the turnout will be. (I'm trying to speed them up, but no one listens to me.)

In the meantime -- and while I am nervously awaiting the beginning of the Bills game -- I wanted to show you a chart that indicates just how much Clark County voter registration has changed since the last two elections. The statewide numbers are below, as you may recall, showing how the Dem lead is now under 1 percent. And the Clark advantage, once in the 13 percent range a few cycles ago, is now under 7 percent for the first time in The Reid Machine era.

I will start talking about the Clark County firewall once early voting begins, the cushion Dems historically have built in the southern bastion that generally has held off losses in the rest of the state. The firewall was under 30,000 in 2022, a non-presidential year, and 90,000 in 2020 -- a more apples to apples comparison. The Dem registration lead now is 98,000 voters, so they would have to at least hold their own with indies and get robust turnout of the base to match the 2020 total.

Here's the chart that shows the registration changes since Joe Biden won Clark by 9 percentage points in 2020:

As you can see, the Dem voter edge in 2020 in Clark was 156,000 (140,000, if you account for 75,000 Clark County voters rendered inactive after the primary but technically stayed on the active rolls because the locals missed a federal deadline to remove them.)

That's still about 35 percent more than it is now. Will it matter? The answer, and you will hear this from me a lot as time goes on, is: it all depends on the indies.

As always, email me at [email protected] with questions, criticism, praise or good Aaron Rodgers jokes. (I don't check Twitter mentions anymore -- and, man, has my mental health improved! -- so don't ping me there.) And if you appreciate this blog, please consider donating to our nonprofit.

More when I have it

Updated, 9:40 AM, 10/12/24

Good morning, faithful blog mates.

Early voting starts a week from today – that’s why Barack Obama is coming to help juice Dem turnout – and urban mail ballots will begin coming in next week.

Only about 6,000 mail ballots have been tabulated, almost all in rural Nevada – that’s .3 percent of active voters. So this means….nothing.

I’ll post this chart on every update:

The urban ballots are about a fifth of this total, and they are mostly what is known as EASE (Effective Absentee System for Elections) ballots. These are mostly military or overseas ballots.

The rurals – 15 of 17 Nevada counties – will be a landslide for Trump. How big? Here are the margins in 2020:

Only the capital, Carson City, is even remotely competitive for Dems.

In 2020, the Dems won urban Nevada – almost 90 percent of the vote – by a combined 8 percentage points, which offset the rural GOP tsunami enough for Biden to win by 2.5 percentage points. If the urban margin drops a couple of points or the rural numbers tick up a bit, the election here will not be over on Nov. 5. (Mail ballots actually can be counted for four days, so it may be longer.)

Something to look forward to!

As always, email me at [email protected] with any errors, thoughts or questions. (I won’t answer on Twitter, so don’t waste your time there, but I will answer your email.)

Updated, 6 PM, 10/10/24

Numbers have been updated, but not a huge change, faithful blog mates: 2,208-1,408 for the GOP, and 1,556 others. It's almost all rural data. By the way, more others than Dems is not that surprising in rural Nevada, where most of those indies will vote Republican.

The urban mail will start coming back next week and then in-person early voting starts on Oct. 19. But this week will be the high-water mark for the Elko-Nye axis and its impact on the election! To be fair to those two relatively large rural counties, the GOP landslides there in the early going may -- may! -- be a harbinger that Republicans have grown to love mail ballots. But it is....way too early.

Five thousand voters represents only .3 percent, so, please, no one get excited. Unless, of course, you are a Twitter troll -- then have at it, declare the race over.

I often will link or quote other analysts here because I don't have all the answers -- just most of them: Jeremy Hughes, the experienced operative in Nevada races, has started up his excellent "Data Dive," and today he highlighted something I have been tracking as well, the shifting Clark registration numbers that have made the Dems apparently vulnerable:

Something is happening in Clark County. Since Oct 1, Republicans have gained 1,118 more registrations than the Democrats. 

In the first 9 days in 2018, Democrats gained 2,038 on Republicans in Clark.

In 2020, Democrats gained 2,639.

In 2022, Democrats gained 2,387.

So suffice to say, this is not normal and goes against all previous trends we've seen in Nevada. The Democrat's Clark County advantage has dropped from 7.02% to 6.89%.

It used to be twice that, just a few cycles ago. It is significant. Whether it is meaningful in the results is yet to be determined. But: Math matters.

More when I have it...Feel free to ask questions and, need I remind you, donate to our nonprofit site if you appreciate this work.

Updated, 6 PM, 10/9/24

Not too many more ballots reported -- 4,222 in all, or .2 percent. Urban Nevada hasn't reported much yet, so not surprising Rs have a 42 percent to 28 percent lead in the rurals. Not enough data yet to draw any conclusions, but I will be keeping my eye on how many people in each party are voting by mail as early voting starts in eight days.

Here's what the early-mail-Election Day breakdown looked like in 2020 -- remember this was at the height of COVID, but mail is becoming more accepted here:

---

This is a very useful link for any fellow data geeks. Professor Michael McDonald -- the good one (not the state GOP chair and fake elector) who doesn't live here -- does a great job of tracking voting across the country. I am happy to steal good work from him, Dr. John Samuelson and others as the election progresses. The more data, the better.

More when I have more to say...

----

Welcome to the early voting blog!

Early voting doesn’t start until Oct. 19, but some mail ballots already are trickling in – you can track them here.

As I say every even-numbered year at about this time, elections are about a lot of factors – character, campaigns, money – but they are fundamentally about one thing: math.

That’s what this blog is about – the numbers. I will present a blizzard of data in the next few weeks to help give you a sense of the race for president in Nevada, hoping to provide context and extrapolation to determine how close it will be. I’ll also eventually take a look at some down-ballot races.

Sometimes enough data is in before Election Day that I can predict winners with a fair amount of confidence, as I have accurately done in recent cycles. But I am not so sure that will be possible this year, even though most of the vote will be in before Nov. 5, primarily because of the explosion of non-major-party registrations.

You can see it here:

It’s all about those voters this time because unlike in 2020, when the Democrats had an 80,000-plus registration edge over Republicans, that partisan advantage has been greatly diminished to less than 19,000. That massive change in the Dem advantage should give Donald Trump optimism that he can break a 20-year drought for the GOP.

You can see the changes in this table:

The Republicans have closed on the Democrats not because they have increased their numbers since 2020; they simply have lost fewer voters than the Dems as the number of non-majors has soared.

If both parties hold their bases, Trump would just need to win indies by a small margin to win here for the first time since George W. Bush in 2004. The real conundrum for the campaigns – and for number-crunchers such as yours truly – is to figure out what the turnout is going to be among those non-major party voters.

I will use this blog to posit various turnout scenarios among the bases and non-majors so you can see what could happen. I think polls here generally have overestimated non-major turnout. Let me show you why:

In 2020, non-majors were 26 percent of the vote. In 2016, it was 24 percent.

It would seem reasonable to project that non-major turnout will be about a quarter of the vote. How the majors divide the remaining 75 percent is very important, and I will get to that later. 

But not only have too many polls taken this cycle had non-majors getting 30 percent or more of the turnout, they also do not account for so many of these nonpartisan voters being what I call zombies – that is, they were auto-registered at the DMV, which has caused most of the non-major increase, and many, I’d guess, will not vote. 

How many? Impossible to say until we see some significant turnout. The only counterbalance to this is that even the ones who are not engaged will get mail ballots and may vote.

But that’s what this blog is for: to track that and see how it develops. I will set the baseline at 25 percent turnout for non-majors, but it may be significantly smaller because of the huge number in the pool – 800,000-plus voters out of about 2 million.

For what it’s worth – and I am not sure it is a lot – President Joe Biden won indies by 6 percentage points in 2020, according to exit polls.

The other wild card is this new era of mail ballots in Nevada, which started with every voter getting one in 2020 because of COVID. Election Day turnout has been relatively low for decades because Nevadans love early voting. But add mail into the mix, and Election Day was only 11 percent of the vote in 2020. But that may be an apples and oranges comparison because it was at the height of COVID and few people wanted to go stand in line with others.

Election Day turnout was 21 percent of the vote in 2022, but I prefer comparing presidential years to each other. My initial gut says it will fall somewhere in between 2020 and 2022, but I think I will err on the higher side, although the GOP appears to have gotten over its aversion to mail ballots.

I will also be keeping an eye on turnout by region. Clark County has almost 72 percent of the vote, Washoe has nearly 17 percent and the rurals about 11 percent. But in 2020, Clark turnout was 2 points under its registration and Washoe and the rurals were each plus 1. The more the rurals punch above their weight, the more trouble Kamala Harris is in.

The key for Harris, as it is for all statewide Democratic candidates, is building up a firewall in Clark County during early voting to offset rural landslide losses. The firewall in 2020 was 90,000 voters (the Dem registration edge was about 150,000 in Clark), almost exactly the margin Biden won by in the most populous county. It seems highly unlikely Harris will get anywhere near that number as the Dem lead over the GOP in Clark is now just under six figures.

Dems recently have done just well enough in Washoe, winning by small margins, to ensure statewide victory. It used to be Dems could only feel comfortable if they had a double-digit edge coming out of Clark. Those days of consistently hitting that mark may be over.

Biden won Clark by about 9 percentage points, but he also won Washoe by 4.5 points to ensure Trump did not have enough votes in the rurals to catch up. The 2020 raw vote totals:

Clark: Biden plus 91,000

Washoe: Biden plus 11,400

Rurals: Trump plus 69,400

If you want a statistic to give Trump lots of reasons for hope this time: In 2020, the Democrats had an 11.5 percent lead in Clark on Election Day. Biden won by 2.5 percentage points less than the actual Clark Dem registration edge. Right now, the Clark Dem lead is only 7 percent. If Harris only wins Clark by 7, this race will be very close. Any number less than that, and I’d guess she loses.

One other relevant stat for 2020: The Democrats had a 3 percent turnout edge in 2020 -- (that is 37 percent of the turnout was Dem and 34 percent was R), which was significant because another way to look at it: The Rs actually had a 5 percent turnout advantage of their voters because they had many fewer voters. Back then, the Dem registration edge was just under 5 percent. It’s now only 1 percent. If the Republicans have a turnout advantage this time, it may be sayonara Kamala.

Adding this context at 10 AM from a Dem data geek:

GOP had a 11% turnout advantage in 2022 which produced a 2.7% share advantage -- they had 28k more voters than we did in the end -- which confirms what you already know that we won by a significant percentage with NPs.  For context - 2018, the GOP had a 4% turnout advantage. 

In 2016 and 2020, the GOP had a 5 turnout out advantage, which is more in line with what you would expect in this election. Question is going to be what does NP turnout end up being.

It's too early to tell any of that now, of course. But as time goes on and enough votes are in, I will extrapolate in various turnout scenarios. I would guess overall turnout will be about 1.4 million (70 percent), but I suppose it could get to 1.5 million (75 percent). I will adjust as the votes come in.

Finally, a brief primer on how Nevada votes are apportioned. Nearly 90 percent of the vote, as I told you earlier, is in urban Nevada – Clark and Washoe counties. Only six of the remaining counties have five figures of registered voters. In 2020, turnout in Washoe was slightly higher than Clark, and most of the rurals have significantly higher turnout percentages. Here are the numbers:

That’s all for now. Let me know your thoughts, and I will update when I have new data or musings.