With One Week to Go, The Midterms Are Anyone’s Guess

0:01Everyone wants health care to be simpler and easier. That's why UnitedHealth Group is fast-tracking more than 60 % of children's procedures that used to need pre-approval, so more kids get the care they need when they need it. And speeding up procedure approvals and payments for more than 1 ,500 rural hospitals, so they can focus on caring for their communities. And that's just the start. Learn more at uhg.com slash access. From the opinion pages of the Wall Street Journal, this is All Things with Kim Strassel. It's one week to the election, and despite some predictions of a Democratic wave, it's still anybody's guess who emerges in charge after this midterm.

0:46Stories are flying about polling, early voting, last-minute campaign outrages, and the mood of the country. But how much does any of that really tell us? Welcome to All Things with Kim Strassel, and joining me to give us some answers to those questions and more is an excellent election analyst, Josh Krashauer, editor-in-chief of Jewish Insider, and a Fox News Radio political analyst. Kim, it is just great to be with you one week before the elections. I know. Are you as happy we're that close to being done as I am? You know, I love covering campaigns and politics. That's been been my beat for the last two decades plus.

1:22But I will say this has been the nastiest, most negative election. You know, we've had negative and nasty campaigns. But looking at some of the Hail Mary ads and just the desperation, I think it's time to have voters vote and to see what the results are on election night. Yeah, I agree with you. I've been doing this a long time, too. And I think this is one of the ugliest political environments I've ever covered. Just broadly, though, we'll step away from the ugly tactics, but just 30 ,000 feet, big picture. Where do you think this race stands at the moment for the House and the Senate? So big picture, the House is all but lost for the House Republicans.

2:00I mean, look, they started out with a very narrow majority, a historic, you know, small majority redistricting. They were hoping could give them an additional six to 10 seats. the reality is a lot of those redistricting, especially in states like Florida and Texas, backfired to some extent. A lot of the gerrymandered districts they thought would be safe Republican seats are actually much more competitive than they ever realized. So fundamentally, we're dealing with a very narrow Republican majority right now in a political environment that is very favorable to very favorable for the Democrats.

2:33So it's just hard to see how Republicans can hold that majority. Now, the question is, how big is the Democrat. I mean, you know, there are not a whole lot of seats that are drawn to be super competitive. So, you know, comparing this to 2018 or 2006 is kind of like comparing apples to oranges. But Republicans probably would say that they'd have a good night if they could only lose 10 seats, 15 seats, and could regain the House in two years. There are some prognosticators and some people who expect a huge wave that could lead to 20, 25 or more seats, which would be a much more historic night for the Democrats.

3:07But I do think it's almost, it's very difficult, if not impossible, to see the Republicans hanging on to the House. On the other hand, on the Senate side, I think a lot of prognosticators have gotten a little too ahead of their skis in proclaiming Democrats are going to run the table to take the majority back. I think this is very close. It's a coin flip race, and the battle is between the environment versus the fact that Democrats need to win very, very red states. They need to win Texas. They need to win Ohio. They need to win Alaska, which I know you're familiar with. And it's a very, very close race in all those states.

3:40So, I mean, the bar is very high. The wave needs to be very big, in my mind, for Democrats to get the four seats necessary to get to an outright majority. Talking about that wave, I want to ask you again about gerrymandering. Just go back to your point. I wrote a column last week saying that the question about how gerrymandering is affecting Republicans is kind of a question of how you look at the bar that's being set, right? So if the bar is it's going to keep them the House, it's not going to do that. If the bar is it's going to win them every seat they carved out, it's not going to do that.

4:19As you note, some of these are very competitive. But could it, because I think there's an argument to be made by doing what they did so aggressively that they are going to be less bad off than they otherwise would be. And it could be the difference between a huge wave and a smaller wave. I think that's a fair point, though. I would note that one of the premises behind a lot of this redistricting, especially in Texas and Florida, where they made on paper at least the most significant gains, is they expected that the Hispanic vote, which went decisively to the Republican Party and to Donald Trump in 2024, they expected they'd be continuing to do well and run competitively with Hispanic voters.

5:00And what you're seeing in all these supposedly gerrymandered districts for Republicans is the Hispanic vote has reverted back to 2016, no less 2020. We're beyond the point where they've given up all their gains over the last decade. So we're now looking at the prospect of the Hispanic vote going back to a pretty solidly Democratic bloc. And that means when you look at the data from the 2016 and 2020 elections, that means a lot of these districts that were drawn to elect Republicans are now very competitive, if not lean Democratic, because the dramatic shifts were so great. So yeah, I do agree, like big picture, that in 2028, will Republicans, if they lose the House, maybe be a little bit better positioned to make gains again, because the districts are slightly better for them?

5:46Sure. But I think they bit off more than they can chew. And also, that was the first moment, Kim, that you look at different moments in the last two years, and where Trump could have done one thing and helped this party and instead did the other thing. I think one of the early moments when a lot of independent voters and a lot of Democratic partisans started engaging was when Republicans started to play around with the maps in Texas and created this nuclear war. So I think that there's also a macro political effect when you play uber partisan ball and you make your party look out to be more concerned with maximizing power instead of, you know, helping out on the economy or doing things on a policy basis that are more effective or more constructive.

6:28That was the beginning, I think, when Republicans lost support. You can't measure that precisely, but I think that moment. I totally agree that if voters ultimately want an end to this gerrymandering, they kind of have to send a message to the people that are doing on both sides because we're beyond the point at which a court's going to do it. That was made pretty clear. So it'll be interesting to see how that turns out. On the Senate, you wrote a, it was just a wonderful column just a couple of weeks ago that I could not have agreed more with. And you were saying that in the Senate, if either party botches it, it will be because they had some bad candidates.

7:08And you named some on both sides, or simply candidates that aren't running great campaigns. Explain that a little bit more. I have never seen an election cycle where Senate candidates are usually the most vetted. These are the races that people take the most seriously. And you have on both sides candidates that maybe 20 years ago couldn't have run for dog catcher and are now one step away from the presidency. It's kind of scary, to be honest. And you look at Michigan, I think, is the poster child where Abdul El-Sayed, I mean, a generic Democrat would be up by, you know, eight to 10 points in this environment in Michigan.

7:43You know, whatever you think of where that race stands, it's neck and neck. It's statistically tied. And you have a guy who is struggling with black voters, really struggling with Jewish Democratic voters and using like this is an angry, you know, react, you know, the whole, his whole campaign is fueled by just his anger and his inability to kind of do the kind of normal blocking and tackling when it comes to politics that you would expect from a general election candidate in a swing state. So Democrats and Republicans, that race is going to be, it's Democratic in Michigan that the Democrat Abdul El-Sayed against the Republican Mike Rogers, who was a very much a conventional conservative who served in Congress, was head of the House Intel Committee back when I started covering politics, and has run a very good campaign and has tried to make outreach to a lot of the disaffected Democratic constituencies.

8:32And that race, according to both Republicans and Democrats I talked to, is just tied, neck and neck. It's very close. And it's one where Republicans are greatly overperforming. I would put Maine in that category with Susan Collins is a battle tested senator. But Troy Jackson is probably the worst candidate she's ever faced. And if she loses, it's because of the political. It's not because of his candidacy. It's because the environment in a blue state is just too difficult to overcome. but I actually talked to a pretty high-level Democratic operative over the weekend who said that they almost wish they had Graham Plattner back.

9:07Wow. I don't agree with that, by the way, and that's a sign of just how lackluster Jackson's campaign has been in the state of Maine. So you have two really historically bad candidates running in a historically good election year for the Democratic Party, and then you flip that on the Republican side, you also have some historically bad candidates. I would start in Texas with the indicted Texas Attorney General, Ken Paxton, who has God knows how many personal skeletons in his closet and scandals, and is turning a state that Trump won easily by double digits into a neck and neck contest with Democrat James Tallarico.

9:45Now Tallarico, I don't think he's a horrible candidate. I don't think he's a great candidate, but he certainly is more progressive than the type of Texas Democrat that would win a red state in the past is someone like Lloyd Benson, who was the last Democrat to win a Senate race in the state. But, you know, someone who was more business oriented, more moderate. I still have a hard time thinking that if Texas breaks the streak of not electing Democrats, it's going to be Tallarico is the guy they elect to the Senate. But look, this race is very close, very neck and neck. If Paxton wins, I also think Greg Abbott may pull him over the finish line.

10:17But this is a guy who's underperforming massively for a Republican in Texas. And then you can go to Kansas and South Carolina, like Lindsey Graham's sister is famously said, she doesn't really know a whole lot about foreign policy, which was her brother's defining issue and has raised very little money, run a very lackluster campaign. You know, Republicans still think she'll pull that out, but she's running against a very good Democratic challenger. And it's a close race, according to the polls and an 18 point Trump state. Kansas, Senator Marshall, Roger Marshall is probably one of the worst campaigners I've ever seen.

10:53Again, not raising money, barely campaigning. And you have a moderate Democrat who he's running against, who is pastor of the most, I think, the largest Methodist church in the whole state, if not the whole Midwest. So these are good candidates on the Democratic side, good environment. The challenge for them is that these are very red states, and it's going to take a lot to overcome that partisan deficit. We're going to take a quick break. When we come back, more with Josh Kroschauer about the upcoming midterms. Everyone wants health care to be simpler and easier. That's why UnitedHealth Group is fast tracking more than 60 % of children's procedures that used to need pre-approval.

11:32So more kids get the care they need when they need it. And speeding up procedure approvals and payments for more than 1 ,500 rural hospitals. So they can focus on caring for their communities. And that's just the start. Learn more at uhg.com slash access. This is Matthew Hennessey, the editor of Free Expression. I want to personally invite you to come check out what we're doing. Signing up for the newsletter couldn't be easier. Just go to our homepage. Directly below the Wall Street Journal logo, you'll find the magic words. Free Expression, wedged between opinion and arts. There's an option to sign up for the newsletter right at the top of our section.

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12:40welcome back to all things with kim strassel i am here this week with josh kraschauer editor-in-chief of jewish insider yeah i was just going to ask you about the possible reverse in some cases it's always a delight to me when i look out and i actually see somebody running a really good campaign where they surprise you my pick for this cycle might be michelle tofoya up in minnesota who was running for the Senate against Peggy Flanagan. Now, Flanagan has a few built-in deficits because she's holding the bag on this enormous fraud scandal that happened in Minnesota. I mean, she's trying to run away from it, but it's hard to wiggle out of that.

13:19And I just think Tafoya has been very on message. She's very good in front of a camera. She's good in front of crowds. And I've been really surprised to see how close that race is. But I wonder, are there any out there that you've seen where you've just said, wow, that's a really good candidate? Oh, yeah, I would do one on each side. Iowa's become a trouble spot for the Republicans. But Ashley Hinson, if they did not have Ashley Hinson as their nominee. And, you know, I've covered her as a member of the House, as a candidate when she first ran for office. But she has done the most talented two step when it comes to speaking about Trump and distancing herself from the unpopular parts of the Republican agenda.

13:58really being the first candidate to talk about her independence and do it in a way that didn't alienate the White House, that's skill, that's talent. And I think that even though Iowa Democrats think that they'll win the governorship for the first time in a while, Hinson is probably going to pull out the victory, which ultimately is a state that has voted Republican in recent elections, though it did vote for Obama twice and it has some Democratic DNA. But Hinson has run the best the best campaign in the country. And this is not an easy environment to be running in. So I think Hinson is the Republican MVP.

14:34For the Democrats, I go back to Kansas and Adam Hamilton, who's the pastor, who, you know, I hear a lot from Democrats that they want to talk more about speaking to Midwestern values, speaking to the heartland. And I don't think Hamilton has done everything perfectly, but to be in contention in Kansas, you can't just rely on a bad candidate running against you he has sounded he he unlike talarico unlike some of these other what i would call pretenders this is someone who lives his faith someone who speaks credibly about issues um that that values related issues social issues that i think a lot of kansas voters care about and it comes across as authentic and it's not like it's poll tested um which so many democrats end up you know kind of faking their way to the same things that will appeal to swing obama was sort as a successful a politician as Obama has been, I look at some of his speeches and they almost seem like caricatures of what he sees as the American electorate.

15:33I think Hamilton has a better finger on the pulse, which is why he's so competitive in a state like Kansas. You've noted several times that this is obviously a top environment for Republicans, and we've had tons and tons of endless analysis of all the things that are hurting Republicans, inflation, the cost of living, the Iran war, gas and diesel prices. I think myself, I'd throw in there the almost utter lack of any next two year agenda. You know, what exactly are they planning to do next? But if there are some Democrats in Senate races that fall short, I'm actually curious, what do you think might have been their issues, their biggest liabilities in this campaign?

16:19Yeah, it's all about cultural disconnect that Democrats still seem to have with the average voter in the country. And Texas, you know, look, if Tallarico loses Texas, it's going to be because he just came across as a little too progressive, a little too woke for a Texas electorate that is, you know, is moving a little bit more blue, but still would vote for a, you know, a more culturally conservative Democrat. but talarico and and you know his identity was forged on this legislative effort where he said that god has like in you know 10 genders and made all these comments about trans issues which he's now is you know to his credit he kind of denounces his own past views but that that still sticks to you and and the republicans are airing a lot of ads defining him as just too too out of touch with texas and and so if they don't win texas again with a really weak candidate that that would be a big problem.

17:14And I think the cultural disconnect, the party that has nominated so many of these socialists, these anti-American, frankly, candidates to office in blue districts. And in Michigan, you have El-Sayed and Troy Jackson, you have AOC campaigning in the final homestretch for these important swing state races. That brand is still very much associated with the Democratic Party. And they've done very little to aggressively distance themselves with it or to it. So you're competing in red states. If Democrats underperform and they don't win Texas, they don't win Kansas, they don't win Iowa. Ultimately, their brand is a little too tarnished and a little too left to win over those heartland voters.

17:52What do you make of this Donald Trump strategy for turnout? He's going around the country to places where he racked up tons of votes. You know, we watched it up and when he came to Alaska, he didn't go to Anchorage, didn't go to Fairbanks. He went to the Matanutska-Susitna Valley, which is the heartland of conservative voters. And the idea here is to reach low propensity voters, to gin up those people that came out for him in 2024. And we know he's out there saying, yeah, pretend I'm on the ballot. Now, of course, El-Sayed in Michigan is telling Democratic voters, yeah, pretend Trump is on the ballot.

18:30And that's why I wanted to get your thoughts on this. Is this a strategy that will help Republicans or is it one that could end up further firing the Democratic base? Yeah, I think it's more likely to do the latter, to backfire, though I will say that there is a method to the madness in that Trump. There are a lot of low propensity voters that have swung right. You think of like the young male podcast listening audience and the independent nature of their their politics these days. And look, I think the thinking is that Trump can turn out some of those low propensity voters that don't typically vote in midterm elections to the Republican side.

19:10I think the problem is the polling seems to suggest that these are not Republican voters. These are anti-establishment, blow up the system, you know, and if anything, they may prefer Democrats. Abdul El-Sayed is running an ad at the end of the campaign appealing to Tucker Carlson listeners because he thinks that's part of that. And there is a reason for that, because he looks at some of these people who are younger, independent voters that just want to blow up the system. They don't have particularly patriotic views. They don't, you know, it's a different worldview that we all kind of grew up with.

19:42And he thinks that he can maybe get them to his side and attack Rogers for his work in national security, protecting the country and his work in the national security fields. So, I mean, that's a very unconventional play, but it does show that this is not necessarily a Trump constituency that are going to vote for Republican midterm candidates. I think it's very unpredictable. And the negative side to when Trump shows up in your in your state. Yeah, he may turn out some some some Republican voters that aren't that are on the fence or that are not going to show up. But he also engages the Democrats like, you know, that he's going to turn out for any Democrat that's that's wondering whether to show up or not.

20:18He's going to supercharge them and get them to call their neighbors and friends and get their Democrats to turn out. So I mean, the whole convention, that midterm convention that Trump had in Texas, you know, a lot of Republicans I talked to think it actually made things harder for for candidates in Texas and made it more uncomfortable for Republicans. We're going to take one more break when we come back. How to read some of the polling data and the early voting information. Everyone wants health care to be simpler and easier. That's why UnitedHealth Group is fast-tracking more than 60 % of children's procedures that used to need pre-approval, so more kids get the care they need when they need it, and speeding up procedure approvals and payments for more than 1 ,500 rural hospitals, so they can focus on caring for their communities.

21:08And that's just the start. Learn more at uhg.com slash access.

21:16From the opinion pages of the Wall Street Journal, this is All Things with Kim Strassel. Welcome back. How much do you actually trust the polling out there? I mean, we're getting lots of stories about analyzing the poll, stories quoting pollsters saying, no, we've gotten so much better at this. And polls pointing out that, you know, or stories pointing out that historically, there have been polling errors. They've been largely in some of these Midwest states like Ohio and Iowa and Kansas, a lot of places that are central to this question of who takes over the Senate. So how trusting or skeptical are you when you look at these polls?

21:55The biggest problem with polling is that I trust about five polls that are high quality, that put a lot of money into calling people and reaching people and knowing how to do things methodologically. Usually they're run by one Republican pollster and one Democratic pollster. The Fox poll is the gold standard. The New York Times, Siena polls are very good. The NBC News polls, very good. There's one or two others that I'm leaving off. But there's a lot of, I would say the second tier are a lot of cheap polls that either media companies or other entities do on the cheap to get attention and to get results.

22:30And now we're learning that there are actually some fake pollsters that were just putting out numbers that were not made up and they actually shaped perception of races in the primaries and shaped how people covered these campaigns and it's fraught and you see more and more of that so when you just you know a lot of a lot of people have averaged all the polls out there and they put them all in one big stew and they think that they have some magic formula to figuring out where a race stands some of the polls and those averages are not very high quality polls and they just get mixed in with the with the good stuff.

23:00And even the best pollsters, as much as I like all the polls I mentioned at the outset, it's just harder and harder to poll, respond on their cell phones. So even that is becoming a challenge. I think you actually hit the nail on the head on the Midwest. The white working class vote is the hardest to poll right now because people, that is the constituency that doesn't like to talk to pollsters. It doesn't like to, they actually maybe lie to, there's just been a lot of polling misses in both midterm and presidential elections in those midwestern states with a high concentration of white working class voters so iowa you know there's one famous pollster that basically lost her job because she put out a poll in 20 and sells her but yeah it's 20 24 that was so off it was embarrassing and um it was partly a reflection of just not real not not getting white working class iowa voters to answer their phones and to respond truthfully to poll.

23:54So Michigan, you know, Michigan, Ohio, Iowa, Kansas, maybe to some extent, I don't take the numbers literally. I think when I see a poll that shows El Syed up by one point, you know, boy, that, you know, that, that might Rogers is, you know, maybe a little more, you know, doing a little better than that. You know, I do think that Hinson has been kind of down in a few polls, up by a little bit in other polls, but I just think that that polling error in those mid, just specifically in the Midwestern polls have been so consistent in recent elections that I do think that Republicans might do a little bit better than the polls suggest right now.

24:26Last question. Give listeners here, because you just do do this so much and you dig into all this data, follow all these races. When you look out there and you see early voting numbers, how much does that matter to you? We're obviously seeing a massive surge in some places. But the reality is I'm always very careful with this data myself because it can be really tricky to know how to read any of that. But how do you look at it? What do you get out of it? I think it's very risky to to over interpret the early voting data, namely for one big reason is that we don't know how now that more people vote early.

25:07We don't know how much of that is like a typical Election Day vote or how many people are actually voting early and turning out in big numbers. So it's hard to have an apples to apples comparison. Right. It's hard to have that kind of consistent kind of X factor to measure against because more and more people, both Republicans and Democrats, are voting early now because that that's the law or that's allowed. And it's it's more popular in many states. Look, there are a lot of people who look at the voter rolls and some, you know, they can tell who who voted in past elections and who's voting. So, you know, like, for example, Michigan, I'm hearing from both Republicans and Democrats that most races Republican turnout is not the enthusiasm is diminished based on what they're seeing in the data.

25:47Michigan is the one exception where Republicans are voting. And I think it's because of the issues with Muslim, the base, basically the issues that are really worrying the base about El-Sayed and his ties to the Muslim. That is that is catnip for for the Republican vote. So they're not seeing a turnout issue, at least in the early data in Michigan. That's one of the exceptions to the rule, because I think Republicans overall are a little more depressed in terms of their enthusiasm. But again, I just see a lot of stuff online that tries to extrapolate a week worth of early voting. And it's very, very tricky.

26:21And I will also add that Trump has been railing against vote by mail and Democrats are now worried that if they vote by mail, their vote won't get counted. So you're seeing a lot of Democrats that normally voted by mail are now either voting early or maybe waiting for doing waiting for Election Day. So, again, these comparisons can be very tricky and misleading sometimes. And I prefer to unless I actually see something that's just thoroughly sourced and it's kind of clear what the point is that's being made. I don't really I wouldn't put too much stock into the early voting numbers. Josh Grashauer, we want to thank you for coming on for all this wisdom.

26:55Can't wait to get back with you again after it all happens so we can see how right or wrong both of us were. There'll be plenty in both category because that's the way it works in our business. We want to thank you. We want to thank our listeners. We are here every week. If you'd like to subscribe, please do hit that button. If you'd like to write to us, you can at ATKim at WSJ.com.

27:25Everyone wants health care to be simpler and easier. That's why UnitedHealth Group is fast-tracking more than 60 % of children's procedures that used to need pre-approval, so more kids get the care they need when they need it. And speeding up procedure approvals and payments for more than 1 ,500 rural hospitals, so they can focus on caring for their communities. And that's just the start. Learn more at uhg.com slash access.