Where things stand as voting winds down

0:00Support for NPR and the following message come from Washington Wise. Decisions made in Washington can affect your portfolio every day. Washington Wise from Charles Schwab is an original podcast that unpacks the stories making news in Washington. Listen at Schwab dot com slash Washington Wise.

0:18Tamara Keith: Voting ends tomorrow. And as voters are making up their minds as to who to vote for, candidates are also making their closing arguments. Today on The Pod, what we're watching for before it all goes down.

0:33Tamara Keith: It's the NPR Politics Podcast. I'm Tamara Keith. I cover politics. I'm Domenico Montanaro, senior political editor and correspondent. And I'm Mara Liason, senior national political correspondent. And let us start with the big news of the weekend. Absolutely wild, unexpected, I think in many ways, news out of the Michigan Senate race. Representative Haley Stevens, who lost the Democratic primary narrowly to Abdul El-Sayed, pulled her endorsement and is now backing the Republican Mike Rogers. She campaigned with him yesterday. What is going on? This is what the definition of an October surprise is.

1:13Tamara Keith: In November. In November. And the biggest losers here are all of those Michigan Democrats who have been working really hard to unify the party since that very divisive primary between Al-Sayed and Stevens. Some of them say they didn't get much help from either candidate. Al-Sayed disinvited Stevens from an event. And then Stevens turned around and did something really shocking, ended her career in the Democratic Party and decided to support the guy that she had criticized very, very harshly. Other than the obvious bad blood between Haley Stevens and Abdul El-Sayed, does this affect the race? Like, were there voters waiting to see what Haley Stevens would say?

1:58Well, I mean, I think that a lot of people voted early already. So, you know, a lot of vote is already banked. And I think that we have to remember that, that tomorrow is the last day of voting, as opposed to the election day that everybody goes and votes in person. I will say, though, given that a lot of Republicans vote on election day, and maybe some right leaning people who are independents, you know, maybe it makes a little bit of a difference for some people. Well, at the end of the day, look, just like President Trump would say, you don't want to have bad press, right? And this is a little bit of bad press for Abdul El-Sayed, you know, heading into Election Day.

2:35But, you know, I mean, it's kind of wild because you've got polls now showing El-Sayed with a fairly consistent lead in this race, you know, around four or five points, certainly at the outer margins of some of the margins of error in some of these races. And then you had the New York Times-Siena poll that popped last night, which really had a lot of people raising their eyebrows because it had him up 11 points. I will say the caution on those polls all is that the Democratic candidates are either very close to 50 percent or just slightly above or below it. So there's a lot of undecided voters and a lot of Republicans tuning in late and deciding late.

3:16So I would expect that that margin is likely going to be closer than 11 points. Whether it would have been without Haley Stevens' endorsement or not. Yeah.

3:24Tamara Keith: OK, we are watching a bunch of other storylines before polls close tomorrow. So let's run through them. One of them is turnout. How many people are voting? What demographics are showing up? What are you guys looking for there? Well, you know, turnout is big across the board. We know that more Democrats than Republicans have turned out in general and primary special elections. But the two demographic groups that I'm really looking at is African-American voters. By some counts, over a quarter of black Southerners have already voted. That is higher than the turnout from the overall electorate and much higher than African-American turnout in past midterms.

4:05And they're angry. Some people call it a blacklash. They're angry not just about high prices, as all voters are, but they're angry because they were gerrymandered out of a lot of seats. and there are going to be fewer African-American representatives in Congress because of the Republican gerrymander. The other group I'm looking at is white non-college voters. Those are probably the most loyal demographic for Donald Trump. They really kind of fueled MAGA. And his approval among that group is under 50 percent, which is very, very low for him with white non-college voters. And that could have a big impact on the election.

4:42Yeah, I mean Mara mentions black voters and we were just talking about Michigan. put those two together. And I think that they are key in the Michigan Senate race because watching Wayne County in the Detroit area, you know, Democrats usually need around 68 % in that county to do well, unless you're going to do really well in the suburbs as Alyssa Slotkin did, the Democratic Senator in the state in 2024 to slightly outpace Democrat Kamala Harris, who was at the top of the ticket so that she could be able to survive and win there. So that's something I'm going to be watching. Notice that Stevens made her move at a black church on Sunday, really sort of jabbing the needle at El Syed.

5:22So I'm watching that. But I'm also watching Latinos, independents, and young voters. Latinos, there's a lot of districts, something like 20 districts on the target board, where Latinos are at least one in five voters. And a lot of those places, they're half or more. Places like the Florida's 27th District, where Maria Salazar is, a Republican who's kind of broken with Trump on deportation tactics. I'm really curious to see what happens there, because that is an overwhelmingly Latino district, and Trump won it by double digits. And if Democrats are able to pull off a victory there or get very, very close, that could spell some trouble for Republicans across the country and a lot of other Latino districts, especially in South Florida and South Texas as well.

6:04Independent voters. Watch the number 46%. That's what Republicans have needed during this Trump era to do well. In all of the elections where they've made gains or Trump has won the presidency, they have gotten at least 46 % of independent voters. When it was below that in 2018 and 2020, obviously Democrats did much better. And when you look at young voters, watch 20 points. That's the margin that I'm looking for to see if Democrats can get a 20 point margin with young voters, 18 to 29. And Democrats need to get them out to the polls. This is one of the lowest propensity voting groups. They see the largest drop off between presidential elections and midterm elections.

6:43And that drop off, by the way, which is pretty large, just generally about 30 % fewer people vote between presidential elections and midterms makes the election a super wild card and very volatile and why polls can be wrong.

6:56Tamara Keith: You know, watching the early vote numbers, And obviously, we don't know how these people voted. In some states, we know they're partisan lean, but we don't know how they actually voted in the elections. It certainly looks like Democratic-type voters are turning out at very high numbers in this early voting. But I guess we just don't know what the Election Day turnout will look like and what the electorate on Election Day will look like until Election Day. Well, we have some clues just because we know what the electorate has looked like in these primaries and special elections. And Democrats have the enthusiasm edge and the turnout edge so far.

7:37Yeah, no doubt about it. I mean, you've had more than 56 million people cast ballots early. That's almost half of the entire 2022 midterm election. But you really can't read too much into early voting, even though Democrats have the double digit edge on early voting because Republicans do vote so overwhelmingly on Election Day. And if they're tuning in late and they are motivated to want to try to hold the Senate, you know, for example, even if they don't like some of these candidates, you know, that can make a big difference.

8:08Tamara Keith: I mean, you have to figure in Texas, like the$500 million in ad spending has to at least have literally everyone who is a voter knowing that the stakes are fairly high in that race. And that there's an election. Yes. And just there is an election. OK, so we are going to take a quick break. And when we come back, we will have more. Stay tuned for the following announcements and messages from our sponsors. This message comes from BetterHelp. Your brain has limited storage, so why is it still holding on to that embarrassing moment from years ago? BetterHelp is an online therapy platform that gives you space to talk about what's taking up too much of yours.

8:51BetterHelp is now in-network with more than 125 health plans, with many co-pays as low as$15 for eligible members. And if you don't have eligible insurance, you can still get 20 % off your first month. Visit betterhelp.com slash NPR. Cost and coverage may vary. Discount cannot be combined with insurance. This message comes from Viking, committed to exploring the world in comfort. Journey through the heart of Europe on an elegant Viking longship with thoughtful service, destination-focused dining, and cultural enrichment on board and on shore. And every Viking voyage is all-inclusive with no children and no casinos.

9:30Discover more at Viking.com. This message comes from Betterment. Dan Egan, VP of Behavioral Finance and Investing, explains why Betterment was designed to take the time-consuming work out of smart investing. I was doing all of these things that were pretty straightforward to implement. I just needed to spend my time doing them. Betterment automates the same practices so that I know I'm doing portfolio management and goal-based planning without me having to spend hours of my life doing it. Learn more at Betterment.com. Investing involves risk, performance not guaranteed.

10:04Tamara Keith: And we are back. And I would like to talk about the elephant in the room, or I don't know what we want to call him. But President Donald Trump has certainly made this election all about him. He has held 30 rallies, mostly in red states. And yes, somewhere in there, there is a closing message about, you know, what Republicans would like to do or what Republicans have done. But so much of it has been about him and exciting the people there in the arena or on the tarmac. Is this working? Well, he's doing something that no other unpopular president has tried to do, which is, as you said, make the election all about him.

10:46Tell voters, pretend I'm on the ballot. Sometimes it's seen that this election was about one issue, the cost of living. And at other times, it seemed like this election was about one person, Donald Trump. Not just Trump, but his unforced positions, actions. Iran war, that was a war of choice. Tariffs, that was him. Don't forget, North Carolina and Texas would not have been in play. We would not be talking about them as possible Democratic pickups. If Donald Trump hadn't decided to push aside the incumbent in Texas, John Cornyn, who probably would have won pretty easily, or to make life so miserable for Tom Tillis, the Republican incumbent in North Carolina, that he decided not to run at all.

11:31And now Roy Cooper, the former Democratic governor there, has that race pretty much sewed up. So this is a Donald Trump-centric election. And I guess we would say surprise, surprise because politics in the last 10 years has been very Donald Trump-centric. Yeah, I mean, look, midterms are usually about presidents anyway, right? I mean, going back all the way to World War II, presidents' parties have lost seats in the House in 18 of those 20 midterm elections. And it's really worse for the president's party when the president is below 50 percent as Trump is now. He's at 38 percent on average in the polls.

12:05And, you know, when that's the case, the political wins are against the Republicans at this point. And, you know, a lot of that has to do with the cost of living, how people are feeling about things. And they're not in a great mood. And when Trump is saying, hey, this is about me, I think there's a lot of swing district Republicans who wish he wouldn't say that. You know, when you talk about 38 percent, let's remember what 38 percent is. That's the bare metal base of the Republican Party. It's hard to see any Republican being able to go much below that. And also, you know, this is an election that's so much about Donald Trump.

12:39It almost doesn't matter that the Democratic brand is still underwater. Well, I will say the one thing I think that we have to keep an eye on here is Republican turnout because President Trump, as we know, is very good at picking winners in primaries and has much more mixed record when it comes to general elections. But these elections are being played out on so much Republican turf in the Senate and in the House that is really going to test this theory that the White House has of whether or not getting Trump out there is going to get more Republicans to the polls. And if he's able to do that, then they might be able to stem some of these Democratic wins.

13:15But if he's not and there's a low Republican turnout on Election Day, that is going to mean a wipeout for the Republican Party.

13:23Tamara Keith: And I think this this need to keep Republicans engaged and not depressed is why the president and the speaker are running around saying, oh, we're going to win the House. We're going to win the Senate. Don't you know, like the polls are wrong, which Domenico gets me to the polls. You know, I think Republicans are eager to at least some of them say, hey, these polls are wrong. And I think a lot of Democrats are very nervous because they don't want to believe that the polls are as good as they say they are. Yeah. And, you know, I mean, the races are close, right? And this is always that time of year where everybody's like biting their nails, wondering what's going to happen.

14:03Are the polls going to be right? Are they going to be wrong? And sometimes they're misinterpreted in the sense that, you know, just because a poll shows somebody with a lead, you also have to look at where they are in relation to the 50 percent number. If somebody is at 49, 44, there's a lot of undecided voters there and that means that the people who make up their minds in the ballot box or start tuning in later in the cycle in the last few days could pull the lever for the Republican, let's say, and you wind up with tighter races. And the fact is, horse race polls are not even, you know, the best use of polls.

14:39And unfortunately, it's the thing that gets the most conversation during these elections. And it doesn't really matter because we're going to have lots of results coming in tomorrow.

14:48Tamara Keith: So we've touched on this a little bit, but the partisan gerrymandering that states entered into in the past year and a half, first Republican states egged on by President Trump, then California weighed in. In the end, do you think that Republicans did give themselves an advantage there? I think they gave themselves an advantage, but a much smaller one than they were hoping for. Some of these gerrymanders are going to turn out to backfire into dummymanders, especially maybe in South Texas. But this is something that Republicans decided to do because the environment for them was so bad. There have been two opposing forces all along in these midterms.

15:32One was all the organic environmental things like voters sour on the economy, the approval rating of the incumbent. just the general enthusiasm of Democrats versus Republicans. On the other side, there were some structural advantages for Republicans, gerrymandering first and foremost, but also the tremendous amount of financial advantage they had, just a difference in money that we've never seen before. When Elon Musk spends half a billion dollars in these races, that's something that a lot of people thought would save Republicans, but it hasn't had the impact, at least as measured in polls, that we thought it might.

16:08Before we go, if as things look, Democrats will do well, there is one person who is inevitably going to be very upset, the president.

16:17Tamara Keith: And the Department of Justice has filed lawsuits in California looking to separate and stop the processing of ballots that it alleges may be from non-citizens voting. They just appealed that to the U.S. Supreme Court after losing at lower levels. The Justice Department also filed a suit in Alaska questioning the presence of two candidates named Dan Sullivan in the Senate race. That was thrown out by a judge over the weekend. Mara, what are you watching when it comes to all of this? You know, like all of this pre-election action certainly indicates some sort of a. Well, we're looking for post-election action is what I'll be watching for is, you know, They so far seem to be losing this lawsuit that told Alaska, do not certify the results of the Senate race unless the incumbent wins.

17:09That, I'm assuming, will go all the way to the Supreme Court. But the big question is, will Donald Trump accept the results of elections that he loses or that his party loses? He has never done that. The bedrock of democratic governance is that either party can lose elections and that both parties accept the results of elections even if they lose. And that's a big open question about whether that's going to happen or are we going to have some kind of a January 6, 2021 redux? The problem is you've never heard Trump concede any elections in a gracious way to say that the other side won and we need to work together or I took a shellacking in the way that President Obama said after 2010 or we took a thump in, as President Bush said, after the 2006 midterms.

17:59That is just not what Donald Trump's going to do. He's contested every single election he's ever been in that he's lost. That's how granular he's going to be about this stuff. And I think we have to be prepared for that. I am just really hoping that, you know, one way or the other, things are decisive and we're not stuck in a situation where the Senate is we're waiting on Alaska for three weeks to to figure out, you know, who's going to be in charge, because that is going to be a complete mess of misinformation and chaos that I don't think any of us wants to see. All right.

18:33Tamara Keith: That is all from us for today. Come back tomorrow for an episode you won't want to miss about how the Associated Press and NPR make race calls. It will be very useful as you are watching those results come in. I'm Tamara Keith. I cover politics. I'm Domenico Montanaro, senior political editor and correspondent. And I'm Mara Liason, senior national political correspondent.

19:04Stay tuned for the following announcements and messages from our sponsors.

19:26This message comes from Bombas. For every item purchased, they donate an item to someone who needs it. Bombas customers have powered over 200 million donations. Go to bombas.com slash NPR for 20 % off your first purchase.