The Good, The Bad, and the Other Takeaways for Both Parties in NY-03
Democrats
The Good – Former Congressman Tom Suozzi, who represented the area previously from 2017 until the current Congress won his old district handily on February 13th, with a margin of nearly eight points over Republican candidate Mazi Pilip
The overall Republican majority in the U.S. House remains quite thin.
Mr. Suozzi’s win appears to have shown a path forward (if not an entirely replicable path) on the issue of immigration, which is seen as more of a traditional Republican strength.
The Bad – From a Democratic Party standpoint, Mr. Suozzi distanced himself from President Biden, which will be harder for House Democrats as a whole to do in the general election, not to mention the implications for the top of the ticket in November.
Republicans
The Good – Despite what has been characterized as chaos in the U.S. House; running a relatively unknown candidate compared to her Democratic rival; being outspent almost 2 to 1 by the Democrats,; not to mention the notoriety of the previous incumbent, (Republican George Santos, only one of six U.S. Representatives expelled in that body’s entire history) – they maintained a respectable, competitive vote share.
The Bad – The Republicans lost. Their House majority shrank where it was already very tight, and Democrats, at least where Suozzi’s campaign is concerned, appear to have shown that they can at least partially neutralize the immigration issue that has been traditionally seen as a strength for Republicans. Moreover, Pilip did not really embrace former President Trump, the likely Republican nominee at this point, which caused for some push back later on.
A brief synopsis of NY–03
This is a suburban Long Island Congressional district that took its current form, encompassing Nassau County and a section of northeast Queens, in 2023. Some urban planners and geographers might recall that Levittown, in the district, was the site of suburban developments which were seen as a prototype of post-war suburbia throughout the country.
The district is rated D + 2 , with Biden carrying it by 10 points. It is one of the nation’s wealthiest and one with a highly educated electorate.
The district took its more or less current form in the early 1960s, prior to that, the area was represented by NY-01 consisting of the eastern part of Long Island. To the extent that any U.S. Congressional District can be called a true swing seat, this district would certainly qualify, although the district’s changing parties has not entirely coincided with control of the U.S. House changing hands at the same time. Probably the most prominent former Congressman from the district is Peter T. King, the Republican representing the district between 1993 and 2013, for the latter part of his tenure Chair of the House Homeland Security Committee.
There is a good chance that a new NY-03 will be somewhat altered as the Democratic-controlled NY State Assembly was greenlighted to redraw congressional boundaries before the fall elections.
While voter turnout was fairly respectable in this special election, there were concerns that the weather might have impacted voter participation.
The Takeaway
There may be some upside to Democrats flipping a district in a year where the country remains deeply polarized and the two likely Presidential contenders remaining neck and neck in the polls. However, this race is more limited as a portent for November. For one, both candidates were seen as distancing themselves from their respective parties’ frontrunners for the Presidential nomination (Biden and Trump), which would be hard for any Congressional candidate to do in the general election. Secondly, the victor, Mr. Suozzi, was a strong candidate, previously serving as Congressman for the district as well as a former Nassau County Executive. Thirdly, while Democrats have an advantage in voter registration, Long Island has in recent years been trending away from Democrats given such issues as migration and crime, especially in the Nassau County portion. The caveat, then, with this particular region and November is that although this area has a lot in common with pivotal suburbs in such palces as Atlanta and Phoenix (suburbs which could well determine the outcome of November’s election), Long Island has moved, at least to some extent, in the opposite direction towards Republicans in contrast with other suburban areas. Despite this, the unique conditions of a special election and a strong Democratic candidate were sufficient to overcome any underlying trends.
Note – for an overview of U.S. Congressional boundary changes over time, I would highly recommend United States Congressional District Shapfiles which provided me with the historical boundaries of New York’s Third Congressional District.
Democrats slight edge in NY3 in today’s vote
A Short Synopsis on U.S. Virgin Islands Republican Caucuses Feb. 8th
Thursday, February 8th might be a historical date for many reasons in American politics. Certainly not as high on the radar, but worth mentioning, is that the U.S. Virgin Islands held their Republican caucuses that day in addition to the Nevada Republican caucuses (see Nevada entry earlier this week). In keeping with the national trends favoring former President Donald Trump, the caucuses broke 3 to 1 for Trump over the only other major candidate in the race, former UN Ambassador Nikki Haley. Just over 250 participated in the voting, which is just over a quarter of the 900 plus registered Republican voters in the territory. Campaigning was either done virtually by some of the candidates themselves or by sending in campaign officials to provide representation on the ground.
The caucuses caused a bit of a stir with the RNC given that they had both moved up their caucuses from the May 30th, (4 years ago), and adopted ranked choice voting. (In the years prior to 2020 the U.S. Virgin Islands Republican Caucuses were usually held around March/April.) Ranked choice voting is a method generally held in low esteem by many Republican officials, a prime example being Alaska’s Congressional seat flipping to the Democrats under this method. Practically speaking for the primary with only two major candidates, ranked choice voting did not really move the needle as the other four candidates on the ballot had already withdrawn from their race, and there were a minimum of votes to be redistributed as a result. It should also be noted that as a U.S. territory, the U.S. Virgin Islands is not eligible to participate directly in November’s general election.
The caucuses themselves were more similar to a primary, in the sense that partisans did not have to attend a party meeting at a set time but could show up and cast their vote as they would in any other election. There were polling locations on all three main islands, La Reine Chicken Shack on St. Croix, the Lovango Rum Bar on St. John and Bluebeard’s Castle on St. Thomas and an election night party held later on at the Morningstar Buoy Haus Beach Resort on St. Thomas.
Judging by various reports on the caucuses, it was not initially clear how many delegates would be up for grabs, and what provisions might govern the allocation of delegates, but ultimately what ended up being a total of four were entirely allotted to former President Trump. The RNC rules (16(c)(3)(ii) p.22) do provide that if a candidate does receive over 50% of the vote, that a given jurisdiction does not need adhere to strict proportionality but can award all the delegates to the top vote recipient, with the vote totals in this case rendering proportional allocation a moot point. Some political analysts believe that ranked choice voting results in less polarizing government and is more reflective of the voters’ wishes, while others felt it was harder to understand and thus risked further undermining public confidence in elections.
Historically the Virgin Island Caucuses do not necessarily follow national trends, and many might discount the influence an upset result in one of the outlying U.S. territories would have on the overall race, although the timing of this race makes it more interesting. On the Democratic side four years ago, for example, former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg won American Samoa on Super Tuesday but dropped out one day later as his showings elsewhere were less than impressive. Four years prior to that, Donald Trump managed a fifth-place finish in the popular vote in the Virgin Islands Republican Caucuses, although by the time of the convention, where he became the nominee, he had secured those delegates’ support.
For those not overly familiar with this locale – the U.S. Virgin Islands is a territory of the United States, consisting of a group of some 50 Caribbean islands and cays (very small, sandy islands) populated by close to 90,000. The diverse population is over seventy percent Black and nearly a fifth Hispanic or Latino. The United States acquired the islands from Denmark in 1917 through the Treaty of the Danish West Indies. At the time the United States was concerned about the possible encroachment of the German military in the area looking for a location to establish a submarine base, while Danish authorities felt they could no longer economically justify their continued possession of the islands. Tourism and government are the largest economic sectors in the territory, The U.S. Virgin Islands overall has a Democratic lean – governed in the capital Charlotte Amalie by a 15-seat legislature comprised of 11 Democrats and 4 Independents, a Democratic Governor, Albert Bryan, and a non-voting U.S. House Delegate, Democrat Stacey Plaskett.
Correction: It was initially reported that RNC rules provided for proportional delegate representation for contests held before a certain date, and by inference that Ambassador Haley might have qualified, at least mathematically, for one delegate, however there is a provision within RNC that does in fact allow for jurisdictions to award all delegates to a candidate receiving over 50% of the vote.
Nikki Haley Risks Nevada Notoriety as “None of The Above” hits record level support
For someone polling barely in the low single digits in the limited Nevada polling that is available, (RealClear didn’t even have her name on their board) one wonders sometimes if it was even worth competing at all in that state’s contest if they are the only widely known, but not particularly popular candidate. Nevada is unique among states in not having a standard write-in option, but rather the infamous “None of These Candidates” option, popularly known to most as “None of the Above” (NOTC/NOTA). The previous high record for the NOTC/NOTA was just after the option’s advent in 1976, where a Republican Congressional Primary saw NOTC/NOTA at nearly 50%. Given the dynamics in play, NOTC/NOTA might surpass this with an all time record of potentially 80%, (my guess 60-80% range) against Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley. Generally losing to the NOTC/NOTA option is seen as very humiliating in Nevada politics, “an absolute slap in the face” in the words of one Nevada political science professor. In turn, this could have further ramifications down the road for Haley’s candidacy for the Republican nomination.
To see how this potential political comedy of errors came about, read on.
Nevada has historically gone back and forth between presidential primaries and caucus systems to influence the selection process of presidential candidates. The Democratic Party’s use of the primary in 1912 made the state one of the first in the nation to adopt this mode of election, although the state has switched up their selection process since that time due to a variety of practical and legal issues.
In 2008, the state adopted a caucus system, supposedly to help transition the state away from a late season primary towards being an early influencer with a caucus in the presidential nominating process. The general process of a Nevada caucus is similar to Iowa, in that throughout the state small, basically precinct-level meetings of neighbors are held and delegates are selected towards county and then the state conventions, from which national convention delegates are selected.
In 2024 the process changed yet again where the Democratic Party is having a primary on February 6th, with a Republican primary also scheduled on that day. The state’s Republican Party, however. opted at their own time and expense, to continue with the caucus system right after the primary this coming Thursday, February 8th.
Nikki Haley, Donald Trump’s main rival for the Republican nomination, is participating in the Tuesday primaries, whereas the former President is participating in Thursday’s caucuses, meaning that they are effectively avoiding a head to head contest. Only the Thursday caucuses are binding. The Republican Party has disallowed candidates from participating in more than one contest (they must chose) but voters (registered Republicans) may vote in both the primary and caucuses.
On the Democratic side, President Biden is facing author and activist Marianne Williamson in addition to a number of lesser known candidates. Minnesota Congressman Dean Phillips is not on today’s ballot.
As noted at the beginning, Nevada does not allow for a write-in option but instead allows for voters to select “None of These Candidates” (a.k.a. “None of the Above”) in the primary process. If the “None of These Candidates” option wins, delegates can not be awarded to that option (i.e. uncommitted) but the result would be declared such that “None of These Candidates” was the winner, with actual candidates placing after the NOTC/NOTA option winning a share of the delegates (if the race is binding).
The overall history of “None of These Candidates” in Nevada is a whole other article, going back almost 5 decades, and is interesting for the fact that not only has that option won two times (a Republican Congressional in 1976 holding the current record of just under 50% of the votes and Democratic Gubernatorial primary more recently), it has also been seen as having played a spoiler effect, particularly one favoring incumbents. Generally the option gets around 1-3% of the vote in more conventional races.
There has been little polling for the specific votes this week, although Trump has generally commanded between 2/3rds to 3/4ths support in polls going back over the past 6 months, levels of support he had while rivals such as Ron DeSantis were still in the race, seen as his main challenger for Nevada delegates.
On the Democratic side, Biden would do well to get 90% support, roughly commensurate with support in South Carolina but also considering the independent lean of many voters here. (A Nevada voter has to declare a party to participate in a primary, but if voting in person, one can do that on the same day as voting. The Republican caucuses are somewhat more restrictive with deadlines for party declarations and participation.) Anything below 80% might suggest more disenchantment with Biden’s candidacy, where some combination of NOTC/NOTA and Williamson support exceeds 20%.
Early polling suggests that while there is broad interest in both parties’ races, there is limited information with which to compare Biden’s and Trump’s performances this year with their respective 2020 and 2016 performances to capture such metrics as enthusiasm/engagement, probably the one measurable from February’s races that might portend this coming November, since Biden and Trump primary wins here are largely a foregone conclusion.
While Trump is focused on the caucuses, many Republican voters, among them Governor Joe Lombardo have expressed interest in supporting the NOTC/NOTA option in the primary today and then supporting the former president on Thursday in the caucuses. Most likely Trump will surpass 90%, given that his only other main rival is pastor Ryan Binkley, who has similar to Haley barely registered in any of the Nevada polls.
In the end, the real story with the Nevada contests this month might be Haley losing decisively to NOTC/NOTA in the Republican Primary, setting an all time record level of support for NOTC/NOTA and calling into question the wisdom of her staying in the race until her home state, South Carolina on February 24th, where she also trails Trump around 2 to 1. It is true that South Carolina has a markedly different political culture than Nevada and the impacts of the record NOTC/NOTA showing might have little sway on voters in the Palmetto State. But it is equally true that being the candidate most decisively defeated by NOTC/NOTA in its entire 50-year history is not a record or designation the Haley camp needs as it struggles to find momentum going forward. And in future years where the former Governor and UN Ambassador may decide to run for office again, it is debatable how much of a rout the Governor can sustain on her home turf this year and still be politically viable in those future races. The more incredible factor, in my mind, is how her advisors and handlers evidently missed the risk that she might endure a humiliating defeat in a non-binding vote, that even if she had won, would have gained exactly zero delegates.
On the strip in Las Vegas, I imagine it would be hard to find a professional gambler who would have made a comparable bet.
Update: This post is being finalized as results from Nevada are already coming in. As expected, President Biden is decisively winning the Democratic Primary with around 90% of the vote, indicating that consistent with New Hampshire and South Carolina, there is little appetite to do anything other than renominate him. On the Republican side, Haley is losing about 2 to 1 against the NOTC/NOTA option and news outlets are predictably using words such as ‘humiliating‘ and ‘embarrassing‘ which might contribute to ending her presidential bid before South Carolina. Please note posts completed and posted after polls closing generally do not count towards my prediction record.
Borden-Kinkora Likely PC But Upset Possible
Final update: The Green Party’s Matt MacFarlane ended up being the vehicle for the protest vote, totals coming in at just under 50%. The PCs were able to retain close to 2/3rds of their 2021 share at just under 40%, but this was clearly a protest vote against the King government in Charlottetown, who at last polling still remained fairly popular province-wide and still enjoys a majority of 7 in the 27 seat legislature. The one takeaway is when provincial Liberals have interim leaders (as was also the case during the Kitchener byelection last November), and the NDP are not particularly strong, Greens tend to perform well, very well, in recent byelections, suggesting some measure of long-term staying power. This ironically could help Premier King, however, as the opposition is now even between 3 Liberal and 3 Green, both parties with interim leaders and tied in the polls, a divided an opposition as it could ever get, more so than in Ontario and Quebec where for the past several years the incumbent Premiers also enjoyed a divided opposition with no apparent government-in-waiting. The other takeaway is that while Newfoundland and Labrador and Northern Ireland remain the most challenging areas to predict between the three countries I follow, PEI, (and Yukon) are not far behind. But even with two incorrect predictions in a row with Atlantic Canada byelections under my belt, the delving into the fascinating political dynamics and history of unique places and regions make this as rewarding an endeavour as ever.
Update: After two days of postponement due to weather, a report showed large accumulations of snow across the island, coupled with high winds. The Crapaud area in the eastern part of the riding received a total of 34 cm between last Friday, February 2nd and yesterday morning, Tuesday, February 6th, with some other areas of the province receiving twice as much. The PEI 511 website currently shows that main roads, i.e. Route 1 are now bare as of Wednesday afternoon, at least where the riding proper is concerned. It remains to be seen if the weather will have a noticeable effect on voter turnout (and potentially on the overall outcome in the event of a close vote.)
This seat opened up after the PC incumbent, Jamie Foxx, resigned last November to run for the Conservative Party of Canada nomination for the federal riding of Malpeque. Foxx had previously served in cabinet as well as interim party leader. The riding has a blueish lean with Foxx’s first election in 2015 in opposition to the Liberal Wade McLaughlin government.
The byelection is against the backdrop of a popular PC Premier, Dennis King and his government, considerably ahead in polling over the Greens and Liberals.
Primary issues for the province as a whole include health care, including the patient registry (waiting lists), and the establishment of a medical school at the University of Prince Edward Island, housing, and overall affordability.
The riding is perhaps best known for being the PEI terminus of the 12.9 km (8.0 mile) Confederation Bridge, the road link between PEI and New Brunswick which opened in 1997. The largest community in the riding is Borden-Carleton. Historically Borden has been the link between PEI and the mainland with ferry service and much of the local history and economy of the town was influenced by transportation to and from the mainland.
Indeed, PEI politics as a whole was often influenced by the prospect of a physical connection to the mainland. (see J. Watson MacNaught, Pearson Liberals wiped out in PEI 1965 election despite promises to build a causeway, Peter Newman, The Distemper of Our Times, p. 76) The causeway had been an issue for over a century before a 1988 plebiscite decided in favour of construction of the bridge, roughly 60% favouring it to 40% opposed, in some quarters still seen as a contentious issue.
The main issues in the current byelection however are not transportation but healthcare, housing and education, and despite not having lost a byelection since his election in 2019, Premier King risks losing the riding to residents upset over the scaling back of services at Prince County Hospital in nearby Summerside, as well as the lack of affordable housing and school overcrowding in the Kinkora area.
The PC candidate Carmen Reeves agrees that more must be done to restore health care services, touting the government’s decision to construct the medical school and thereby ensuring a more ready supply of doctors and health care workers in the province, although his opponents have been critical of the decision to assign waitlists (patient registry) to medical homes and failures to recruit needed health care personnel.
Liberal candidate Gordon Sobey, former President of the PEI Federation of Agriculture, might be the candidate most likely to flip the riding, although Green Candidate Matt McFarlane has also been critical of the government’s response by building a medical school, calling it a ‘zero solution’ to fix the immediate shortages of health care. NDP Candidate Karen Morton has also been critical of the government’s approach and in a recent interview urged the government to listen to all sides.
Takeaways from the byelection might effectively be a warning sign for the King government to show voters more readily perceived results in healthcare; as well as establishing a more discernable Official Opposition, whether that is Liberal or Green (both of whom currently have interim leaders), depending on who either comes in a strong second or upsets the race; and even a possible warning sign to the federal Conservatives that while Atlantic Canada might be trending blue federally, like the more surprise result in Conception Bay East – Bell Island last week, not to discount local issues and take anything for granted.
Historically the Borden-Kinkora riding was largely 4th Prince, a dual member riding electing both Assemblymen and Councillors concurrently between joining Confederation in 1873 and its reorganization to the current area beginning in 1996. This area has been traditionally more of a bellwether provincially, with some instances of voting Liberal for the one office and Conservative for the other concurrent office. Federally this area has been in the Prince riding before placement in the current Malpeque riding starting in 1968, an area of the province with overall strong Liberal leanings, (Prince being one of the few English Canadian seats to buck the ferry’s landing namesake*, Robert Borden and his Unionist sweep in 1917, for example), more recently the seat being Liberal uninterruptedly since 1988.
*Borden, PEI was so named in 1919, after the Prime Minister. To make the 1917 voting in Prince even more interesting was that the new port was commissioned and ferry service established at that point the very same year and still the riding voted against the federal government of the day. One wishes to have had the individual polling station results at the time.
Biden will win today, turnout and enthusiasm portents for November
South Carolina will officially be the first state to vote in the Democratic Presidential Primary today, in accordance with DNC rules. This is the first election cycle where South Carolina has been officially recognized as the first in the country to vote in Democratic nomination contests, due to the stated goal of giving more voters of color a voice earlier in the nominating process.
It is also worth mentioning that President Joe Biden was able to vault ahead of other contenders in the 2020 Democratic Primaries with a strong showing in South Carolina with nearly 50% of the vote, support predominantly coming from the state’s Black population, and with the support of longtime South Carolina Congressman Jim Clyburn, a breakthrough that came after less than stellar Biden showings in Iowa and New Hampshire.
The state’s population is just over one quarter Black, however the Black Democratic voters made up close to 60% of South Carolina’s voters participating in the party’s primary 4 years ago, and they awarded Biden with 60% of their support according to exit polls.
This cycle, while Minnesota Congressman Dean Phillips and prominent author and speaker Marianne Williamson are still on the ballot contesting the nomination, polling in South Carolina has them in the low single digits, while Biden is far ahead at around 70%.
The key factors will not be who wins, but how energized the party base will be to support Biden. Since there is effectively no real contest (if polls are to be believed), turnout will likely be lower than the 550k or so voters who participated in the 2020 Democratic Primary. Since polling also shows that Biden has lost some support with younger voters and voters of color, the metrics to watch will be his levels of support (which where Biden is concerned should surpass the 63% level he received in the ‘unofficial’ New Hampshire write-in campaign), as well as where his support comes from and what the overall turnout rate will be.
In South Carolina voters do not register by party. Therefore, some Democrats might have the incentive to sit this election out and cross over to the February 24th Republican Primary, to support either Nikki Haley (in opposition to Trump) or to pad Trump’s support (who is variously seen as the weaker candidate to run against Biden in the November general election). While the DNC chair, Jaime Harrison, has disowned any such tactics, this dynamic cannot be entirely discounted, especially if the turnout levels today end up being lower but Nikii Haley ends up surpassing expectations three weeks from now.
Since Biden is polling consistently at much more than 50% nationally in the Democratic primary and is well ahead of any rivals for the nomination, and this dynamic is mirrored here in South Carolina, ericvotes.com will not make any predictions on this race. There is truly little quantitative data for ‘mildly’ contested primaries for an incumbent Democratic President – the 1996 Democratic Primary was cancelled, and the 2012 primary gave the incumbent Barack Obama nearly 100% of the vote. I would put a benchmark of relative success for Biden as being at least one half of the 2020 turnout and four-fifths of Black voters per exit polling, and 10% points higher than New Hampshire’s write-in campaign. If he fails to hit any of those numbers, that might portend sufficient disenchantment with his reelection campaign below the surface that might be problematic for a Biden victory in November.
Progressive Conservatives Likely to Retain Conception Bay East – Bell Island in Today’s Vote
Update: The results are in and this prediction was wrong, Liberal Fred Hutton ended up with a fairly decisive victory with unofficial results showing him with nearly one half of the vote. I look forward to learning more about what factors contributed to his win. A wise former U.S. House Speaker once said that “all politics is local” and I suspect this factored into his win as he had deep family roots in the riding (among other factors). The logo rebranding the provincial Liberals did evidently worked. I predict as a hobby races in three countries, Canada, the U.S. and the U.K. and between Newfoundland and Labrador and Northern Ireland, these have to be the hardest races to predict. I am certainly appreciative however of the challenges of psephology (election analysis and predictions) and am glad for these “outliers” in making this hobby truly interesting and rewarding. Always something new to learn … thanks to all who happened by my website or who took the time to interact with me on X (Twitter).
By-election called due to resignation of former interim PC Leader David Brazil due to health reasons.
Conception Bay East – Bell Island is seen as a reliably PC seat in the St. John’s exurban area, having voted blue since 2003 … prior to that was more of a Liberal-leaning bellwether.
The constituency has taken on its present form since the 1985 election, consisting of Bell Island in Conception Bay, Portugal Cove-St. Philip’s on the mainland east and a portion of Paradise. For a number of elections Bell Island was its own constituency, and in other years it was grouped with Harbour Main at the head of Conception Bay.
Federally the riding has been a part of the St. John’s East … in surveying polling station results since 1997, Bell Island has trended strong PC/Conservative except in strong NDP years, whereas the Portugal Cove – St. Philips section has seen all three main federal parties showing various levels of support depending on the overall strength.
All three main parties are running candidates in the election along with one independent candidate. Among the main riding issues include improved local ferry service, health care and ambulance services, the winter closure of a local waste facility, road conditions and overall cost of living. It is worth noting that the byelection was originally scheduled for Monday, January 29th but was postponed one day due to the weather.
Tina Neary is the PC candidate and most likely to succeed David Brazil. A town councilor for Portugal Cove-St. Philip’s, she is also a non-profit Executive Director. The campaign has alluded to issues of general affordability on their campaign website, while others have tried to tie the provincial Liberal candidate to their unpopular federal counterparts and the carbon tax.
There was some question that the independent candidate, Darryl Harding, a colleague of Neary’s on town council, might split some of the vote as he self-identified as an ‘independent progressive conservative’ although Neary said she was not concerned about a possible vote split. Harding was suspended from council last March due to allegations of sexual harassment and breaching the town’s code of conduct. Prior to the byelection, he was formerly the local PC district association president who accused PC Leader Tony Wakeham of hand-picking Neary as the byelection candidate and wrote a negative letter questioning Wakeham’s leadership.
Liberal Fred Hutton was a prominent journalist and adviser to Premier Andrew Furey. The Liberals have notably dropped their logo on campaign signs and replaced those with the Premier’s name, an acknowledgement perhaps of the Liberals’ national unpopularity. In the campaign he has addressed health care, ferry service and dumping. One of Hutton’s more memorable quotes in the campaign was related to road issues. “When I am your MHA, I will be able to pick up the phone and call the transportation minister and say, ‘These roads … need to be done in this year’s budget,’ and they will be done.”
NDP Candidate and disability rights activist Kim Churchill is probably best known for her fight in court to have the Newfoundland and Labrador English School District provide services for her son in American Sign Language, a case she won last spring. Her campaign has focused on ferry service, health care, housing, and affordability.
The bottom line – Premier Furey’s government is relatively popular, as is his Premiership, compared to his federal cousins, although not overwhelmingly so. Wakeham, the new PC Leader and NDP Jim Dinn have held their own in support since the last election. Neary should be able to keep the seat in PC hands, the potential vote splitting by the independent candidate will likely be negligible compared to the overall PC lean of the riding. If the Liberals place distant third, despite their new branding and relative high-profile candidate, that will likely indicate that national trends are impacting otherwise more local races. The NDP can hope to place a strong second, but this is territory they have not won previously on the provincial level, although at the polling station level federally they have fairly recently shown some strength. Final prediction is a PC hold, vote shares PC around 60%, NDP and Liberals around 20% a piece, IND a few percentage points. (Overall result predicted, not vote share).
New Hampshire – No McCain moment for Haley, no LBJ speech from Biden
Even though New Hampshire is holding their ‘first in the nation’ presidential primaries today for both the Democratic and Republican parties, there is a sense that both parties have largely decided that this will be a Biden versus Trump rematch. Since thus far only Iowa (a caucus, not a primary) has already voted, this raises the specter that for the first half of 2024, the supposedly tumultuous year for democracy, primaries might be more pro-forma and anti-climactic, the winners already decided, with national attention perhaps focused elsewhere, i.e. court or congressional battles.
On the Republican side, while twenty-four names plus one write-in line appear on the ballot, the race is between former UN Ambassador Nikki Haley and former President Donald Trump. Haley has been hoping for an upset win where most polls show her trailing by between 15 to 25 points. While Governor Ron DeSantis’ withdrawal might have moved (a small number of) voters over to Trump in the state, DeSantis’ endorsement of Trump was likely more impactful nationally in giving Trump the sense of inevitability of becoming the nominee. Nationally Haley is barely able to crack double digits against Trump’s two-thirds to three quarters of Republican support.
The Haley team is hoping that a strong showing, beating expectations in New Hampshire, will help set the stage for the February 24th primary in her home state of South Carolina, and then run competitive with Trump in the (oftentimes pivotal) early March Super Tuesday contests. (Perhaps aided by any legal troubles Trump might encounter.) While Haley has secured the endorsement of New Hampshire’s Governor, Chris Sununu and is seen as having attracted a coalition of traditional Republicans, Never Trumpers and some cross over independent voters (primaries are not open to Democratic-affiliated voters), significant obstacles remain going forward. The South Carolina primary is another month away, where it might be challenging to maintain momentum. Nevada will hold a primary earlier on February 6th, and Trump is far ahead in a state where he has a significant business presence. South Carolina is also an uphill battle for Haley, where Trump has secured the endorsement of most of the congressional delegation, the two Senators and the incumbent Governor, and where he leads by over twenty points in most recent polls.
So, while Governor Haley has taken a somewhat more combative tone in the New Hampshire primary, and where this race bears the most watching tonight, to see at least if she exceeds expectations, going forward it appears that she would need to do some very persuasive arm twisting in her home state alone to stay viable even there. My prediction here is that she her tally is within 15 – 25 points of Trump, (no surprise like John McCain’s 2000 upset, in other words), and she drops out by Nevada.
***
Meanwhile, the Democratic Primary …
Meanwhile, on the Democratic side … there are twenty-one names plus the write-in on the Democratic New Hampshire primary ballot, but President Biden’s name will not listed be among them. He is waging a write-in campaign instead. New rules from the Democratic National Committee sought to have greater diversity in earlier voting contests in the presidential primaries and officially moved, (where the DNC is concerned), South Carolina as the first state to hold an official primary contest. New Hampshire Democrats have pushed back against the proposal and noted that their state law provides for a presidential primary to be held at least seven days prior to any other state. The state Democratic Party affirmed their date, citing state law, prompting push back from the DNC, saying that they cannot accept this exercise as determinative of delegate selection to this summer’s national convention, using in some correspondence the word ‘meaningless,’ prompting yet more pushback from state officials.
The end result is that while Biden is not officially campaigning in New Hampshire, a number of New Hampshire Biden supporters staged a write-in campaign for the incumbent President anyway. It might be noted that this is not the first time a state’s Democratic primary came in conflict with the DNC, the most notable instances perhaps being that of Michigan and Florida in 2008, where those states moved their primaries up to January 15th and 29th, respectively. Both delegations were initially halved that summer as a result, before finally being restored to full voting rights on the eve of that year’s convention. One would be hard pressed to argue that the dustup had an adverse effect on Democratic chances that fall, with Barack Obama carrying MIchigan by nearly seventeen percentage points, Florida was closer but still decisive at just under a three percent margin for Obama.
Biden’s two main challengers are author and activist Marriane Williamson, who previously ran for the Democratic nomination in 2020 and Minnesota Congressman Dean Philips, seen as more moderate and in some circles as a more serious challenger to the incumbent president. Williamson aligns more on the progressive left, with calls for such reforms to address poverty, the environment and large investments in education and healthcare. Phillips, from Minnesota’s suburban 3rd Congressional District, has tacked centrist on such issues as Israel and belongs to the moderate Problem Solvers Caucus in Congress. His campaign has been arguably hampered by a series of missteps, however, including criticism of Vice President Kamala Harris, (where he later apologized) and some flirtation with a White House bid under the No Labels banner, even if he later ruled it out.
Nationally Williamson and Phillips are well back in the single digits in polling where Biden far outpaces them with close to two-third to three quarters support. In New Hampshire, however, Biden is polling in the 50s/60s range whereas Phillips’ support ranges anywhere from 6 – 32% based on the current month’s polling. If the narrative on the Republican side shifts towards a Trump coronation, which it will likely do if he beats Haley by 20% or more, the story tonight might be Biden’s numbers, especially should they be less than 60%, by any standards low for an incumbent president. While there is a discernable hunger for a 2024 contest other than a Biden/Trump rematch, New Hampshire is likely not the state to deliver a harsh verdict to Biden given that the younger, more diverse cross section of voters polling suggests is more dissatisfied with the Biden candidacy are not as represented in this state.
Thus, it is unlikely that we will hear from Biden a 1968 Lyndon Johnson speech “I shall not seek, and I will not accept, the nomination of my party for another term as your President” after LBJ won only half of the vote in that year’s NH primary against (also from Minnesota) Senator Eugene McCarthy. Phillips simply does not have the name recognition and profile that McCarthy did, nor are the Democrats as divided as they were in 1968 to give Biden immediate pause. But a low level, i.e., <60%, could certainly harm Biden.
New Hampshire only saw an incumbent President defeated once in their primaries, with Harry Truman losing to Tennessee Senator Eastes Kefauver in 1952 (and hastening his withdrawal from the race). More recently, Jimmy Carter won only 48% when he ran against Senator Edward Kennedy for renomination, although given Kennedy was from a neighboring state, that 48% was seen as a more decisive victory. On the Republican side, Nixon only won 68% in 1972, in his bid for renomination, although his neither of his opponents had a high profile and he won the general in a landslide. Ford (50% in 1976) and Bush Sr., (53% in 1992) fought contested primaries, however, and that threshold of support augured badly for their re-election bids later on. Biden can always spin it as the difference as write-in, as opposed to fully engaged campaigning, but lacking any suspenseful narrative on the Republican side, he needs considerably more than 50% to shut down any underground campaign that his reelection bid is in serious trouble.
My prediction here is Biden gets at least 60% of the vote, and likely falls within the range of 60% – 75% to keep moving forward. Phillips and Williamson might remain in the race, but their overall polling stays mostly below 10%.
The irony of this exercise is that more likely than not, the expected tumultuous 2024 will start out quietly on the primary front, with both parties lining up behind their prospective tickets (unusually) early, with successive primaries already being a foregone conclusion, along with lower voter turnout and people largely tuning out until at least the summer conventions. Certainly litigation with the Republican frontrunner could upend that, although the attention would likely be on the courtroom, not the ballot box. We might reasonably expect polling for the general to show a dead heat, or with some polling with Trump ahead in the low/mid-single digits with third parties on the ballot. I would expect things to get more heated in the second half of the year, with some polling possibly changing at that point, so analysts and voters alike might appreciate a less intense primary season before the main event truly gets underway.
Iowa polar weather follows US politics, low visibility on road to clear Trump alternative
Update 10.30 pm: At this point 90% + of the vote is in. Donald Trump is slightly over 50%. DeSantis is slightly ahead of Haley, outside my predicted margin of 2%, although that may tighten. The following map is for second place, Trump appears to have won all 99 counties. The lighter shaded areas indicate where the vote is less than 80% in. Brown-shaded is for DeSantis, green-shaded for Haley. The counties with stripes denote larger urban centers. As predicted, Haley did well in urban centers but not as well as she likely needed to, as DeSantis is narrowly ahead in the largest county, Polk, where the capital Des Moines is located. DeSantis also did well in the critical northwest section that promised to be a battleground of sorts for second place. At this point, it appears that DeSantis is on track to outperform polling expectations and place second, albeit not by a lot. Haley still has some vote outstanding in Waterloo (Black Hawk) and Cedar Rapids (Linn) which might help keep the distance between her and DeSantis < 2%. Map is as of 10.15 pm, so does not convey real-time results, more for purposes of illustrating where each candidate’s respective strength is.
Update 8.17 pm: Very preliminary returns, as expected race has been called for Trump. When I post this it will likely still have 95% of precincts and votes still outstanding. Thus far race looks like a nail bitter for the crucial second place with Haley and DeSantis seesawing back and forth between 2nd & 3rd. DeSantis is doing somewhat better in the northwest section of the state and a shade better than I would have expected in the urban areas. Trump might fall below 50%. I am curious if there have been any empirical studies on the psychology of Iowa Caucus goers voting in real time if they are aware that a race has already been called. It appears the answer is no and no, i.e. I can’t seem to find any empirical studies at first glance and no calling a race does not, at this point, appear to have changed much minds if Trump’s % is slightly falling, as opposed to rising.
The 2024 U.S. election year kicks off with the Republican Iowa caucuses, a quadrennial event going back to 1976 for that party, and touted as first in the nation in the presidential selection process. Iowa caucuses have had some success in predicting eventual nominees, although in this instance the true race may be for second place, while the cold sub-zero temperatures raise questions as to overall turnout.
The caucus date also falls on the Martin Luther King Jr. Holiday, observed the third Monday each January. This happened previously with the Iowa Caucuses in 2004. While the Republican Party initially set the date, (some claiming it was an accident or oversight), and there was some concern that the ‘first-in-the-nation’ caucus might divert a fair amount of national attention from the holiday itself, the state Democratic Party ultimately ended up chosing the same date for their caucuses and pledged to honor the Civil Rights leader’s legacy during the meetings.
A caucus differs from a primary in that the latter is essentially an party election that selects a political party’s standard bearers in the general election, whereas a caucus is a meeting of party members in person where speeches are made and other party business might also arise.
The Iowa caucuses will be held at various precinct locations beginning at 7 p.m. local time that evening and on the Republican side will have two main items of business – holding a binding vote on the presidential nominee and selecting delegates to attend county conventions, part of a multistep process of selecting the delegates who will ultimately attend the national convention later this summer.
Monday, January 15th | Iowa GOP Precient Caucuses |
Saturday, Februrary 13th | Iowa Caucus County Convention |
Saturday, April 6th | Iowa Republican Party District Conventions |
Saturday, May 4th | Iowa State Republican Party Convention |
The contest awards delegates in proportion to votes received.
The Democrats will also hold caucuses on their side but more for the purposes of party business and delegate selection, the actual vote for the nominee will occur by mail and will be announced in early March. Selected delegates would be bound by the results of the mail-in voting.
Due to the length of time in making the delegate selection, Iowa has traditionally been towards the front of the line in the presidential nominating process. With some of the candidacies historically, such as George McGovern in 1972 (defying expectations with a credible second place finish) and Jimmy Carter four years later, Iowa was seen at least in part as a tipping point to propel them forward to the nomination and, in Carter’s case, the White House.
By contrast, George H.W. Bush won Iowa in 1980, claimed to have the ‘big mo’ (momentum) and then proceeded to lose that year’s race to the nomination to Ronald Reagan. Iowa has notably helped two incumbent presidents fend off significant primary challenges, with Ford narrowly winning over Reagan in 1976 and Carter racking up a stronger margin against challenger Ted Kennedy in 1980.
As the following chart indicates, Iowa caucuses have portended the eventual Republican nominee 7/12 times, and 9/13 times on the Democratic side (the Democrats first having starting the caucuses in 1972, four years earlier than the Republicans).
Year | R Caucus Winner | Winner as Nominee | D Caucus Winner | Winner as Nominee | |
1972 | not held that year | n/a | Uncommitted, then Edmund Muskie | No, George McGovern 2nd | |
1976 | Gerald Ford | Yes, Reagan close 2nd | Uncommitted, then Jimmy Carter | Yes | |
1980 | George H.W. Bush | No, Reagan close 2nd | Jimmy Carter | Yes, wide margin over Kennedy | |
1984 | Ronald Reagan | Effectively unopposed | Walter Mondale | Yes | |
1988 | Bob Dole | No | Richard Gephardt | No | |
1992 | George H.W. Bush | Yes, Caucuses not contested | Tom Harkin | No | |
1996 | Bob Dole | Yes | Bill Clinton | Effectively Unopposed | |
2000 | George W. Bush | Yes | Al Gore, Jr. | Yes | |
2004 | George W. Bush | Effectively Unopposed | John Kerry | Yes | |
2008 | Mike Huckabee | No | Barack Obama | Yes | |
2012 | Richard Santorum | No, Romney close 2nd | Barack Obama | Effectively Unopposed | |
2016 | Rafael “Ted” Cruz | No | Hillary Clinton | Yes, Sanders nearly tied | |
2020 | Donald Trump | Yes | Peter Buttigieg | Buttigieg, by delegates, Bernard Sanders, by votes |
This year, however, the Iowa vote might not be as much of a portent of the election winner as much as following the overall national polling which suggests that former President Donald Trump is anywhere from 30 to 50 percentage points ahead of his nearest GOP rivals in the country as a whole. On the state level, the polling suggests Trump has at least 50% of the vote, with former Florida Governor Ronald DeSantis around 15%, and former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley with slightly higher support. In terms of local endorsements, DeSantis won the endorsement of Governor Kim Reynolds as well as a signficant number of state legislators and evangelical leaders, while members of the congressional delegation have shied away from aligning with any of the candidates.
Last year’s Iowa Straw Poll, unscientific but widely seen as indicative of overall voter sentiment, placed Donald Trump with the most votes at 42.47%, followed by Ron DeSantis (15.31%), Tim Scott (11.09%), and Vivek Ramaswamy (9.37%). Former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley was well back at slightly under 4%. DeSantis is seen as having a good ground game in visiting all 99 counties, dubbed “the full Grassley” after the long time Senator who held constituency meetings annually in all the state’s counties.
The final Des Moines Register poll showed Trump just shy of 50%, DeSantis basically the same at 16% and Hailey up to 20%, indicating that she had gained the most ground during the campaign. It should be noted that the poll has had some significant predictive ability in the caucuses, but some misses as well, for instance correctly predicting Barack Obama’s initial 2008 win over Hillary Clinton but not predicting Ted Cruz’s win in 2016 over Donald Trump.
The following map will not actually be shaded this way, (as Trump is expected to win most of the counties), but serves as a rough guide to the places where DeSantis and Haley need to do especially well in order to make second place and keep momentum going forward.
Iowa as a whole has trended more Republican over the last two presidential campaigns, although the darker shades of Republican red (on the conventional general election maps) masking a rural/urban divide where Des Moines, and Sioux Falls have trended more towards the Democratic Party, and Waterloo and Davenport have remained solid Democratic strongholds.
The urban counties are those that Florida Senator Marco Rubio carried in the state’s 2016 caucuses, the same counties where Nikki Haley (green-shaded) will at least need to place a solid second to entrench that status going forward to other primaries.
Many of the central counties, some towards the northwest, north central and south central, are where prior more evangelical-based candidates such as Mike Huckabee, Rick Santorum and Ted Cruz did well in their respective 2008, 2012 and 2016 campaigns, and where Ron DeSantis (brown-shaded) would need to place strongly in to remain discernably in second place overall to former President Trump. The Sioux City northwest section might end up being pivotal in the race for second, this was an area where both Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz did relatively well in and where the same dynamics between Haley and DeSantis could play out.
Trump could win close to, if not all 99 counties at more than 50 percent support. The red-shaded Fremont county at the very southwestern corner of the map above was indicative of the part of the state where he did the most strongly in 2016, even as he narrowly lost the state to Ted Cruz.
So where will the road go through the GOP Caucus and Iowa and potentially beyond?
For Donald Trump – while there has been some speculation as to whether or not he will make 50% of the vote, the fact remains that if he does not, virtually all polls put him over 40%, where for context the highest Iowa GOP caucus total in an open contest (without an incumbent President) the previous record was George W. Bush’s 41% in 2000. If he can’t beat 41%, that might be construed as a sign of weakness, otherwise he can claim to have set a new record. According to the Des Moines Register poll, enthusiasm for his campaign runs highest of all candidates, (49% extremely enthusiastic, 39% very enthusiastic and 82% firmly committed) which likely makes the wintry weather less of a factor for his final numbers. (Thanks to NBC for making the full .pdf available.)
For Ron DeSantis – the key will be to hold onto second place, consistent with broad expectations, and there are some indications he can still do this despite the late polling. showing Haley inching ahead. The same Des Moines Register poll had more modest levels of ethusiasm, 62% extremely or very ethusiastic, but still far ahead of Nikki Haley’s extremely or very ethusiastic measure at 39%. The best case scenario at this point would likely be to at poll within 10 points of Trump, the next best would be to poll 10 points ahead of Haley if still far behind Trump, the third best would be to poll a few points ahead of Haley, then tie Haley or something close to a tie (say within 2 percentage points), the worst case scenario would be to lose second spot by more than 2 points, which would likely have adverse effects on fundraising and momentum going forward. To any extent that he exceeds opinion poll numbers, expect his campaign to spin this as a win. According to the recent-most Iowa Department of Transportation (DOT) road condition map, the crucial areas in the rural north have more drivable roads, another plus factor where DeSantis will likely need to secure a large number of his votes to secure second place.
For Haley – best case scenario at this point is run 10 points within Trump or, failing that, 5-10 points ahead of DeSantis to dethrone him as the main alternative to Trump, and benefit from momentum, including fundraising, going forward, especially with New Hampshire. A tie could still be spun as a win, since she discernably gained the most ground in opinion poll surveys. Any less than 2-3 percentage ponits behind DeSantis, however, and that could alter the narrative of her as the main alternative to Trump as the race moves to New Hampshire. She will likely poll in the same urban areas of the state where Marco Rubio did well in 2016, however some of those areas, i.e. Cedar Rapids, are where roads are most adversely affected by the weather. If the race for second is tight, this could help DeSantis more.
The bottom line from this race for 2024 is that Trump remains the favorite for the Republican nomination, the race for the GOP-Trump alternative being far less clear. Trump will ulimately benefit the longer this lack of clarity persists. He also benefits if the main alternative has less cross-over appeal within the party, which judging by both state and national polls of Republicans, would appear to be Haley, not DeSantis. However – the harder Trump attacks Haley, that might risk giving some more moderate general election voters pause. If DeSantis preserves standing as the main alternative to Trump, he can potentially take more votes away from the former President in a primary and potentially deny him the nomination, but Trump’s attacks on DeSantis “DeSanctimonious” could potentially help him in a general election.
So the dynamics are multi-layered, but the weather and the backdrop remain the same as they have been for the past decade or so. A hard road for the Trump alternative, a polarizing, cold climate politically and seemingly impassable roads in Washington to get much of anything done, whether it is something major like immigration or something temporary like a continuing resolution.
Usually my predictions are based on one outcome, i.e. candidate a wins or not, and I mark my prediction right or wrong. In this case, however, I don’t see it as a mark of political acumen to predict a race where polls have consistently indicated the same likely winner over many months. Therefore, I am predicting three things, all of which have to be met for me to consider calling this race correctly.
- Trump wins at least at the mid-40s if not over 50%
- DeSantis and Haley are within 2 points of each other and both either spin it as a tie, or surpassing expectations
- Both continue forward without suspending their campaigns prior to New Hampshire