No predictions today as both projected winners, Biden, D and Trump, R far ahead in polls.

Watch for ‘uncommitted’ (purple shaded on map) and Haley support (green) for relative strength on map, even as both front runners might sweep all counties. A strong Haley showing, (i.e. furthering the narrative of a persistent anti-Trump faction in the GOP ahead of Super Tuesday) is around 25%. An “uncommitted” vote on the Democratic side of 10% or more would further raise concerns about Biden’s 2020 coalition hanging together, 20% or more would portend a particularly challenging situation from the standpoint of a general election. Both Trump and Biden will be compared to each other in this swing state to see who has relatively higher support in their respective party.

The other factor is relative turnout for each primary as a barometer of ethusiasm on each side. I would project Biden and the Ds might run a bit lower than turnout in the R primary since the incumbent’s party has less of a race, Haley has a higher national profile than Dean Phillips (Biden’s remaining opponent) and might profit with some additional interest from voters more motivated to oppose Trump.

Overall race predicted only, not margins or individual counties

Margin expected to be 60-70% Trump and 30-40% Haley

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.

Thursday, February 8^th 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 30^th, (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.

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 6^th, 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 8^th.

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.

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 4^th 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. 

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 24^th 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.