McCaskill's big victory surprised most pollsters
Yael T. AbouhalkahU.S. Sen. Claire McCaskill’s victory last week was hard-fought, deserved and expensive.
The post-election narrative is that, well, sure she won, largely helped by Todd Akin’s extreme positions and self-destructive comments on rape and abortion.
Still, McCaskill’s large margin over Akin was very surprising, especially to the pollsters.
Up front, I’ll admit I bought into the theory for months that the race was going to be close. Once concern was McCaskill’s high negatives with Missouri voters. Also, I thought a lot of ultra-conservative rural Missourians would support Akin on Election Day. Polls showed that would be true, too. And many of them did back Akin, but not nearly in the swarms expected. McCaskill also did well in urban areas and especially with women voters.
So how accurate were the last few polls in the Senate race? Not very, after looking at the results on RealClearPolitics.
Here’s how the race actually turned out:
McCaskill got 54.7% of the vote, Akin 39.2 and Libertarian Jonathan Dine 6
The closest poll predictor was SurveyUSA: McCaskill 51, Akin 36, Dine 8, undecided 5
Next came Public Policy Polling: McCaskill 48, Akin 44, Dine 6, undecided 2
We Ask America: McCaskill 48.6, Akin 45.2, Dine 6.2
The worst was Mason-Dixon Polling and Research (The Star was a client): McCaskill 45, Akin 43, Dine 4, undecided 8.
Overall, McCaskill won by a 15.5 percentage point margin, just over the prediction made by SurveyUSA.
The actual winning margin for McCaskill was far better than the 2 percentage points that Mason-Dixon had pegged the race at just 10 days or so before Election Day.
Given all the attention on polls this year, it would be absurd to say these predictions should have been discounted. McCaskill had good reasons to make sure she spread the word about how extreme Akin’s views were, and how he couldn’t be trusted to speak on behalf of Missourians.
In the end, you could certainly argue that McCaskill succeeded almost beyond her wildest dreams.
Johnathon Busby
6 months, 1 week agoThere have been calls for the GOP to become more moderate as a result of Akin’s race, and also that of Murdoch (to say nothing of the presidential loss). Staunch conservatives loathe this idea; they’re convinced they have the right ideas (and do in some cases, on some issues), and you don’t shy away from good ideas. It might be the case that the GOP doesn’t need to become more moderate, so much as it needs to become more modern.
That said, while Claire certainly dug Akin’s grave for him, Akin threw himself in bodily with his moment of accidental honesty about what he thinks a woman’s body is capable of. He accidentally exposed the core thesis and thoughts of the socially conservative movement. And voters showed what they thought of that core.
Mark Hastert
6 months, 1 week agoClaire had a very large enthusiastic ground game. People were canvassing voters multiple times. Aiken, aside from conservative Christians had luke warm support. The Tea Party et al lost this election fot the Republicans. More sensible policies and candidates would have carried the day.
Reginald Thornton
6 months, 1 week agoSeveral Missouri voters told me they were going to leave that race blank, while still voting for Romney. So, what is Claire’s percentage of total votes cast, and of total Obama votes cast? Where is the result of how many ballots left this race blank? If not very many, then I think we know how Claire got such a big margin. Anyone care to share the data?
George Hunsucker
Northland
6 months, 1 week agoAre we going to be reading 6 more years of how wonderful air claire is as she continues to vote non-MO values YT.
Mark Hastert
6 months, 1 week ago“Are we going to be reading 6 more years of how wonderful air claire is”
Aw c’mon now you have something to live for!
Reginald Thornton
6 months, 1 week agoSo, no data on the number of ballots left blank in the Claire/Akin race? Did someone helpfully fill-in those left blank? Starting to smell a rat. Sort of like how so many Philadelphia precincts voted 100% for Obama- what, not even a single error?
Yael T. Abouhalkah
6 months, 1 week agoReginald, here’s the link to the official Missouri vote totals. The McCaskill-Akin race had 1 percent fewer votes than presidential race (always the biggest draw for voters) and was equal to the Missouri governor’s race vote totals.
http://enr.sos.mo.gov/ENR/Views/TabularData.aspx?TabView=StateRaces^Federal%20/%20Statewide%20Races^011656688155
Reginald Thornton
6 months, 1 week agoThe 1% difference between votes cast in the Senatorial race vs. the Presidential race seems pretty close considering my anecdotal evidence (i.e. hearsay) from Missouri voters I know who claimed they would be voting for Romney but not for Aikin or Claire.
That was also the margin of difference for the Governor’s race, which was also heavy on the character asasination.
Those 1% differences should probably be less than, not greater than, the difference between lower races vs. President. Yet, the Lt. Governor, Secretary of State and Treasurer each registered one-tenth of 1% fewer votes than for President.
None of those lower level races had any controversy like the distaste for Claire before Aikin’s gaffe, or the disgust with Aikin afterwards. So why such a narrow difference in their race vs. President, or a tighter spread vs. the lower levels?
Fascinating.
Reginald Thornton
6 months, 1 week agoSort of like the Philadelphia and Ohio precincts that went 100% Obama. Mmmkay. Not even a single vote cast in error for Romney? Please.
Reginald Thornton
6 months, 1 week agoThe Star started it. It ran a column pointing out (rubbing in?) what might have contributed to Claire’s wide margin. That just got me thinking about possibilities. I wouldn’t want a Democrat or a Republican to get away with it.
Mark Hastert
6 months, 1 week agoThere is nothing more entertaining than an excusifying loser.