October 2021 – The Poll Bludger

US off-year elections minus five days

Will Biden’s ratings slide damage Democrats in Virginia and New Jersey? Also featured: gerrymandering latest and Sunday’s election in Japan.

Guest post by Adrian Beaumont, who joins us from time to time to provide commentary on elections internationally. Adrian is an honorary associate at the University of Melbourne. His work on electoral matters for The Conversation can be found here, and his own website is here.

Elections for governors of Virginia and New Jersey, and two federal House by-elections, both in Ohio, will be held next Wednesday AEDT. Polls close at 10am AEDT in Virginia, 10:30am in Ohio and 11am in New Jersey. If 2020 vote counting patterns are repeated, I would expect early results in Virginia to favour Republicans, but in Ohio to favour Democrats.

I believe there will also be legislative elections in Kentucky and Mississippi, and local government elections. The highest profile of these is for New York City mayor, which Democrat Eric Adams is set to win after narrowly winning the Democratic primary earlier this year.

Joe Biden’s ratings continue to slide. In the FiveThirtyEight aggregate, he’s now at 51.0% disapprove, 43.7% approve (net -7.3); his net approval has dropped a further 2.3 points since my last article, two weeks ago.

Economic concerns explain Biden’s current problems, with headline inflation up 5.4% in the year to September. In the September quarter, US GDP grew at an annualized 2.0% (0.5% in quarter on quarter terms), disappointing analysts who expected higher growth. The economy was up 6.7% annualized in the June quarter.

In the FiveThirtyEight aggregate of Virginia polls, Democrat McAuliffe leads Republican Youngkin by just 0.1%, down from 2.5% last fortnight. A Fox News poll out Friday AEDT had Youngkin leading by eight points; while Fox News is very right-wing, its polls are well regarded. Biden won Virginia by ten points in 2020. In New Jersey, four recent polls gave Democratic incumbent Murphy a four to 11 point lead (Biden by 16 in 2020).

Democrats have been unable to make progress in advancing either the bipartisan infrastructure bill or the Democratic infrastructure bill through Congress. It is not likely that either of these infrastructure bills can pass before next Wednesday’s elections.

US gerrymandering: there are no good guys

Every ten years, a US Census is conducted, and maps for US House seats are based on the Census. But the US has no national body like Australia’s AEC to draw boundaries. While some states, notably California, have an independent commission, most states allow politicians to draw boundaries.

If one party has control of both chambers of the state legislature and the governor, they can gerrymander away, though occasionally courts will intervene. Seats must have equal numbers of people, but can have ugly maps.

In comments to my last article, I posted a proposed Democratic gerrymander of Illinois that would create a 14-3 Democratic split of Illinois’ House seats (13-5 previously with Illinois losing a seat).

2020 and 2010 were both Census years. Republicans’ big victories at the 2010 midterms gave them full control of many populous states, and enabled them to draw maps that allowed them to comfortably retain the House in 2012 despite Democrats winning the popular vote that year by 1.2% (see my 2012 report for The Green Papers).

But Democrats are no innocents. Republican control of the New York state senate in 2010 kept Democrats from gerrymandering NY, but Democrats won the state senate in 2018, and are likely to aggressively gerrymander NY for a far more lopsided split than the current 19-8. Democrats would love to gerrymander California (currently 42-11), and I have seen comments that suggest they could wipe out Republicans with a gerrymander. But California has used a nonpartisan commission since 2010.

Democrats justify their gerrymanders by arguing that Republicans do it too, and that unilateral disarmament would cost them seats. But by continuing to gerrymander, Democrats undermine the case for electoral reform.

Japanese election on Sunday

Japan’s elections have been boring, as the conservative LDP and its Komeito allies have governed since 1955 with only two brief interruptions: 1993-94 and 2009-12. In 2017, the 465 total seats were elected using 289 first-past-the-post seats and 176 proportional seats. Polling for Sunday’s election indicates another easy win for the LDP. This is an election for the lower house only; upper house elections are held separately.

Donation drive

At the end of every second month, this site issues a plea to its valued readers for contributions. If it doesn’t seem to you that I’ve been working that hard for your money lately, you will have cause to think again when I publish my vast federal election guide later today. Donations can be made through the “become a supporter” buttons at the top of the page and the bottom of each post. Many thanks to you all for your support, moral and financial, now and always.

UPDATE: The federal election guide (except the yet-to-be-done Senate section) is now available for viewing here.

Morgan poll, Essential Research voting intention and more

Two more weak sets of voting intention numbers for the government, plus the latest on voter identification and looming New South Wales state by-elections.

Two new bits of federal polling news:

• Roy Morgan’s fortnightly poll has Labor’s two-party lead out from 53-47 to 54-46, from primary votes of Coalition 36.5% (down one), Labor 35% (down one), Greens 13.5% (up two) and One Nation 3.5% (up half). The state breakdowns have Labor leading in New South Wales with 55.5% of the two-party vote (up two on the last poll for a swing of about 7.5% compared with the 2019 election), in Victoria with 56.5% (up half a point for a swing of about 3.5%), in Western Australia with 55% (steady, a swing of about 10.5%) and in Tasmania from a very small sample with 58% (up five, a swing of about 2%). The Coalition leads with 51.5% in both Queensland (down three-and-a-half points, a swing to Labor of about 7%) and, anomalously, South Australia (up six, a swing to the Coalition of about 2%). The poll was conducted over the past two weeks from a sample of 2778.

• Essential Research has at last come good with its occasional dump of voting intention data, providing results from its last nine fortnightly surveys. If the 6% undecided are removed from the equation, and the results are rounded to the nearest half a point, the primary votes convert to Coalition 39.5%, Labor 38.5%, Greens 10.5% and One Nation 3%. If preference flows from 2019 are used, this comes out at around 52-48 in favour of Labor. The pollster’s “2PP+” measure has Labor on 49% and 45%, without allocating the 6% undecided. These numbers are Labor’s strongest over the period covered by the release, which goes back to the start of July.

I’ll finally get around to adding all of this, together with this week’s Resolve Strategic poll, to the BludgerTrack aggregate later today. Also:

• The new voter identification bill was introduced to parliament yesterday and can be viewed here. The Guardian reports Centre Alliance Senator Stirling Griff is “generally supportive”, which could give the government the vote it needs to get it through the Senate together with those of the two One Nation Senators. The report also says Pauline Hanson is claiming credit for the measure, saying she had made it a condition for her party’s support for government legislation lowering the threshold for political campaigners to lodge financial statements conditional. Antony Green’s account of the issue is naturally definitive; Peter Brent also offers his thoughts at Inside Story.

• Julie Owens, who has held the seat of Parramatta for Labor since 2004, has announced she will retire at the election. Joanne Vella of the Parramatta Advertiser reports that Julia Finn, who holds the state seat of Granville, is not ruling out seeking the nomination, potentially setting up yet another state by-election. Durga Owen, criminal lawyer and Western Sydney University lecturer, has confirmed her intention to run.

• Vince Connelly, Liberal member for the soon-to-be-abolished seat of Stirling and unsuccessful preselection candidate for the safe seat of Moore, has confirmed his intention to run for the far less attractive prospect of Cowan, held for Labor by Anne Aly on a post-redistribution margin of 0.9%.

• The Victorian state redistribution has been finalised, and you can read all about it here. I haven’t had time to look at it in any depth, but you can join in a discussion about it on the Victorian Resolve Strategic poll thread that went up yesterday.

New South Wales by-election latest:

• Andrew Constance has announced he will not resign from his New South Wales state seat of Bega until November 26, which, as Antony Green notes, means the by-election for the seat is unlikely to be held this year, and certainly not on December 4, which has been mooted as the date for a “super Saturday” of by-elections coinciding with the state’s local government elections. Indeed, it does not seem that any of the members who have announced their imminent departures has actually formally resigned yet.

• A third contender has emerged for the Liberal preselection in Willoughby to succeed Gladys Berejiklian in Kellie Sloane, former host of the Today Show and Seven Sunrise. The other two contenders are Willoughby mayor Gail Giles-Gidney and Menzies Research Centre executive general manager Tim James, although a senior Liberal quoted by James O’Doherty of the Daily Telegraph describes the latter as “not a viable option” since he could potentially lose the seat.

Resolve Strategic: Labor 38, Coalition 34, Greens 10 in Victoria

Matthew Guy’s first preferred premier result is quite a bit better than Michael O’Brien’s last, but Labor remains well ahead in the latest Victorian state poll.

The Age has published the bi-monthly Resolve Strategic poll of Victorian voting intention, which has both major parties down slightly on the primary vote: Labor by two points to 38% and the Coalition by one to 34%, with the Greens steady on 10%, independents up two to 11% and others up one to 7% (with due regard to the fact that the pollster’s questionnaire likely causes independent support to be overstated). How this converts to two-party preferred, for which the pollster offers no guide, depends heavily on how preferences from the latter two are allocated: around 55-45 in Labor’s favour if they are allocated 50-50, which is roughly in line with the 2018 result, to 53-47 if Labor’s share falls to 40%.

A preferred premier question finds Matthew Guy doing rather better on his return to the job than Michael O’Brien did in his last poll, with Daniel Andrews now leading 45-32, compared with 50-24 for O’Brien. The poll combines the results of the pollster’s last two monthly surveys, with a sample of 1105.

Resolve Strategic, Essential Research, Redbridge Group and voter ID laws

Three or four new sets of polling numbers, plus a late-term move by the government to grab the hot potato of voter identification.

The Age/Herald has published its latest monthly federal voting intention poll from Resolve Strategic, with better results for Labor than the last two: the Coalition is down two to 37%, Labor is up three to 34%, the Greens are up one to 11% and One Nation is down one to 3%. This comes out at roughly 51-49 in favour of Labor on 2019 election preferences. The breakdowns provided for the three largest states have it at about 50-50 in New South Wales and Queensland and 52-48 to Labor in Victoria. Scott Morrison’s personal ratings show a combined very good and good result of 47% (down two) and a combined poor and very poor result of 43% (down two), while Anthony Albanese is respectively on 30% (down one) and 41% (down five). Morrison’s lead as preferred prime minister is little changed at 44-26, compared with 45-26 last time.

Also out yesterday was the regular fortnightly Essential Research poll, which includes approval ratings for the state Premiers, based on small sub-samples from the relevant states – although these have been juiced up in this survey for Western Australia and South Australia. This provides the first numbers first published for Dominic Perrottet, at 47% approval and 28% disapproval from a sample of 352. Daniel Andrews is at 52% approval and 40% disapproval from a sample of 275; Annastacia Palaszczuk is at 66% approval and 27% disapproval from a sample of 217; Mark McGowan is at 82% approval and 13% disapproval from a sample of 441; and Steven Marshall is at 61% approval and 27% disapproval from a sample of 443.

The regular question on the federal government’s handling of COVID-19 records one-point increases in both the good and poor ratings, to 46% and 31% respectively. The good ratings for the state governments are 57% for New South Wales (up two), 43% for Victoria (down three), 59% for Queensland (down nine), 78% for Western Australia (down two) and 66% for South Australia (down one), from the same sample sizes as noted in the previous paragraph. The poll also records what is no doubt a pandemic-induced slump in the view that immigration is too high, at 37% compared with 56% in January 2019, although too low is only up from 12% to 16%. There are further questions on immigration, as well as climate policy, in the full release. The poll was conducted Wednesday to Sunday from a sample of 1781.

Also out recently are two localised polls from Redbridge Group, one targeting the Perth seat of Swan, which the Liberals hold on a post-redistribution margin of 3.2%. Consistent with other polling showing a swing to Labor approaching 10% in the state, the poll has Labor on 43% (33.2% in 2019), Liberal on 32% (44.7%), the Greens on 10% (12.3%), the United Australia Party on 6% (1.8%) and “a local independent” on 9%, if responses to a forced-response follow-up for the undecided are included. A very great deal of further detail from the poll is available in the full release, including state voting intention results that suggests Mark McGowan’s government is at least as popular now as when it annihiliated the opposition in March. The poll was conducted by automoted phone polling from October 9 to 12 from a sample of 814.

The other Redbridge poll targeted the three Sydney electorates of Banks, Lindsay and Macquarie, and it has the striking finding that the United Australia Party is on 19%, with Liberal on 32%, Labor on 31% and the Greens on 9%. The pollster reports this as converting to 53-47 to Labor, though I am unclear as to how this was determined as there does not appear to be a full release of results as there is with the Swan poll. The combined result in these seats at the 2019 election was Liberal 47.3%, Labor 36.8%, Greens 6.6% and United Australia Party 3.1%, with the Liberals on 53.7% and Labor on 46.3% two-party preferred.

The other big electoral story of the hour was yesterday’s revelation that the federal government will shortly introduce a voter identification bill to parliament, which has naturally caused the spectre of Republican-style voter suppression to be invoked. However, the bill seems to follow the model followed by the Newman government in Queensland at the 2015 election, which was promptly repealed by the new Labor government, and I have always been of the heretical view that this did little harm and perhaps even a degree of good with respect to public confidence.

According to The Guardian, acceptable forms of identification will include “passports, drivers licences, proof of age cards, and student cards, as well as government-issued documents including Medicare and pensioners cards, and recent documents from financial institutions and utility companies”. Furthermore, those without identification will still be able to cast a declaration vote, to be admitted to the count once it is established that the voter’s name has not already been marked off. Nonetheless, Antony Green notes that the relative ease with which this was administered in Queensland was aided by its lack of an upper house, whereas it is likely to mean delays in counting when two ballot papers are involved.

Both Labor and the Greens immediately announced their opposition to the bill. One Nation, however, will presumably be on board, having earlier introduced voter identification legislation of their own in response to delusions endemic on their end of the ideological spectrum. That means the government will need to win over one or more of Jacqui Lambie, Rex Patrick and Stirling Griff.

Newspoll: 54-46 to Labor

A nudge in the wrong direction for the Coalition in the latest Newspoll.

The Australian reports the latest Newspoll has Labor leading 54-46, out from 53-47 three weeks ago, from primary votes of Coalition 35% (down two), Labor 38% (up one), Greens 11% (steady) and One Nation 3% (up one). Scott Morrison is down two on approval to 46% and up one on disapproval to 50%, while Anthony Albanese is steady on approval at 37% and down one on disapproval to 46%. Morrison leads 48-34 as preferred prime minister, out marginally from 47-34. More to follow.

UPDATE: The poll also finds 35% saying Anthony Albanese and Labor would be better at “leading Australia’s response to the global climate change crisis”, 28% favouring Scott Morrison and the Coalition, and 21% saying both would be equal. It also find a continuation of a significant shift on what the federal government should prioritise out of energy prices, carbon emissions and preventing blackouts, which has now been asked four times going back to 2017. From July 2018 to February 2020 to the present, the response for carbon emissions has escalated from 24% to 43% to 47%, while energy prices has declined from 63% to 42% to 40%. Preventing blackouts has been steady, going from 9% to 11% to 10%. I am not able to access a sample size of the poll because I can’t get The Australian’s online printed edition to work, but the poll will have been conducted from Wednesday to Saturday.

UPDATE 2: The sample was 1515 – the methodology statement for the poll can be viewed here.

The fortnight before Christmas

Another pre-Christmas election theory, a court ruling brings some clarity to Labor’s preselection process in Victoria, and the latest on New South Wales’ looming bonanza of state by-elections.

Seemingly nothing doing on the polling front this week, though I would have thought we were due the monthly Resolve Strategic poll from the Age/Herald. That may yet come – perhaps even very shortly – given the publisher’s unpredictable past treatment of it. I need a new post sooner than that though, so here are some relevant recent developments:

• Anthony Albanese has reportedly told his party to be prepared for the possibility that Scott Morrison will call an election for December 11 after he returns from the Glasgow climate summit early next month. Andrew Clennell of Sky News describes this as a “ploy”, and says the genuine view within Labor is that the election will most likely be held in March. Kevin Bonham notes that the proximity of this date to Christmas and New Year would complicate the protracted process of Senate counting, and that it would not allow time for new laws requiring registered parties to have at least 1500 members to take effect.

• The Victorian Supreme Court has thrown out a legal challenge against the Labor national executive’s takeover of the Victorian branch’s federal preselection process. This had been pursued by the factional bloc of the Right associated with Bill Shorten, which The Age reports is considering an appeal. Assuming the ruling holds, it confirms the preselection of former state party secretary Sam Rae in the new seat of Hawke, and allows the party to proceed with other federal preselections that have so far been in limbo.

• The Sydney Morning Herald reports that candidates for Liberal preselection in Hughes are likely to include Jenny Ware, moderate-backed director of legal services at Georges River Council, and that there is also likely to be a factional conservative in the field. This complicates matters for Melanie Gibbons, who will quit her state seat of Holsworthy to run, and has the backing of Scott Morrison.

New South Wales by-election latest:

• There is now a fifth state by-election on the way in New South Wales, and the first in a Labor-held seat, after Jodi McKay announced her intention to resign five months after losing the leadership to Chris Minns. This will create a vacancy in her seat of Strathfield, which she held at the 2019 election by a 5.0% margin. Anton Rose of Inner West Courier reports potential preselection candidates include Sravya Abbineni, multiculturalism adviser at NSW Government Health and former staffer to McKay; John Faker, mayor of Burwood; and Jennifer Light, the party’s national assistant secretary.

• The Nationals have preselected Nichole Overall, a local historian, communications consultant and freelance writer, to succeed John Barilaro as the party’s candidate in Monaro.

• In addition to the previously noted Gail Giles-Gidney, the mayor of Willoughby, the Sydney Morning Herald reports candidates for the preselection to succeed Gladys Berejiklian in Willoughby will include Tim James, factional conservative and executive general manager of the Menzies Research Centre.

US off-year elections minus three weeks

November 2 elections in Virginia, New Jersey and two US House seats as Biden’s ratings fail to recover. And can Democrats pass their infrastructure agenda?

Most US states hold their elections concurrently with federal elections, but a few hold theirs in November of an odd year; federal elections occur each November of an even year. State elections this November 2 include contests for the governor of Virginia and New Jersey. There are also two federal House by-elections in Ohio.

In Virginia, which Joe Biden won by 10.1% in 2020, Democrat McAuliffe is ahead of Republican Youngkin by just 2.5% in the FiveThirtyEight aggregate. Biden won New Jersey by 15.9%, and two September polls gave incumbent Democratic governor Murphy a nine to 13 point lead.

For the US House by-elections, Biden won the Ohio 11th by more than 60%, while Donald Trump won the Ohio 15th by 14% according to Daily Kos elections. While both districts are expected to be held by the incumbent party, swings from the 2020 results will be interesting.

Many expected Biden’s ratings to recover from Afghanistan, but this has not occurred. Two months since the fall of Kabul, his ratings in the FiveThirtyEight aggregate are 49.6% disapprove, 44.6% approve (net -5.0). Biden’s ratings are worse than for any past president since Harry Truman at this point in their presidencies except for Trump and Gerald Ford, who took over after Richard Nixon resigned.

I previously suggested that Biden could suffer long-term damage from Afghanistan owing to undermining his core strength of competence. Other factors are the continuing US COVID crisis and inflation in the economy. In four of the five months from April to August, real disposable personal income contracted. Biden’s RealClearPolitics net approval on the economy is -5.6.

If Biden’s ratings do not recover, they will be a problem for Democrats in the November 2022 midterm elections, in which the whole House and one-third of the Senate is up for election.

Can Democrats pass Biden’s infrastructure agenda?

In my introduction to live coverage of the German election, I covered key US Congress votes on infrastructure, the budget and the debt limit. Congress has procrastinated both the budget and debt limit fights until at least December. Republican Senate leader Mitch McConnell came to a deal that would raise the debt limit enough that the US will not default until at least December.

Democrats control the House by 220-212 and the Senate 50-50 with Harris’ casting vote. But it takes 60 votes for most legislation to pass the Senate as this is needed to shut down filibusters (get “cloture”). Despite McConnell’s support for the debt limit increase, the cloture vote was 61-38, just one above the required threshold. Republicans were opposed by 38-11, so McConnell’s leadership could be under threat if he makes further concessions.

Democrats want to pass both a bipartisan infrastructure bill (BIB) that previously passed the Senate with a filibuster-proof majority and a Democratic infrastructure bill (DIB) that would rely on a special process called “reconciliation” to circumvent the filibuster.

The problem is that House progressives won’t vote for the BIB before the DIB has passed the Senate. And two Democratic senators, West Virginia’s Joe Manchin and Arizona’s Kyrsten Sinema, are resisting the DIB. Manchin has the excuse that WV voted for Trump by 39% in 2020, but Biden won Arizona by 0.3%, and it has been trending Democratic.

A major problem for Democrats is the Senate, where there are two senators per state. The US has become far more polarized along rural/urban lines in recent times. Analyst Nate Silver said that 52% of the US overall population is in a big city, suburbs or small city, while 48% is either rural or in a small town or exurban. However, the average state’s population is 61-39 towards rural, exurban and small town areas.

Late counting updates

With counting final for the September 14 California recall election, Democratic governor Gavin Newsom defeated Recall by a 61.9-38.1 margin, down from 63.9-36.1 after election night. The Newsom margin is the same as in the 2018 regular election, but down from Biden’s 29-point margin in California.

The Liberals won an additional seat at the September 20 Canadian election, after a Quebec Bloc win by 286 votes in one seat became a Liberal win by 12 votes after a recount. The Liberals won 160 of the 338 seats, ten short of the 170 required for a majority.