The outperformance is in full swing
In an age where the political media routinely highlights the polls they think will cause the most buzz, and by buzz, I typically mean dooming, it’s always important to make note of polling averages and look at those collectively rather than what any particular poll tells us.
We have 14 months until the 2024 election officially happens, and before then, a number of important local, state and legislative elections that will happen in 2023. There isn’t necessarily polling for a lot of these races – but in the special elections we’ve already seen since January – a total of 40 so far – Democrats have managed to outperform expectations by an average of eight points.
Generally, when one party occupies the White House, it’s the party out of power that tends to do better, as their supporters try to act as a check on the president’s party or just in reaction against the president’s policies. We saw Democrats exceed expectations in the midterm last year, gaining an extra Senate seat in the best midterm performance Democrats had since 1962.
Now, even in elections they lose, the Democrats are regularly overperforming relative to their numbers, a pattern that seemed to build in the wake of the Dobbs decision but is showing no sign of slowing down. Let’s keep the momentum going – get involved with any and all local races and elect Democrats down the ballot on Nov 7.
James Sullivan is the assistant editor of Brain World Magazine and an advocate of science-based policy making