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We’re at T-minus eight hours until Election Day — at least here on the East Coast — and Democrats are likely feeling good about their electoral odds right now. 

The party is strongly favored to win the House and make big gains in the Senate, with a serious chance of retaking both chambers. The final New York Times/Siena polls, released Sunday, put Democrats ahead of Republicans in at least five of the seven battleground states that will determine who holds the Senate. That includes Kansas and Texas, two states that haven’t elected a Democratic senator in generations.

The picture appears so dim for Republicans that even President Donald Trump seemed to acknowledge it during remarks this afternoon: “For some reason, the sitting president doesn’t win the midterms. We gave this a very strong shot.”

But while many, many polls and pundits are forecasting a blue wave…I’m a little more cautious about making definitive predictions. Polling has only grown more difficult in recent years, as we saw especially clearly in the 2016 and 2020 elections.

Go a little deeper

Polling methodology sounds complex. (And it is!) But one of the field’s biggest challenges is actually pretty easy to grasp: Some people enjoy chatting with pollsters and filling out little surveys on their phones…and some people could not care less.

The poll-takers tend to be older, more educated, and more invested in politics. The poll-avoiders are often younger, less educated, and — in recent presidential contests — more likely to support Trump. Pollsters are aware of these imbalances and try to correct them by applying statistical adjustments after the fact, but it’s not a perfect science. 

It’s difficult to gauge, for instance, how the Republicans who do respond to polls might differ from the ones who don’t. And it’s impossible to know for certain how many people who say they’re going to vote will actually drag themselves to their nearest school gymnasium or fire hall tomorrow.

There are a few new wrinkles this year, too. Pollsters conducted fewer late-cycle surveys than they do in the typical midterm cycle, according to the Washington Post. That not only means that we have less data overall, but that the data we do have may not account for late-breaking developments, such as Democratic Rep. Haley Stevens’s surprise endorsement of a Republican in the Michigan Senate race or a ballot-stacking scandal in Alaska. 

Several close Senate contests are also in rural states — think Alaska, Maine, and Iowa — where reaching a representative mix of voters can be especially difficult for pollsters.

But even if the polls are right and a blue wave is likely, that doesn’t mean it will actually come to pass. My colleague Astead Herndon sees another possibility: The fear of a liberal takeover could motivate large numbers of Republicans to vote, even if they’ve soured on Trump or had previously planned to sit out this election. 

None of this is to say that the blue wave won’t happen, to be clear, or that it won’t happen on the scale that some pundits have predicted. But I wouldn’t take any victory laps yet. Polls just aren’t the same thing as elections. 

One link for later

➨ Brace for political fights with your family. They are, after all, an election-year tradition! Instead of clapping back at relatives with different politics, try to get curious about their positions. If in doubt, deploy the line “why does that matter to you?” Then explain your own views with an “I” statement, rather than a put-down or accusation.

Before you go…

• Did you know…that we’ve unwittingly dosed the world’s fish with anti-anxiety meds? Our bodies don’t entirely absorb these drugs, so trace amounts end up in our urine…and from there, in rivers and coastal habitats.
• Today’s trivia: Which US pharmaceutical giant was founded by a Union army veteran after the Civil War? (You can find this and other brain puzzles in Vox’s daily crossword. Look for the answer in tomorrow’s edition.)
• Yesterday’s trivia: Last week we asked you for the name of the reclusive neighbor in Harper Lee’s classic novel To Kill a Mockingbird. That would be Arthur “Boo” Radley, played by Robert Duvall in the 1962 film adaptation.

Author: Source Author

Source: Vox.