The 2017 Virginia Gubernatorial election (much information)

As things start to heat up in both VA and NJ, I thought that some information would be helpful.

First, NJ and VA do their gubernatorial elections in the off-year directly following a presidential election year and so, quite often, the political punditry and analysts and such try to use it as a measuring device for the current presidential administration. I hold a different view and think that both of these elections have not as much about a presidential administration to say as most people think.

In VA, Governors are term-limited. Actually, they are not. The VA constitution says that they cannot serve consecutive terms, which effectively limits them to one-term. The fact that only two Governors since 1830 managed to jump back into the race at a later date and win again shows that VA law effectively makes for term-limits.

BTW, those two cases are interesting:

-Democrat William Smith served 3 years as VA's 30th governor, from 1846-1849, and then as Virginia's 35th Governor under the Confederacy from 1864-1865. That being said, there were TWO elections for VA Gov in 1983, with a Unionist having won the election on the side of the Union.

-Mils Godwin was the 60th and 62nd Governor of VA, first as a Democrat, then as a Republican. He was one of the first "Democrats for Nixon" in 1972 and was essentially drafted by the Republicans to run as a Republican again for Gov. in 1973.

Speaking of Republicans, if you look at the long electoral history of this state, you will see that until 1953, virtually all of them were huge Democratic landslide wins with over 60% of the popular vote. In fact, you have to go back 52 years from 1953 to 1901 to find a Democrat who won with under 60% of the vote (1901: Montague, 58.2%). One Republican did indeed win the Governorship before 1953: in 1869, Gilbert Walker won as a Republican in an R-vs-R race in VA and then, after the election, promptly switched his party affiliation (back) to Democratic. The first REAL Republican to win VA and also stay within the Republican Party was Linwood Holton, in 1969. And then Mils Godwin, as mentioned above, was also elected as a Republican in 1973, but remember, he had been a life-long Democrat up until that point in history. Nonetheless, it would then be 40 years, until Terry McAuliffe's election in 2013 that the same party would be in the VA Governor's mansion as in the White House.

From 1977 all the way through 2009, Virginia elected a Governor from the party other than the party in power in the White House, and this is often called the "Virginia Curse", which was broken in 2013.

To visualize this, I have created an excel table showing all of the Virginia elections that have happened in the nuclear age, starting with 1949:



How to work the table and understand the color-coding? Here's how: in column A, the color represents which party was in the White House during that gubernatorial election year. For instance, 2017 is shaded in red since Pres. Trump (R) won the election last year. In column B, the color represents which party won the Gubernatorial election in that year. In column C, the color represents which party won Virginia in the last presidential election. This is why, also using 2017 as an example, column A is shaded in red, but column C is shaded in blue, since Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton won the Old Dominion in the 2016 presidential election.

I have created a green box around 2013, then 1973 back to 1965, and then 1949. Also a smaller box for 1961. The longer boxes are the four election cycles where the party in the White House was also the party that won the governor's Mansion in that year and interestingly enough, in all four cases, that same party also won the state in the presidential election in the year before as well. The smaller box, 1961, is the only exception, where the party in power in the WH also won the Governor's mansion in the next off year, but lost the state of Virginia in the presidential GE (Kennedy-vs-Nixon).

That table, interepreted as full-analysis:


Pre-"Curse":
In 1949, Harry Truman (D) was president and in VA, John Battle (D) win with 70% of the vote.

From 1953-1961, Dwight D. Eisenhower (R) was President. In VA, in 1953, Thomas Stanley (D) won the Gub election, but with slightly under 55% of the vote. In 1957, James Almond (D) won the Gub election, with over 63% of the vote.

From 1961-1969, two Democratic administrations were in the White House (John F. Kennedy / Lydon B. Johnson). In 1961, Albertis Harrison (D) won the Gub election with almost 64% of the vote. In 1965, however, the political landscape of Virginia became very interesting and also competitive: Mils Godwin (D) won, but with just under 48% of the vote. His Republican opponent, Linwood Holton, got almost 38% of the vote. This was the first time ever that a Democrat won with under 50% of the vote. And the only reason why Holton did not win was because the Republican Party vote was split between the establishment Republican (Holton) and a Conservative Party candidate, William Story, who got 13.4% of the vote. George Rockwell, founder of the American Nazi Party, was also on the ballot and received 1% of the vote (he would later be assassinated by one of his own leutenants). Story won 12 counties in that election.

From 1969 to 1977, two Republican administrations were in the White House (Richard Nixon / Gerald Ford) and in 1969, for the first time, a Republican won the Governorship of VA: Linwood Holton, who won with 52% and a lean 5 point margin. He is the father of Ann Kaine and the Father-in-law of current Democratic Senator Tim Kaine. Holton was considered a moderate Republican. In 1973, Mils Godwin, who was a Democratic Gov. from 1965-1969, came back as a Republican and won in a squeaker election, with just under 51% of the vote.

"The Virginia Curse":

In 1977, during the Jimmy Carter (D) administration, John Dalton (R), who was Linwood Holten's Lt. Governor, won the Governorship of VA with almost 56% of the vote, making him the first Republican to win the VA Governship with a landslide margin. In 1976, Virginia was the only Southern state that Jimmy Carter did not win and it was a squeaker election for then-Pres. Gerald Ford (+1.34%). Some are pointing to the Linwood / Dalton symbiosis and relating it to the current McAuliffe / Northam symbiosis, where a sitting Lt. Governor suceeded his boss. Wait and see.

Ronald Reagan (R) was our 40th President from 1981-1989, but in 1981, the Democratic Lt. Governor, Chuck Robb, won the Governor's mansion, with 53% of the vote. Yes, from 1977-1981, Virginia has a split-administration (Republican Gov., Democratic Lt. Governor). And in 1985, Democrat Jerry Bailies (who had been the VA AG), won with over 55% of the vote, in spite of the fact that Reagan just won a massive landslide re-election in 1984 and easily carried Virginia in that year.

George H.W. Bush (R) was our 41st President from 1989-1993, but in 1989, then Lt. Gov. Doug Wilder, a Democrat, won the VA Gubernatorial, but barely, with just over 50% of the vote and a +0.48% margin.

Democrat Bill Clinton was our 42nd President from 1993-2001 and yet, in 1993, Republican George Allen won the VA Governorship with over 58%, the largest GOP landslide to date in that state. It was pundited as an omen that Clinton would lose his re-election campaign in 1996, which he won. Allen's Lt. Gov., Don Beyer, was a Democrat who went up for election in 1997 but who lost to Republican Jim Gilmore, who got almost 56% of the vote.

Republican George W. Bush was our 43rd President from 2001-2009, and yet, in 2001, Democrat (and now current Senior-Senator) Mark Warner won the Governorship of VA with 52%. In 2007, during Bush's 2nd-term, Democrat (and now current Junior-Senator, also 2016 Vice-Presidential nominee) Tim Kaine won the Gubernatorial with almost 52% of the vote.

Barack Obama (D) was our 44th President from 2009-2017 and yet, in 2009, Republican Bob McDonnell won the Governorship with 58.7% of the vote, the largest GOP Gub landslide ever.

And so, up until 2013, the "Virginia Curse" held.

In 2013, the race was between Democrat Terry McAuliffe, Republican Ken Cuccinelli and Libertarian (Software Developer) Robert Sarvis. McAuliffe led in all polling since the second week of July, 2013. The polling more often than not showed a far higher percentage for Sarvis than he actually accrued on election night, something that most analysts say meant that Sarvis leaning voters, seeing Cucinelli behind, pulled the lever for Cucinelli at the last moment. Possible, but we will never know if that is the case or some of the polling simply exaggerated the Libertarian candidate's strength. At any rate, it was the first real 3rd party challenge in this state since 1965 and the Gub election was called for McAuliffe between 10:30-11:00 pm on election night. Including the 2016 presidential election, this would be the fourth major election cycle in VA where the vote tallying indicated the Republican far ahead early in the counting, but once the NOVA counties were all in, the Democrat had won.

What is more striking is the similarity of the electoral map between Obama's 2012 re-election (where he won VA by +3.87%, almost identical to his national margin) and Terry McAuliffe's +2.52% win in 2013.Let's take a look.

Here is Obama's 2012 presidential win in Virginia, by county:


Source.

Here is McAuliffe's 2013 gubernatorial win in Virginia, by county:



Source

And Hillary Clinton's 2016 presidential win in Virginia, by county:



Source.

You will see that all three electoral maps of VA look almost identical to each other, with varying margins.

As election night unfolds in VA in 2017, those maps may come in helpful.

One key factor in VA is the minority vote. In fact, it is one of the largest factors.
In 2012, the black vote in VA was 20% of the electorate
In 2013, the black vote in VA was 20% of the electorate
In 2016, the black vote in VA was 21% of the electorate.

So, in spite of a definitive upturn in the White vote nationally in 2016, the White vote in Virginia actually went down and the black vote went up. All of these things are going to be factors looking at the 2017 gubernatorial race.

If the "Virginia Curse", which was temporarily broken in 2013, holds in 2017, then Democrat Ralph Northam will be elected. But if it does not, then Republican Ed Gillespie will win. Again, a Libertarian is in the race (Cliff Hyra), but it looks like the Libertarian influence is not nearly as strong this time around as it was in 2013. In spite of the fact that Lt. Gov. Ralph Northam is leading in polling, I would not make any predictions about this race, for a day can be a month in politics and all politics is local. In Northam's favor is the endorsement of sitting Gov. Terry McAuliffe (who is also strong Clintonite), the support of 2 sitting Democratic Senators and also the support of the Clintons. In Gillespie's favor is the fact that he is an experienced campaigner: he brought the 2014 Senatorial race against Mark Warner (once seen as a possible Presidential candidate) to an almost draw and he has not run a controversial campaign as Ken Cucinelli did in 2013. Working against Gillespie are Pres. Trump's dismal approval/disapproval ratings in this state. The most recent Roanoke College poll (a pretty decent pollster, but not the best of them) has the President with dismal approval numbers (28/57, -29) while Terry McAuliffe is above water (49/30, +19). Apparently, the White House is quite aware of this, because I have yet to hear Pres. Trump endorse Ed Gillespie like Barack Obama endorsed Terry McAuliffe in 2013.

But again, wait and see. With New Jersey very looking like an absolute lock for the Democrats, if they also win Virginia, then they will be bragging about 2017. If they don't win Virginia, then 2017 will essentially look like a mirror image of 2013. Wait and see.

Hope this info was helpful.

-Stat

 

RE: OP above

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Just a friendly shout-out to a number of people to/with whom I have had good contact in PF, people of very differing views. With some of you I agree most of the time, with others I disagree most of the time, but you have all been pretty decent to me and willing to write your thoughts, which I always find grand and impressive. I may have forgotten a couple of names as well, but it's not intended. Not on all that much, what with work and some illness issues.

I wanted to invite all of you to enjoy this OP (which was a helluva lot of work) and hope it brings you some useful information.

Oh, and the 1881 VA gubernatorial, which I did not mention in the OP, was a really interesting upset election, carrying a party name we never heard of before or since then.... just to throw that little tidbit out there.

Best Greetings,

Stat

 

Thanks for inviting me in. This is a lot of information so I'm going to break this down and get a better understanding of what I'm reading

 

Democratic front runners have underperformed their polling in Virginia for awhile. Some think that the democrat having a polling advantage is good. In Virginia, in may not be.

 

Gov Krispie Kreme reminded the NJ voters why he is a boorish lout and why the state would be far better off under Dem control so short of something dramatic occurring it is going to be a D win.

VA is much more complex politically and your analysis is excellent. Thank you for all the hard work on it.

I very much suspect that VA is going to reflect the abject failure of the BLOTUS regime. With even the military turning against the Racist-in-Chief there isn't much chance other than in the most rural southern parts of the state for Gillespie to gain much traction. If he panders to the racist nazi white supremacists he will lose NOVA in a landslide. However if the BLOTUS is undergoing efforts to remove him from office come November that will motivate the racist nazi white supremacists to come out and vote in large numbers.

Which makes the military the deciding factor IMO. It was Ike who integrated the military and that tradition has been around for long enough that the military does not take kindly to having a nazi embracing Racist-in-Chief in charge. I can see them abstaining in larger numbers than usual. That demographic is key to GIllespie winning IMO and unless he can win them over he is going to have a problem.

 

I have the Dems winning both races.

 

You have the dems winning VA with 17% undecided and 4% for the libertarian this close in? I think you may be a little too optimistic at this point in the game.

 

duplicate

 

Are you referring to the presidential races, senatorial races, HOR races or gubernatorial races in VA?
Before I can respond to you, it would be helpful to know this information. Thanks.

 

Take your choice. The current democratic nominee for governor was behind in the polls and won unexpectedly, so there is your starting point.

 

Wait a minute, that makes no sense. You wrote in the posting before that you thought that Democrats underperformed their polling, but if you are referring to Northam and his bid for the Lt. Governorship in 2013, since he came from behind, he then logically OUTperformed his polling.

But I will get back with you and bring some hard data with to the table.

 

On VA, my take is that there is going to be a ton of money pouring in (on both sides).

It will become a referendum on Trump, and (in the end) Richmond and the DC suburbs will carry the Dem over the line.

 

The areas that always vote democrat aren't going to be the swing voters

 

Northam was behind Perriello in all the polls leading to the nomination and he won. The guy he is trying to replace won but also underperformed his polling.

 

Oh, you are talking about D-vs-D polling......

you do realize that that is not a 1:1 correspondence to D-vs-R polling...

But worse yet, once again, to point out your very obvious mistake, since Northam was BEHIND in polling but then won, then he did not underperform his polling, but rather, he OVERPERFORMED it, because he did BETTER than his polling predicted, not worse.

 

Not my very obvious mistake since I said originally "Democratic front runners have underperformed their polling in Virginia for awhile" so I was talking originally about Periello in this context as the front runner, not Northam.

 

Thank you for confirming your mistake, for what you wrote in no way indicates a D-D race. For you see, there have been a number of D-R and D-R-I races where the Democrat was leading. I am referring specifically to Virginia, since that is what this thread is about.
And no, you did not mention Periello at all.... so.....

And to use a D-D race to claim that a D underperformed his polling: well, DUH! IN a D-D race or in an R-R race, one of the two candidates will have invariabla, statistically underperformed his polling, unless it was a statistical tie all the way along or nailed the margin all along.

So, do you want to continue to troll or would you like to contribute some real information?

 

Again you are wrong as Is aid in Post #14 "Northam was behind Perriello in all the polls leading to the nomination and he won. The guy he is trying to replace won but also underperformed his polling." so I am not the one trolling, Mr. Obtuse.

 

Exactly. Northam was behind Periello, so, since he won, he (NORTHAM) overperformed his polling, not underperformed. Are you still not understanding this? And why in the world are you focusing on a D-D primary race? That makes absolutely no sense at all.

 

You truly are challenged. No wondr you through out random statistics and pretend it is analysis.

What part of the conversation involving "Democratic front runners" applies to Northam when he wasn't the democratic front runner? "Democratic front runner" would and could only apply to Tom Perriello. The democratic front runner who underperformed was Thomas Stuart Price Perriello!!!!!! Northam has nothing to do with it no matter how many times you inject him into it. He is the front runner NOW, not when the election I was referencing took place.

 

When you first mentioned Democratic front runner in your first reference to such, you made no reference to a D-vs-D race, which of course, is in no way representative of the entire politics of the state of Virginia, since it involves the resonance among voters of only one party. Any normal, reasonable person would have assumed you meant a D-vs-R race for a higher office, since that is what this thread is about, namely, the upcoming 2017 gubernatorial, where a Democratic nominee will be up against a Republican nominee and a Libertarian will also be in the mix. So, to use polling for a D-D primary race to try to make a point is not only silly, it is trolling. But later tonight, I will bring real stats to this thread because the claim you originally made is not true, anyway.

But feel free to make yourself look as ridiculous as you want.

 

We know how well your predictions go. I predict we won't see you on this board for a few days if this prediction goes like the last one.

 

Those maps show that Virginia should utilize the electoral college method in state elections. That or give away the three counties at the top of the state!

 

So, back to the, ähhh, interesting quote above. I promised to bring some actual data to answer this point.

On the presidential level, in 2008:



There were 9 polls in the end-polling in 2008 and the Obama vs. McCain aggregate was: +4.93. Obama won Virginia by +6.30% in 2008, so he OUTPERFORMED his end-polling by 1.37 points. The screenshot does not show all nine polls. Go to the link and scroll down to see all of the information.

On the presidential level in 2012:



There were 11 polls in the end-polling aggregate and the Obama vs. Romney average was: Obama +0.77. Obama won Virginia in 2012 by +3.87%, so he OUTPERFORMED his end-polling by 3.1 points. Please also note that Obama's Virginia margin (+3.87%) was practically identical to his national margin in that year (+3.86%) and the exit poll for this state was almost perfect: Obama +3.8.

On the presidential level in 2016:

Here was the end-polling:


10 end-polls. Here was the calculated mean of both the two-way and the three-way (with Johnson) race:

.

I did rolling polling aggregates for all of the battlegrounds in 2016, starting 42 days before the election, as is my tradition. Two days before the election, the aggregate was: Clinton +5. On the day before, it was Clinton +5.85 (the mean of which is: Clinton +5.425). Clinton won Virginia by +5.32%, which is slightly under the end aggregate of +5.85 by 0.53 points, but above the aggregate from two days before the election by +0.32, and just under the mean by 0.05%. Technically, she underperformed her polling, but anything under 0.5% difference is considered statistically insignificant, could just as well be polling noise. So, actually, Clinton's 2016 margin, which was between Obama's 2008 and 2012 margins, was pretty much dead-on with her end polling.

In all three cycles, on the presidential level, the Democrat was the established front-runner in this state for a long time in the polling. So, @Deckel 's claim that "Democratic front runners have underperformed their polling in Virginia for awhile" is a verifiably untrue claim at the presidential level. He brought no data to back up his point. I did. More data about gubernatorial elections to follow next week.


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data is not their friend