The Current Political Environment and Forecasting the 2018 Midterm Elections

Currently, the polling averages have the Democratic lead on the generic ballot at 8.9 points, down from 11 in mid-December, but still very significant.

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/other/2018_generic_congressional_vote-6185.html

46.237.3

Democratic Candidate Republican Candidate

+8.9

Generic Congressional Ballot Polling Average

CNN Poll – February 26, 2018Democratic Candidate – 54%Republican Candidate – 38%

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Lessons from 2017 and the 2018 Landscape

Gillespie Exit Polls 2017

YearRegistered

VotersTurnout % Turnout

Republican

Candidate

Democratic

Candidate% Difference

2017 5,529,742 2,614,282 47% 1,175,731 1,409,175 9%

2013 5,240,286 2,253,418 43% 1,013,354 1,069,789 2.5%

• Special elections in 2017 have been a battle of turnout, not persuasion.

• As seen in the 2017 election for Governor in Virginia, coalitions from 2016 remained the same but Democrats had a considerable advantage in energy and turnout.

• 2017 turnout was four percent higher than in 2013.

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A Turnout Election – 2017 Special Elections

• The 2017 special elections have

demonstrated a significant

Democrat swing, averaging a 16

point swing for federal elections.

• Increased Democrat turnout turned

districts with a significant

Republican voter registration

advantage into competitive races.

• This indicates that 2018 elections

will primarily be decided on party

turnout.

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Current Control of Senate Seats Up in 2018

Typically, an unpopular president will lose seats during midterm elections in both the House and Senate; President Trump remains unpopular.

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2018 House of Representatives

• There are 12 Democratic House members who hold seats that Donald Trump carried in 2016.

• There are 23 Republican House members who hold seats that Hillary Clinton carried in 2016.

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Currently, Democrats have to net 25 seats in order to have a majority of 218 members. In order to do that, Democrats will have to win on Republican territory, which likely requires a Democratic wave to pull off.

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Solid D Likely/Lean D Toss Up Likely/Lean R Solid R

175 23 23 48 166

193 238

Currently

Source: https://www.cookpolitical.com/ratings/house-race-ratings

*With 4 Vacancies

2018 U.S. House Ratings

Wave Years Where U.S. House Flipped 2010: Republicans picked up 63 seats2006: Democrats picked up 31 seats1994: Republicans picked up 54 seats

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The Role of Data in Campaigns

The Role of Data in Everyday Life

• Data is exponentially becoming more entrenched in everyone’s lives.

• The number of messages on Twitter grows at around 200 percent a year in 2017 had exceeded 500 million tweets a day, and 200 Billion Tweets per year.

• Worldwide, there are over 1.86 billion monthly active Facebook users which is a 17 percent increase year over year.

• 900 million monthly users of Google’s YouTube service upload over an hour of video every second. There are currently 1.3 Billion viewers worldwide.

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Global Information Access is the New Normal

• By the end of 2016, global Internet traffic reached 1.1 zettabytes per year, and by 2019, global traffic is expected to hit 2 zettabytes per year.

• The equivalent of streaming Netflix's entire catalog 3,177 times.

• If it were all printed in books, they would cover the entire surface of the United States some 104 layers thick.

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The Fragmentation of Viewing Patterns

• People are becoming increasingly fragmented in their viewing patterns.

• Voters are reading more and more of their news online.

• Modeling must be able to optimize an organization’s reach in cyberspace.

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In 2010:34% answered online31% answered daily newspaper

Understanding Fragmentation: Cord Cutters

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Washington 1,042,735 (24%)Idaho 167,644 (23%)Oregon 556,227 (22%)California 2,504,612 (13%)Nevada 278,246 (18%)Wyoming 37,240 (13%)

What Big Data Is

• Big data is about predictions.

• By using big data, we can predict the cereal you eat in the morning to the stock you invest in.

• Big data can model behaviors and trends of both individuals and universes to create probabilities of future events.

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How we use Big Data

• Big data is not about trying to “teach” a computer to “think” like humans.

• Instead, big data is about computing large quantities of data in order to infer probabilities.

- The probability of whether a person will vote,

- What issue will influence their vote and, ultimately,

- Who they will vote for.

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Targeting the Right Audience

• Combining multiple variables, a campaign can identify the turnout likelihood and candidate preference for each voter.

• This approach creates specific voter universes for unique targeting.

• Oorlog measure head-to-head effectiveness in a multi-candidate race.

Candidate

Opponent

Swing

Reach

Turnout

Other

1.00

Tu

rno

ut

Sco

re

Ballot Score

0.75

0.50

0.25

0.00

0.00 0.25 0.50 0.75 1.00

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Messaging and Persuasion Models

• Using predictive analytics we model the impact of the best messages on each individual voter, donor or consumer.

• This process identifies messages that persuade each movable donor and messages that mobilize.

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• Politics and campaigns have already been transformed by what is really "medium sized" data.

• But we're now on the precipice of a true "big data" revolution where we can capture every interaction a voter has with a campaign and all of the information they are likely to be receiving about it.

• This data will allow us to predict, customize, and optimize at the voter-by-voter level and make campaigns that use the data well far more effective, efficient, and ultimately successful.

The Future of Campaigning

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• The next frontier in campaigns is going to revolve around big data in real time.

• Simply having traditional polling is not going to have the same efficacy as it did before the speed of social media.

• Just as Amazon recommends purchases at the personal level, so too will the script for canvassers going to door to door in a precinct.

The Next Frontier in Campaigns

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• The future of campaigning is going to be the aggregation of data across multiple platforms at the speed of thought.

• From polling to consulting, every cog seamlessly interacting in real time shaping the most effective digital campaign possible.

Seamless Aggregation of Data

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WPAi used scores and optimization tools

to create 315 field “turfs” for Governor

Abbott

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Ashlee Rich Stephenson(703) 303-6102

ashlee@wpaintel.com

For questions or projects, reach out to us anytime.

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