* The Tribune has a really good story up about GOTV and early voting. Let’s start with a couple of charts…

* Those vote by mail (absentee) numbers for Chicago are going to rise by a lot, and may in other places as well.

Four years ago, about 65 percent of all Chicago absentee ballot requests were eventually mailed in. This year, Chicago has received just shy of 55,000 requests. So, if the return percentages hold (and they may not, we’ll see) we could see 35-36,000 absentee ballots counted.

Also, there are still a couple of days left for early voting, so we’ll see where those numbers end up.

* From the Tribune story…

As of Thursday, more people statewide had already voted early, either in person or by mail, than had done so in the last race for governor in 2010, according to officials involved in the Democratic get-out-the-vote effort. Four years ago, 546,630 ballots were cast early, they said. This year, the count stood at 554,549 ballots cast with four days of early voting opportunities yet to go, Democratic officials said.

* Regarding the Dems…

Those Democratic efforts have counted significantly upon maximizing the volume of mail-in votes — absentee ballots in the old election parlance — as well as early voting that began Oct. 20. Statewide, Democratic officials said, they have reached out to more than 2.2 million people through mailings, literature dropped at the house or face-to-face contacts. They are hoping to improve on 2010 results, when midterm turnout was roughly 49 percent and more than 3.7 million ballots were cast.

* But what does this really mean? The object here is to expand the electorate, not just get people to vote early. And many people are voting early because it’s a lot more convenient, or because they fell they can finally tune out the political bickering by voting, or whatever. Yes, both parties are pushing it, but early and mail-in voting is up everywhere and much of that is a natural occurrence.

* As I told you months ago, the Quinnsters were hoping to increase their electorate by 250,000 over four years ago. It’s not gonna be close to that, despite millions spent on the effort. Let’s switch over to Greg Hinz for a moment…

According to strategist Pete Giangreco, who handled the state Democratic Party’s vote-by-mail program, Mr. Quinn so far may have picked up an additional 40,000 votes or so just in the Chicago area. Mr. Giangreco gets that figure by comparing who returned their ballot — the party provided envelopes that included tracking information — with their primary voting history.

Based on that and other factors, the party assumes that only about half of those who had returned ballots by early this week did so because the party mailed them an application. Of those who did vote, 85 percent will support Mr. Quinn, he said. That yields the 40,000 figure.

I’m hearing the Durbin campaign thinks the number is maybe half that, but we’ll see.

* Back to the Tribune and the GOP side of the fence…

A big share of Republican get-out-the-vote efforts will be centered in the GOP-leaning suburban collar counties, with more money devoted to organizing and more boots on the ground. Statewide, Rauner campaign manager Chip Englander said a key target has been voters in 600,000 households thought to be open to voting for the Republican. Englander said an even greater focus has been put on voters in another 400,000 household who traditionally vote for Republicans but only in presidential election years.

He acknowledged Democrats have “perfected” a turnout model encouraging early voting and voting by mail, but Englander said the Rauner camp has “made a huge investment and a big push” for those votes and is satisfied with the effort. “They’ve never been up against someone like us,” he said.

The Rauner campaign has national winds at their back. The Democrats are fighting headwinds. So, convincing non-traditional off-year voters to cast a ballot could be easier for the Republicans than the Democrats, which is why the Dems spent so much money on this project.

       

40 Comments - Anonymous - Saturday, Nov 1, 14 @ 2:53 pm: IMHO the much larger increases outside of Chicago and Aurora would indicate there is an unprecedented Republican ground game at work. If, this level of success is replicated on Election Day Rauner will win. Maybe all this means is Republicans who have been frothing at the mouth to vote against Quinn have taken the first opportunity to do so. But, Rauner camp probably has more reason for optimism than Quinn camp from these numbers. - Oswego Willy - Saturday, Nov 1, 14 @ 2:56 pm: ===“They’ve never been up against someone like us,” (Englander) said.=== The road is littered with Dopes who say that stuff. Keep quiet and go about your business and crow on Wednesday. To the Post, Horrible news for the Dems. The only thing left is to drag every voter and their brother fur same day voting. Rauner may win despite himself; the incredibly weak numbers should make someone as seasoned as Durbin and his Crew take pause. They are, in voted Pluses, down +/- 75,000 to be in a ball park of being above water to run normal GOTV operations. The strain of voting verified Pluses in one day of the additional +/- 75,000 is like leaking all your oil and you need to go two laps and you can fake it for a lap and a half. Rauner is well within the realm of winning, despite themselves. What a waste of $8 million. - Oswego Willy - Saturday, Nov 1, 14 @ 2:59 pm: ===IMHO the much larger increases outside of Chicago and Aurora would indicate there is an unprecedented Republican ground game at work.=== Unless you know where your pluses are, and who they are, you know as much as you did before you saw the numbers. Aurora with Chapa La Via and Kifowit, those might be Dem votes too. Unless you know the pluses, the GA representation and Aurora area politics (borders Oswego) it’s anyone’s guess if they are against local trends. - Anonymous - Saturday, Nov 1, 14 @ 3:12 pm: Keep in mind the election authorities provide lists of who voted early to campaigns upon request, so they know whose plusses have voted already - Oswego Willy - Saturday, Nov 1, 14 @ 3:22 pm: ===Keep in mind the election authorities provide lists of who voted early to campaigns upon request, so they know whose plusses have voted already.=== Unless you know, your speculation given that given field of operation, the trend ain’t Rauner’s friend out there. - QCLib - Saturday, Nov 1, 14 @ 3:23 pm: I have several Republican operative friends who have been telling me all along about the absentee operations in BR’s camp. I had been thoroughly impressed until now, hearing a couple of key trade secrets it seems obvious the Republicans hadn’t been utilizing. Especially one area which I always categorize as a rookie mistake. However, good work. I think some of these numbers don’t give Republicans enough credit, but we’ll find out in a few days! Rich, I’d love to see an absentee breakdown by county when all is done. Perhaps comparing totals, win margins, and comparisons to 2010 to see how well and how improved Republicans were in this effort. - The Captain - Saturday, Nov 1, 14 @ 3:51 pm: There’s no way to tell who’s winning early voting/vote by mail unless you have live records matched against a voter file. Not all EV/VBM votes are equal. Ask the campaigns for a crosstab matrix that shows modeling scores down one side and turnout scores (or just old fashioned voter frequency) down the other. They have the means to do this, but instead they’ll probably just issue competing press releases to cherry pick numbers. - Anonymous - Saturday, Nov 1, 14 @ 4:35 pm: - Horrible news for the Dems. - Would be if it were true. - walker - Saturday, Nov 1, 14 @ 4:45 pm: Looks like the Republicans did something right this cycle. Glad they’re back in the game. - Oswego Willy - Saturday, Nov 1, 14 @ 4:46 pm: ===Would be if it were true.=== Numbers aren’t subjective. You’re welcome. - Anonymous - Saturday, Nov 1, 14 @ 4:56 pm: - Numbers aren’t subjective. - But the people that report them are. - Oswego Willy - Saturday, Nov 1, 14 @ 5:01 pm: Fix you tin foil hat and get back to us. lol - K3 - Saturday, Nov 1, 14 @ 5:10 pm: I’m a bit confused about national GOP winds. Sure it’s a midterm election, but I don’t know that competitive Senate elections in Kansas and Georgia equate to GOP winds. - Applied Math Professor - Saturday, Nov 1, 14 @ 5:51 pm: What am I missing? Look at the totals (NOT percentages) in the two tables above. Summing together the Voting by Mail plus Early Voting for the 2010 Total Vote versus 2014 Vote through Friday, Chicago plus Suburban Cook’s votes have increased by 48,062. Grouping together all the Collar County votes for the same periods finds a net increase of votes cast through Friday of 24,602. Per Orr’s final tabulation ( http://www.cookcountyclerk.com/elections/results/Pages/default.aspx ) Quinn beat Brady taking 64% to Brady’s 29% for Cook County in total, with Quinn receiving 54% to Brady’s 40% in Suburban Cook. Since the Cook County total increase of 48K is almost twice that of the Collar County’s 24.6K, and using 2010 Final Results as the baseline reference point, lacking any other descriptive statistics, it would be fair to conclude the Dem’s GOTV has far surpassed Rauner’s GOTV. - Winston Smith - Saturday, Nov 1, 14 @ 6:00 pm: Real winners in the race for IL Gov are Rauner’s con$ultants. Whole article reminds me of the Romney’s Project Orca that crashed and burned on EDay. In Suburban Cook its the unions driving higher VBM & EV numbers…a lot of the same names that crossed over in primary. - MIMI - Saturday, Nov 1, 14 @ 6:15 pm: I hear Mary Mitchell say that GOTV rally for Democrats with Durbin and Quinn had the AA pastors supposedly supporting Rauner- LOL - Quiet Sage - Saturday, Nov 1, 14 @ 6:16 pm: =Applied Math Professor= Good analysis. - Anonymous - Saturday, Nov 1, 14 @ 7:23 pm: @ OW 2:56 PM. I have read your post several times and don’t have a clue what you are talking about. What does +/- 75,000 mean…..LOL and where did you even come up with 75,000. To say I confused with your post is an understatement but that is nothing new. - James formerly from Wrigley - Saturday, Nov 1, 14 @ 7:32 pm: Applied Math Professor- About 35k of the 48k is from suburban cook. My thought is the the much larger increases in suburban Cook compared to Chicago-Cook are from an unprecedented Republican effort in Republican leaning areas of suburban Cook. Thus Rauner is winning Collar increase of 24.6k favors Rauner. Chicago increase 13k favors Quinn. Net 11.6k favoring Rauner Using 2010 results on current suburban increase we get: .54*35k=18,900 votes for Quinn Net 7.3 favoring Quinn .40* 35k=14000 votes for Rauner Net 6.7 for Rauner. Does that make any sense? - The Captain - Saturday, Nov 1, 14 @ 8:03 pm: James your assumption is that increases in Suburban Cook, an area that has not favored Republicans in a long time and Rauner is not leading in most polls, is a benefit for Rauner? Seems legit. EV/VBM voters are not equal and you cannot infer anything from raw totals. A majority of EV/VBM voters are not an outcome of GOTV efforts, they are habitual voters. The GOTV operations on either side are targeting voters with high likely support scores and an infrequent voter history. Until you can measure the returns on those efforts you can’t tell which side’s EV/VBM efforts are producing a better outcome. The reported raw totals are a mix of these GOTV targets and also habitual voters and you can’t segment the raw totals to tell the difference without a voter file. - Madison - Saturday, Nov 1, 14 @ 8:46 pm: Caps gotta point there James. Without the historical data on what a voter’s habits are, one cannot screen out the noise in the sample from regular voters changing the method they use to vote for the purposes of convienience. I would bet a bone for Oscar the Puppy that somebody already knows those stats and are playing those cards real close to the vest right now. - Oswego Willy - Saturday, Nov 1, 14 @ 8:54 pm: - Anonymous -, If I confuse you, that’s on you not me. Again. Good luck with that. To the Post, ===* As I told you months ago, the Quinnsters were hoping to increase their electorate by 250,000 over four years ago. It’s not gonna be close to that, despite millions spent on the effort.=== The reality of the 250,000, that also includes the plurality that will be needed. Two very important things make the speculation credible; Known voted Pluses that voted early. The percentage of plurality of known Pluses, to voting history of the unknown voters who voted. That’s it. That plurality and raw votes gives the best indication. Period. The rest is speculative to the raw. Not a good way to run early voting. - Wordslinger - Saturday, Nov 1, 14 @ 9:06 pm: I question the Rauner crew’s GOTV strategy of going apey over the Grimm candidacy. Why spend money to tell your supposed base voters that there is a Libertarian alternative? Even worse, the effort got play in media, giving the Libs free publicity. I think they’ve had an extreme and foolish over-reaction to a few Libertarian mailers. - Madison - Saturday, Nov 1, 14 @ 9:15 pm: Willys right the only way to TRULY know who’s ahead is with their plus count lists, and those are very closely held right now. - Madison - Saturday, Nov 1, 14 @ 9:24 pm: Guys I firmly believe that the undervotes in this race could be significant. How do you project that? MJM could have a great Constituional Amendment for next cycles ballot! A none of the above box on the ballot! - Anonymous - Saturday, Nov 1, 14 @ 9:24 pm: Madison, you are correct. That is the point I was making about OW’s post. Without the plus count list there is no way to know who these raw numbers favor. - Oswego Willy - Saturday, Nov 1, 14 @ 9:32 pm: - Anonymous -, if I confuse you, but then you agree with - Madison -, it had to be you, not me. The big question is the plurality the Dems feel the need (250,000 - unknowns = alleged/guessed margins) ===Horrible news for the Dems.=== I stand by that, 100%. The fear they may have is knowing the Pluses v. Margins. - Mighty M. Mouse - Saturday, Nov 1, 14 @ 10:27 pm: ===As I told you months ago, the Quinnsters were hoping to increase their electorate by 250,000 over four years ago. It’s not gonna be close to that, despite millions spent on the effort.=== I’m not sure if you mean register 250,000 voters or get 250,000 more voters to vote for Pat Quinn. If you mean the latter, since Quinn got 1,745,219 votes in 2010, he’d need almost two million votes, and I think that flunks the “reasonableness” test. It sounds too unrealistic to have been their goal. If you mean the former that’s hard to believe too. - Wordslinger - Sunday, Nov 2, 14 @ 1:19 am: Mark Brown has a hilarious column today. The Cook County GOP chair (try to guess, no google) says that running no candidates for countywide office helps Bruce Rauner. Keeping it on the down low just magnifies exponentially the GOP vote. Given that logic, the fact that the GOP has no organization whatsoever in most of the county, the only question is whether Rauner will exceed Gov. Brady’s landslide victory against Quinn. Can’t beat the Hopeless 98 County Romantics, except in elections. - Anonymous - Sunday, Nov 2, 14 @ 10:01 am: Quinn’s inside polling shows him down 4 points. - Grandson of Man - Sunday, Nov 2, 14 @ 10:23 am: I saw this morning on the news that there were lines at early voting locations in Cook County and/or Chicago this weekend. From what I can tell, this comes down to how the bases will vote. Can Quinn get enough African-Americans and Cook County voters to vote for him, and can Rauner overcome his weaker numbers downstate? What about Chad Grimm and the weaker numbers downstate for Rauner? Is the apparent GOP bleed-out fatal to his chances? Is Rauner’s mixed-message social policy actually hurting him–along with conservative union members downstate? Rauner is in Chicago today to campaign in an African-American church, which seems like sound strategy, and then he’ll head downstate to campaign with Chris Christie. Is that good, being seen with Christie? - Roadiepig - Sunday, Nov 2, 14 @ 10:40 am: Grandson of Man- saw on Headline News that Christie was set to appear in something like 30+ states for candidates this weekend. Not sure if it’s because he is so popular all over the country or if it’s because he’s the head of Republicn Governors Association (I’m leaning towards the second one). And please- will people stop using the term desperate for anything that either canidate does these last few days? It’s becoming as trite a saying as “Kool-Aid drinker” about anyone who pulls for the candidate they are opposed to ( and considering the Kool-Aid has origins in the Jonestown mass suicide it is way over the top and inappropriate) . Just because a candidate pulls out all the stops to win doesn’t make them anything but a decent politicians. Would you be less surprised if Quinn or Rauner just stayed home and watched football all day instead? - Roadiepig - Sunday, Nov 2, 14 @ 10:42 am: Sorry - I should have put the second part of my comment on the “Rauner scared of African American TSA agents” thread (but I stick by what I said) - Wordslinger - Sunday, Nov 2, 14 @ 10:44 am: Again with the Chris Christie? Downstate? I don’t understand. Did the cheez-whiz kids put in a call to Rand Paul? There’s a guy with some star power who could have delivered a powerful rebuttal to the Grimm candidacy. He’s campaigning all over the country for GOP candidates. - Responsa - Sunday, Nov 2, 14 @ 11:26 am: I’s fun trying to make sense of politics, isn’t it? Roadiepig has my thanks and has received my early vote this morning for calling out the overload of “desperate” and “kool-aid drinker” name calling by partisan commenters trying to dismiss the opposition’s tactics and gotv efforts regardless of party. To that I’d also like to add the dopey hyphen-bot silliness as in Raunner-bot and Quinn-bot to describe any one who votes for the other guy regardless of their reasons or thought processes might be. - Mighty M. Mouse - Sunday, Nov 2, 14 @ 11:59 am: ===- Anonymous - Sunday, Nov 2, 14 @ 10:01 am: Quinn’s inside polling shows him down 4 points.=== Oh yeah? Well, I’ll see your 4 points and raise you 2. Rauner’s inside polling shows him down 6! So there. - Anonymous - Sunday, Nov 2, 14 @ 12:18 pm: 6 is the number on the dot, but it’s what Rauners polling showing what he is up. - Oswego Willy - Sunday, Nov 2, 14 @ 12:21 pm: ===6 is the number on the dot, but it’s what Rauners polling showing what he is up.=== “20 is the number on the dot, but it’s what Rauners polling showing what he is up in this Primary.” - March 16, 2014. - (618) Democrat - Sunday, Nov 2, 14 @ 1:18 pm: @anon 10:01 Not true and not close to truth! - Mighty M. Mouse - Sunday, Nov 2, 14 @ 4:38 pm: ===6 is the number on the dot, but it’s what Rauners polling showing what he is up.=== This time I really could believe YOU (despite that you lied the first time) but not the result. I can believe Rauner’s polling really IS that far off! Sorry, comments for this post are now closed.