What’s up with the state treasurer’s race?
Friday, Nov 7, 2014 - Posted by Rich Miller
* Scott Kennedy’s Illinois Election Data website is by far the most useful, most up to date, most indispensable site anywhere in this state. He’s far ahead of both the AP and Reuters, and that’s why I’m using his numbers (posted in the near upper right hand corner) as we track the oh so close state treasurer’s race.
Kennedy was concerned about the freshness of numbers from 20 small counties, so I had my new intern Marc Reiter call all of them today. Nothing has changed yet from the AP’s original results.
* So, who’s gonna win this thing? Scott wrote the following analysis exclusively for us…
The margin as of the morning of 11/7 is Cross by 11,407 per my unofficial count.
Here is what is known and unknown:
The City of Chicago still has almost 24K votes to count and Frerichs will net a margin probably somewhere between 10K and 15K out of that.
I am told that Cook has about 13K votes to count. Yesterday Cook counted about 6,500 votes and Frerichs netted about 1,500 votes, if that trend stays the same Frerichs will likely net another 2,000 to 4,00 votes here.
On Wednesday night, both DuPage and McHenry updated their numbers from election night. I expect these were mail ballots. Cross netted about 3,700 and 4,900 votes respectively from those two updates. As near as I can tell neither Lake or Will has provided a similar update. Also, Kane should be looked at too but it’s important to remember that both the Kane County Clerk and the Aurora election authority have jurisdiction there.
* Here are some questions that when answered would give us a better picture overall:
- In these collar counties, how many uncounted votes are there that are not included in the data publicly available on the county websites and when is it expected to be counted/updated?
- It would also be helpful if someone did the same for the next 20 or so biggest counties.
- Last, the State Board of Elections typically has no election results until the certified totals are reported to them in about a month but one bit of useful information they do have concerns the number of early voters and vote by mail applicants. During the election season each election authority has to report the list of people voting early or by mail within about 48 hours to the State Board and then that data is made available to the state parties so they can update their voter files nightly. The State Board should be able to use this data to give a count by county of the number of vote by mail people for each.
It’s important to remember that even with vote by mail there will be several numbers here. The number of people who applied for a ballot, the number of ballots returned to the election authorities that either have been counted or still need to be counted, and then the number of ballots that have not yet been returned but potentially could still legally show up in the mail and be valid votes.
You can do a little math to come up with some likely scenarios based on what is known but there are a lot of unknowns still to be resolved before you can accurately predict the final outcome for sure.
- Formerly Known As... - Friday, Nov 7, 14 @ 12:03 pm:
Posting that tracker in the corner of the site was a great idea, Rich.
Thank you.
- Almost the Weekend - Friday, Nov 7, 14 @ 12:10 pm:
The City of Chicago still has almost 24K votes to count and Frerichs will net a margin probably somewhere between 10K and 15K out of that.
=I am told that Cook has about 13K votes to count. Yesterday Cook counted about 6,500 votes and Frerichs netted about 1,500 votes, if that trend stays the same Frerichs will likely net another 2,000 to 4,00 votes here.=
So there are 37,000 ballots still to be counted in Chicago and Cook County suburbs combined? That paragraph was kind of confusing.
- Rich Miller - Friday, Nov 7, 14 @ 12:11 pm:
Yes. And I don’t see why you think that paragraph was confusing.
- OneMan - Friday, Nov 7, 14 @ 12:13 pm:
With the Aurora election commission you also have some (not too much) Will and Kendall counties as well.
Fairly confident based off the last update time for the Aurora election commission all of the absentee and early votes that were in the office would have been counted.
- steve schnorf - Friday, Nov 7, 14 @ 12:26 pm:
sounds like Tom by 1,000-2,000
- Yellow Dog Democrat - Friday, Nov 7, 14 @ 12:42 pm:
On a side note, when I heard that Rauner had assembled the best and the brightest for his transition team, I was genuinely disappointed to not see you name on that list.
Rich, I think that’s a good QOTD:
Whose name wasn’t on the Transition Team list but should have been?
- Yellow Dog Democrat - Friday, Nov 7, 14 @ 12:54 pm:
Right Presley.
It is a vast left wing conspiracy that rigged all postal equipment to put a postmark on everything but mail-in ballots.
And the 30 GOP lawyers in the room watching the counting of every ballot just ignore it when some county employee risks years of imprisonment by writing a date on the ballot after they witness him unsealing it.
If this WERE a conspiracy involving the post office, wouldn’t it make more sense to unseal the ballots at the post office, put a straight democratic ballot in, reseal, and then run it through to get a post mark so no one would know the difference.
Rich, can we put up a field of magnets around the perimeter to detain the folks with tinfoil hats stitched to their skull?
- Formerly Known As... - Friday, Nov 7, 14 @ 12:55 pm:
== many or most city absentee ballots, if mailed and returned within the city, have no postmarks ==
That cannot be true, can it? Postmarks are used and required for official purposes all the time.
It seems necessary to have a postmark on every letter mailed, whether it is going across a city or across the country. Unless you have a psychic device for every letter processed to sort out the ==important== letters which require a postmark. Absentee balloting alone would be good enough reason to require a postmark on intra-city mail.
- Formerly Known As... - Friday, Nov 7, 14 @ 12:57 pm:
Good deletion, Rich. And thank you for immediately clarifying, YDD. That made no sense at all. Weird.
- OneMan - Friday, Nov 7, 14 @ 1:05 pm:
== It seems necessary to have a postmark on every letter mailed, whether it is going across a city or across the country. ==
Everything is supposed to be postmarked (my dad used to fix that sort of equipment for the PO) if for no other reason it made it so you couldn’t reuse the stamp. At one time letter carriers were told to use a pen on a stamp if they saw one that wasn’t canceled (not sure if that is true anymore).
A useless piece of Friday trivia, Hallmark on some envelopes would use an ink what would convince the canceling machine the entire thing was a stamp and it could cancel all 4 corners…
- Yellow Dog Democrat - Friday, Nov 7, 14 @ 1:11 pm:
Schnorf:
I’d still love to see that math.
- Anonymous - Friday, Nov 7, 14 @ 1:25 pm:
So, when is a result expected? Monday?
- 1776 - Friday, Nov 7, 14 @ 1:34 pm:
I see a Frerichs win.
Cross is up by 11,400
Frerichs nets between 10,00-15,000 in Chicago - We’ll say 12,500
Frerichs nets between 2,00-4,000 in Cook - we’ll say 3,000
So Frerichs picks up 15,500. That leaves him with a +3,100 votes.
Cross will need to pick up 3,100+ in Kane, Lake and Will County to surpass Frerichs (McHenry & DuPage are already in).
Is this accurate?
- 1776 - Friday, Nov 7, 14 @ 1:35 pm:
I meant 4,100
- Soccermom - Friday, Nov 7, 14 @ 1:46 pm:
Totally disagree with FKA. I am so upset that it was deleted before I could read it, because it sounds like it was an award-winner…
- Mia wallace - Friday, Nov 7, 14 @ 1:50 pm:
Well according to everyone here picking frerichs to win, there were no mail in or absentee ballots received in downstate counties like McLean, Adams, Boone, Tazewell, and on and on..
- SouthSide - Friday, Nov 7, 14 @ 1:52 pm:
Rich - thanks again for such great election - and post-election - coverage.
Without getting too far ahead, what happens if Frerichs wins? Is there a special election for his seat?
- OneMan - Friday, Nov 7, 14 @ 1:54 pm:
Mia…
Odds are the smaller areas were able to process their ballots on election night from the mail-in/absentee voters. That would exclude the ones still coming in however.
- Ron - Friday, Nov 7, 14 @ 1:54 pm:
Given the 24K uncounted votes from Chicago and the 13K uncounted votes from suburban Cook County, if the current voting pattern/trajectory holds up I think Frerichs is probably going to end up with a higher vote total than Cross when the vote count is finalized.
- Joe Maddon - Friday, Nov 7, 14 @ 2:06 pm:
Cross by 1500-2000 and will cost Rauner and State GOP some decent size cash after the lawyers are called in. Rauner for sure will pick up tab, bet it and book it.
- Formerly Known As... - Friday, Nov 7, 14 @ 2:18 pm:
Soccermom - I stand corrected
- Yellow Dog Democrat - Friday, Nov 7, 14 @ 3:08 pm:
Mia:
It is not just that most all of the downstate mail in ballots have been counted.
Frerichs has been winning Chicago 75-19. A margin of 56%.
Cross won DuPage by only 58-37. A margin of only 21%.
That means that for Cross to make up a 4100 vote deficit there would have to be roughly 20,000 ballots still to be counted downstate.
The other problem of course is that the assumption is that any outstanding provisional ballots are expected to lean Slightly more democratic than the general voting population.
Democrats move more.
- Mia wallace - Friday, Nov 7, 14 @ 3:10 pm:
Yes @oneman..i spoke with a downstate County clerk today who has 273 ballots received since Nov 4th and not counted.. She plans to count them Nov 18th..its a county Cross won 65-35..how many more of those are out there?
- HoosierDaddy - Friday, Nov 7, 14 @ 3:25 pm:
Recount. Court battle. Hang on for the ride.
- Mia wallace - Friday, Nov 7, 14 @ 3:25 pm:
Ydd..all due respect, u lost your credibility when you claimed there were still 75000 votes to count in cook County..
- thechampaignlife - Friday, Nov 7, 14 @ 3:30 pm:
SouthSide - What I’ve been told is that the county party chairs get a weighted vote to seat a candidate which essentially means that Champaign County Democrats chair Al Klein singlehandedly gets to choose.
That doesn’t seem like a good system, though, so perhaps what I heard is wrong.
- Yellow Dog Democrat - Friday, Nov 7, 14 @ 3:30 pm:
273 ballot received. A 30 percent pick-up for Cross.
71 votes.
All he needs is about 600 more counties, Mia.
Look, there is another reason that provisional ballots lean slightly more Democratic than the electorate.
Let’s face it, in a county with only 3,000 voters where everyone knows everybody, an election judge is not going to make you fill out a provisional ballot just because you moved down the street are a couple blocks over.
The election judge probably isn’t even going to do an affidavit. So, you get to vote like everybody else.
In Chicago, if you move one house down you get bumped off the voter rolls and get to go stand in line for nine hours.
- Lost in Chicago - Friday, Nov 7, 14 @ 3:35 pm:
The potential release of the Braver report comes down to a few thousand outstanding ballots. Wow.
- OneMan - Friday, Nov 7, 14 @ 3:45 pm:
Sorry Mia, I guess I wasn’t clear…
Cook and the city likely have not processed the stuff they had before election day. That is why they have more. Most other authorities have processed that stuff so they are going to see a tickle of ballots at this point.
- steve schnorf - Friday, Nov 7, 14 @ 4:02 pm:
have there been no new numbers at all added today, because the tracker doesn’t seem to have changed at all?
- The Captain - Friday, Nov 7, 14 @ 4:34 pm:
If there any significant changes they’re most likely to come from Chicago, the Cook suburbs, Lake or Will and none of those have new updated numbers so far today.
- Rich Miller - Friday, Nov 7, 14 @ 4:37 pm:
Steve, we’ve been calling counties much of the day. No new numbers yet.