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Covid influencing US politics
Dec. 26th, 2021 09:12 pmThere's been some speculation that in the US the difference in Covid deaths between "red" and "blue" areas will be enough to change some election results. It is true that red areas are seeing much higher death rates. This appears to be happening when one looks at data at both a state and county level. This is very likely due to lower vaccination rates among some Republicans and self-identified conservatives, and yet the majority of every major demographic political group, Republicans, Democrats, self-identified liberals, self-identified conservatives, and self-identified centrists, are vaccinated. At the same time, vaccination rates are lower among Republicans than among other groups, and a vocal minority of anti-vax Republicans are making it seem like a more common Republican position than it is.
However, it seems unlikely that the differences in vaccination rate, and thus death rate is enough to alter many elections. It could alter a close election, and that's especially likely in a Presidential election. Georgia was decided by a margin of a little under 12,000 votes, and has had around 30,000 Covid deaths. (There's some reason to think that Covid death totals are being undercounted, and that this undercount is especially strong in red leaning states and red counties of red states. But actually determining how much of an undercount this is seems very difficult). But despite that, it seems unlikely that Covid will by itself be enough to change a Presidential election.
What about Senate and House elections? This seems a bit more plausible, but the House is so gerrymandered that this doesn't seem to be that likely. And even aside from Gerrymandering, the Democrats are just really unpopular right now, and the generic congressional ballot looks bad for them.
Governor elections seem to tell a similar story. Virginia's off-year gubernatorial election was decided by about 60,000 votes, but that was after there was already an uptick in "red" voters dying, so that already bakes some of that in. Even if it didn't, Virginia has had around 16,000 Covid deaths, not enough to change an election result.
However, there are two unappreciated sets of elections where Covid deaths may have a major influence. Local elections have much lower turnout than state-wide or federal elections. And primaries have very low turnout also. More importantly, the data suggests that the most likely to be unvaccinated Republicans are one who are more conservative. Thus, this may mean that there will be fewer right-wing voters coming out to vote in primaries. Here, then the numbers do look a lot more plausible. Let's look again at the Virginia governor election, but this time at the primaries. The Republican governor was decided at a convention with a form of ranked choice ballot . But that's less important than the fact the total numbers are tiny. The final difference in the last round of elimination was 1182, which is tiny. If there's only a small number of conservative voters dying, that still can look drastically different. And that's before we get to how since there were six candidates in this election, it is potentially sensitive to the order of elimination in the various rounds. And the final round candidate who Youngkin beat, Pete Snyder, was noticeably to his right.
Other elections also look pretty close. The Republican senate primary in Alabama was decided by around 12,000 votes. Right now, about 16,000 people have died officially from Covid in Alabama. It would need to be an extreme ratio to have an influence on the election of that sort (especially because many of the initial deaths in Alabama have been among poor African-American communities, as well as in the major cities, and those people are not going to be right-wing anti-vax conservatives generally). But if that election were slightly closer, it starts looking pretty plausible.
Many other primary elections state and local offices have similarly low turnout. Obviously, this isn't universally the case, but it does seem to be common. If this pattern is enough, it may not change much in the way of general elections directly, but it may result in more moderate Republicans winning primaries. That may moderate the Republican party as a whole, but it might also help the Republican party itself, as more moderate candidates may be more likely to win general elections.
However, it seems unlikely that the differences in vaccination rate, and thus death rate is enough to alter many elections. It could alter a close election, and that's especially likely in a Presidential election. Georgia was decided by a margin of a little under 12,000 votes, and has had around 30,000 Covid deaths. (There's some reason to think that Covid death totals are being undercounted, and that this undercount is especially strong in red leaning states and red counties of red states. But actually determining how much of an undercount this is seems very difficult). But despite that, it seems unlikely that Covid will by itself be enough to change a Presidential election.
What about Senate and House elections? This seems a bit more plausible, but the House is so gerrymandered that this doesn't seem to be that likely. And even aside from Gerrymandering, the Democrats are just really unpopular right now, and the generic congressional ballot looks bad for them.
Governor elections seem to tell a similar story. Virginia's off-year gubernatorial election was decided by about 60,000 votes, but that was after there was already an uptick in "red" voters dying, so that already bakes some of that in. Even if it didn't, Virginia has had around 16,000 Covid deaths, not enough to change an election result.
However, there are two unappreciated sets of elections where Covid deaths may have a major influence. Local elections have much lower turnout than state-wide or federal elections. And primaries have very low turnout also. More importantly, the data suggests that the most likely to be unvaccinated Republicans are one who are more conservative. Thus, this may mean that there will be fewer right-wing voters coming out to vote in primaries. Here, then the numbers do look a lot more plausible. Let's look again at the Virginia governor election, but this time at the primaries. The Republican governor was decided at a convention with a form of ranked choice ballot . But that's less important than the fact the total numbers are tiny. The final difference in the last round of elimination was 1182, which is tiny. If there's only a small number of conservative voters dying, that still can look drastically different. And that's before we get to how since there were six candidates in this election, it is potentially sensitive to the order of elimination in the various rounds. And the final round candidate who Youngkin beat, Pete Snyder, was noticeably to his right.
Other elections also look pretty close. The Republican senate primary in Alabama was decided by around 12,000 votes. Right now, about 16,000 people have died officially from Covid in Alabama. It would need to be an extreme ratio to have an influence on the election of that sort (especially because many of the initial deaths in Alabama have been among poor African-American communities, as well as in the major cities, and those people are not going to be right-wing anti-vax conservatives generally). But if that election were slightly closer, it starts looking pretty plausible.
Many other primary elections state and local offices have similarly low turnout. Obviously, this isn't universally the case, but it does seem to be common. If this pattern is enough, it may not change much in the way of general elections directly, but it may result in more moderate Republicans winning primaries. That may moderate the Republican party as a whole, but it might also help the Republican party itself, as more moderate candidates may be more likely to win general elections.
