Still trying to understand Maine results.

[Funtatlaguy]

President
Trump 44%
Biden 53%

Senate
Collins 51%
Gideon 42%

https://www.google.com/search?q=maine+senate+election+results+2020&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&hl=en-us&client=safari

And Gideon led or was tied in almost all of the late polling.
What the hell happened in Maine?

[Silent3]

1. Probably less a matter of strangely split tickets...

...and more a matter of people showing up to vote for Biden (and against Trump), then failing to vote down-ticket at all.

[Statistical]

3. Collins got more votes than Trump.

So it very clearly is split ticketing for at least some of the vote.

[JI7]

8. The poster is saying that some people that voted for Biden only voted for him

and didn't vote on anything else.

[Statistical]

12. I get that but if that were the case Collins wouldn't have more votes than Trump.

Last edited Mon Nov 9, 2020, 09:56 PM - Edit history (1)

We would see Biden with the most and then both Collins and Trump way down. Trump is way down but Collins is not. There is a significant number of people who voted for Collins and didn't vote for Trump. That is clearly obvious by the vote counts from both races.

[JI7]

15. Yes, that's true and a common thing. People often have their own relationships

with their senators and reps. It could be anything from pork projects that help with jobs or even just help filling out forms for govt aid .

But things which aren't exactly about views on issues but more about them helping out with personal matters.

[onenote]

18. The total number of votes in the presidential and senate races in ME were nearly identical

There were around 813,300 votes cast in the presidential race and 811,400 in the Senate race.

While it wasn't enough to make a difference in the outcome, the margin by which Gideon lost (51.1 - 42.2) may reflect the fact that around 54,000 votes (6.7%) were siphoned off by two independent party candidates. I'm guessing the polling simply didn't accurately factor in the third party candidates, which is why it seemed a lot closer before election day.

Maine is one of the places where a GOP senate candidate outperformed Trump. In contrast, check South Carolina, Kentucky and North Carolina -- all won by Republicans senate candidates who didn't get as big a percentage of the vote as Trump did.

[Statistical]

2. People voted split ticket.

They voted for Biden and then red down the rest of the ballot. Why the polling was so bad? The polling was beyond horrific everywhere. As soon as returns starting coming in for Florida that was obvious.

[Claustrum]

4. If you are right, then we are in for a tough few years ahead.

If there isn't another Trump like figure, they will freely vote for the republicans and we will be outnumbered.

[Statistical]

5. Well maine is a little weird and Collins is an incumbent.

I wouldn't translate Collins race to the overall nation but yeah it is clear we aren't as competitive in the senate as we hoped (and polls led us to believe). I will leave it up to the experts to figure out why and what we do to change that.

[Claustrum]

7. that's my main concern right now.

We lost the senate since 2010? We really need to be more competitive with more states.

[In It to Win It]

20. Senate, since 2014. House lost in 2010 and regained in 2018

[Kashkakat v.2.0]

6. it just means that 7% are conservatives who hate Trump but are

happy with RW congress. Its been a phenomenon in other places. Nothing mysterious about it. Back in the day "swing voting" or split ticket used to be a much more common thing - back before the age of extreme polarization and identity politics.

[Dem2]

9. In NH Senator Shaheen won by 18%, Biden by 7%

People are comfortable with their experienced senators?

[JI7]

10. I think Collins voting against ACB helped her. Many people don't pay close attention

to the process . How there are Multiple votes and Collins never did anything to stop her. And during the final vote when ACB had enough to confirm without Collins she was allowed to vote against to help her politically but without changing the outcome.

[LAS14]

11. All or almost all of the polls showed a number of undecideds...

.. equal to the spread. I interpret this to mean that Trump voters were lying to pollsters. I think there's a good chunk of GOP voters that are so hostile to institutions that they want to destroy the pollsters. Just like they wish the MSM would self destruct. I don't know what we do about this.

[onenote]

19. around 6.7 percent of the vote went to third party independent candidates, not Collins or Gideon

[Iris]

13. Here in GA I heard a trend of voting red down ticket and blue for POTUS has been discovered.

I mean, if you like having Susan Collins as your Senator but not a Cheeto for President, you might split your ticket.

[Dem4Life1102]

14. Never Trump republicans

are still republicans.

[KentuckyWoman]

16. They voted for Collins and Biden.

In my district the Republican congressman got significantly more votes than Trump.

[OAITW r.2.0]

17. I've been voting in ME since 72.

I can't explain this. I suspect that the 2nd District helped Collins, but the State was clear about Trump.

[Amishman]

21. Moderates who disliked the idea of one party controlling congress and the white house?

[Funtatlaguy]

22. Thanx for responses. Would love to hear from more Mainers.

[treestar]

23. Sticking by their own senator

While wanting dump out.

Typical. State likes their senator even if the rest of the country does not

[radius777]

24. I wonder if Bradley effect

Gideon is Indian+Armenian woman of color. She seems like she was a good candidate for the state, good resume and perfectly suited for the 'soccer mom' vote.

Collins is horrible and has no redeeming qualities.

This race needs to be studied, but I wonder if the Bradley effect could be at play, where voters in a very white state were uncomfortable with a brown woman, lied to pollsters, then voted for Biden and crossed over to vote for Collins.

[Sewa]

25. They don't understand rank voting