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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsLandslide: Biden will achieve the highest level of support by % of eligible electorate since 1980
Last edited Sat Nov 14, 2020, 06:28 PM - Edit history (3)
I wanted to find a way to quantify how much support a candidate achieves to compare support across elections while accounting for an increased number of voters each succeeding election cycle. Why? To understand if a candidate's support has expanded or decreased if running twice, and to compare what percentage of the country actually supported a candidate. Increased turnout over and above the mere increase in eligible voters for that year is an indication of enthusiasm for or against a candidate, and should correlate with their support levels. Normalizing the absolute number to the electorate size provides the desired measure.
By this metric, Joe Biden already has 32.68% and will achieve a level of support of 34.52% of eligible voters (% Voting Eligible Population=%VEP) if he wins 52% of the popular vote as expected, greater than anyone has achieved (including Reagan and Obama) since eligible voter records (not registered voters, not all voters of age) are available. This level suggests that a combination of support for Joe and anti-Trump sentiment is at record highs. To compare, Hillary Clinton only achieved 28.52% in winning the popular vote in 2016. Biden has seen an increase in support in 6% of %VEP over Hillary.
The bad news is that Trump has achieved a 30.42% VEP, with a 31.2% %VEP predicted at the end suggesting Trump has greatly expanded his support from the 2016 level of 27.24% %VEP, an increase of 4% MAGAs, suggesting just how dangerous Trump is, especially since his supporters often are cultish and enthusiastic in trying to spread their beliefs. His final level of %VEP will only be exceeded by Obama in 2008, Reagan in 1984, and Biden this year. This number helps explain why Democrats did not achieve a blue wave-- Trump induced an almost corresponding red wave of enthusiasm, cancelling out much of Biden's large blue wave.
Dawson Leery
(19,348 posts)andym
(5,441 posts)his cult is growing and we can hope that Trump's loss will discourage them, but 30% of the eligible electorate is a lot for Trump or a neo-Trump to exploit.