Mini Tuesday April 26 Primaries discussion thread

Here’s a thread to discuss the 5 primaries being held on April 26.

Pennsylvania: 71 R delegates (54 are unbound) 181 D delegates

Maryland: 38 R delegates 105 D delegates

Delaware: 16 R delegates 27 D delegates

Rhode Island: 19 R delegates 24 D delegates

Connecticut: 28 R delegates 65 D delegates

Looks like another good night for Trump and Clinton. A Brown University poll shows Clinton beating Sanders in Rhode Island 43-34 with 16% undecided. Rhode Island is semi open, those not affiliated with a party can pick either ballot, which works in Sanders’ favor.

The big delegate prize is Pennsylvania and the latest NBC/Marist poll shows Clinton 55% and Sanders 40%.

I’ll be quite interested in the Sanders concession speech. Does he continue scorched earth with some favorable states to him in May? Will all the losses finally slow his fundraising? He’s been burning through money like mad.

Cruz and Kasich have surrendered all 5 states to Trump. Cruz is wooing Indiana while Kasich is onto Oregon and New Mexico as part of their strategy.

PPP shows this as +4 Sanders (49-45) which seems more likely to me than +9 Clinton but it won’t matter much either way since Clinton will win Maryland and almost certainly win PA.

PPP also has Clinton +2 in CT and +9 in PA.

Here are the win probabilities derived from current prices at PredictIt.

Rep side:


		Trump	Cruz	Kasich
Connecticut	97.03%	0.99%	1.98%
Delaware	97.03%	0.99%	1.98%
Maryland	93.94%	1.01%	5.05%
Pennsylvania	97.98%	1.01%	1.01%
Rhode Island	98.00%	1.00%	1.00%

Dem side:


		Clinton	Sanders
Connecticut	78.22%	21.78%
Delaware	95.10%	4.90%
Maryland	98.99%	1.01%
Pennsylvania	95.96%	4.04%
Rhode Island	42.72%	57.28%

Those PredicIt numbers are mostly useless on the Dem side unless you are actually betting on who wins. Also, I think all but the most loco Bernie supporters must realize the race is over now.

Probabilities of certain events occurring on Tuesday are useless in a discussion about what is going to happen on Tuesday? I’m not sure I agree.

They are next to useless for determining what is going on in the Democratic race. So Hillary has a 99% chance of winning Maryland, what does that tell us about how many delegates she will win? At least half, I guess. So now we know she’ll get between 50 and 100% of Maryland’s delegates.

Worth noting that in the PA GOP Primary, individual voters must select delegates, and the ballot does not say which delegates support which candidate.

I suspect that favors Ted Cruz over Donald Trump, given the nature of their respective demographics.

The Democratic side doesn’t mean much anymore. Bernie isn’t going to make it, turnout will be lower, and where the primaries are open enough independents will move more to the GOP race. There could be a big Bernie turnout down the road in CA, but that depends a lot on how far Hillary gets by then.

On the dark side, it’s all a question of whether Trump can hit 1237, or over 1100, the latter seemingly inevitable. So the independent turnout in open primaries is the big factor there, and difficult to read because there may be just as many anti-Trump as pro-Trump votes. I think there’s a fair chance Trump goes over 1000 tomorrow putting him close to the same position of presumptive nominee that Hillary has, and inevitably taking him over 1100, considered by many the point where the party can’t afford to take it away from him.

Delegate predictions based on 538’s polls-plus model (with some interpolation for Delaware for which there is no polls-plus):


		Clinton	Sanders
Connecticut	28.71	26.29
Delaware	11.91	9.09
Maryland	61.93	33.07
Pennsylvania	110.80	78.20
Rhode Island	12.21	11.79
Total		225.56	158.44
Net		67.12	-67.12

I can’t find where I read it but apparently Cruz kind of uncharacteristically dropped the ball in PA. He hasn’t gotten a full slate of delegates ready and a lot of the less partisan ones are planning to vote however the statewide or their congressional district voted, which likely means Trump as he is polling strong.

Similar to the other article I read:

http://www.mcall.com/news/local/elections/mc-pa-republican-delegates-presidential-picks-20160420-story.html

Oops. I had Rhode Island backwards in my last post.


		Clinton	Sanders
Connecticut	28.71	26.29
Delaware	11.91	9.09
Maryland	61.93	33.07
Pennsylvania	110.80	78.20
Rhode Island	11.79	12.21
Total		225.14	158.86
Net		66.28	-66.28

For what it’s worth I think the margins in PA and MD are a little high in 538’s model.

So do I. Your calculations have Clinton with an overall 17 point delegate spread (ironically enough, what Sanders would be needing to do if he was to be catching up). Double digit maybe but that seems high.

The race is over but the nature of the process from here and its potential impact on outcomes at the top of the ticket to the bottom are still to be determined.

I just took the median values from 538’s polls-plus model. Right now it’s at Clinton 57.5% - Sanders 39.9%.

I think the recent Harper Polling poll at Clinton +28 has a lot of weight in the model, but I’d be shocked if that poll was accurate.

Whoa, really? I see all sorts of potential for misinformation there. Candidate A can send volunteers to a precinct which favors B, and tell the voters as they’re going into the polling place that A’s delegates are B’s. Of course, they may or may not have to contend with B’s volunteers there also telling folks, but then it’s a question of who the voters believe.

Oh I believe your math!

I just agree with your incredulity regarding what the model predicts.

Here are two lists of Pennsylvania’s prospective district delegates, along with whom they say they will vote for:

Allentown/Lehigh Valley Morning Call (Monday)

Sean Hannity (last Thursday)

Is that a new rule this year? I don’t remember PA being subject to so much of an opportunity for a massive cock-up before now.

There is also this market at PredictIt: Will the margin of victory in the Pennsylvania Democratic primary exceed 13 percentage points?

Right now it’s at around 67% Yes 33% No. So getting close to a 17% margin may not be impossible.

Aha! You just reminded me of the article I talked about upthread. It’s on conservative blogsite hot air:
http://hotair.com/archives/2016/04/21/uh-oh-has-cruz-been-trumped-in-trying-to-win-over-pennsylvanias-delegates/

It includes a link to a spreadsheet that American Commitment President Phil Kerpen has put together of the PA delegates.

Trump will sweep, and Hillary will near sweep everything except Rhode Island; a state almost as liberal as Vermont, no, even moreso; it voted for Carter twice and voted Dukakis, as well as the most recent 6 elections. Also, its not a fully closed primary.