CA-45: KATIE BAR THE DOOR! Porter UP by 261; no looking back!

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It happening slowly but surely … Katie Porter is eclipsing Mimi Walkerts in C-45.

Updated text, 5:00 11/13

We’ll update the “What’s Left to Count” in due time (working on CA-39 right now), but this result is not going to change in Mimi’s direction, other than a possible hiccup here or there.  OJB CALLS IT FOR KATIE!  Dems have three out of four flips in OC; just one left to go!

(Text below was prior to Tuesday, November 13 results)

For the second time in three consecutive reporting cycles, Katie Porter has cut Rep. Mimi Walters’s lead almost exactly in half.  Friday’s report saw 4037-vote lead cut to 2020; Saturday’s meager count saw a cut of 11 votes (the raw numbers being 107,132 to 105,123.) Today that 2009 vote lead has been cut, seemingly reflecting some cosmic sense of humor, to 1,011 votes.  The raw vote numbers are 110,853 to 109,841.

That means that of the votes included in this last count, which are probably a better indication of what is to come than the poll or earlier absentee votes, Porter received 4,718 votes to 3,721 for Walters — a share of 55.9%.  In other words, she’s picking up 118 voters per every 1000 counted.  So if there are about 8,570 — let’s make it 8600 to be safe — more votes counted in this race, at that rate of gain she wins by a fraction of a vote.  (No, there are no fractional votes.  It’s just a guideline.)

So how many votes are left to count?  Here’s what I wrote on Facebook on Friday when that leap of 2,000 votes was reported:

Here is the ROV’s vaunted “What’s Left to Count” feature:

Total estimated number of ballots to count (after Election Day): 437,980
Total estimated number of ballots counted (after Election Day): 71,544
Total Estimated Left to Count: 366,436

Vote-by-Mail Left to Count
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots to count: 55800
Total vote-by-mail ballots counted: 51,835
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots left to count: 3,965

Provisionals Left to Count
Total estimated number of provisionals to count: 160000
Total provisionals counted: 0
Total estimated number of provisionals left to count: 160,000

Vote-by-Mail Returned at Polling Places Left to Count
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots returned at the polls to count: 187800
Total vote-by-mail ballots returned at the polls counted: 18,860
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots returned at the polls left to count: 168,940

Election Day Paper Left to Count
Total estimated number of election day paper ballots to count: 13200
Total election day paper ballots counted: 849
Total estimated number of election day paper ballots left to count: 12,351

Eligible Vote-by-Mail Ballots received after Election Day Left to Count
Total estimated number of eligible vote-by-mail ballots received after Election Day left to count: 19,380
Total eligible vote-by-mail ballots counted: 0
Total estimated number of eligible vote-by-mail ballots left to count: 19,380

Conditional Voter Registrations Left to Count
Total estimated number of Conditional Voter Registrations to count: 1,800
Total eligible Conditional Voter Registrations counted: 0
Total estimated number of Conditional Voter Registrations left to count: 1,800

Of the 722.212 votes recorded as cast in the election so far, 205.930 of them have had votes in the CA-45 race. That’s about 28.5% — almost exactly 2/7 — which is a pretty reasonable estimate for one of the districts where people are most inclined to vote. If that proportion held up for the votes left to count, that would be about 125,000 votes yet to be tallied in this rase — and those categories remaining are likely to lead Democratic.

There are other differences between the tallied and yet-to-be-tallied votes which would suggest a lower estimate — but if those votes are from a similar pool as the ones tallied today (which is the way to bet), Then one would expect a Porter win by about 4,000 votes. If they’re only half as likely to support Porter as today’s batch, then you’d still expect a Porter win by about 1,000 votes.

No prediction here, just noting the impact of a pretty great day for Katie Porter.

OK, let’s update those figures with today’s data:

Total estimated number of ballots to count (after Election Day): 441,011
Total estimated number of ballots counted (after Election Day): 138,116
Total Estimated Left to Count: 302,895

Vote-by-Mail Left to Count
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots to count: 55800
Total vote-by-mail ballots counted: 55,800
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots left to count: 0

Provisionals Left to Count
Total estimated number of provisionals to count: 160000
Total provisionals counted: 0
Total estimated number of provisionals left to count: 160,000

Vote-by-Mail Returned at Polling Places Left to Count
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots returned at the polls to count: 187800
Total vote-by-mail ballots returned at the polls counted: 81,305
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots returned at the polls left to count: 106,495

Election Day Paper Left to Count
Total estimated number of election day paper ballots to count: 13200
Total election day paper ballots counted: 1,011
Total estimated number of election day paper ballots left to count: 12,189

Eligible Vote-by-Mail Ballots received after Election Day Left to Count
Total estimated number of eligible vote-by-mail ballots received after Election Day left to count: 20,947
Total eligible vote-by-mail ballots counted: 0
Total estimated number of eligible vote-by-mail ballots left to count: 20,947

Conditional Voter Registrations Left to Count

Total estimated number of Conditional Voter Registrations to count: 3,264
Total eligible Conditional Voter Registrations counted: 0
Total estimated number of Conditional Voter Registrations left to count: 3,264

Of the 788,784 votes recorded as cast in the election so far, 220,693 of them have had votes in the CA-45 race. That’s about 28.0% — a little bit under 2/7 — which is a pretty reasonable estimate for one of the districts where people are most inclined to vote. If that proportion held up for the votes left to count, that would be about 84,746 votes yet to be tallied in this rase — and those categories remaining are likely to lead Democratic.

There are other differences between the tallied and yet-to-be-tallied votes which would suggest a lower estimate — for example, it could be that all of the votes for CA-45 have already been counted or that a disproportionate number of pro-Katie as opposed to pro-Mimi votes have already been counted — but I don’t know of any reason to think so.  (Information about the entire race is available to anyone who wants to delve into the RV’s analytics — but this is earlier than I would normally do so in what doesn’t look likely to be that close a finish.)  If those votes are from a similar pool as the ones tallied today — the “55.9% to Porter” batch — then one would expect that the margin would swing Porter’s way by literally 9,994 votes — giving her an 8.983-vote win.

In fact, if we presume that 2/3 of those votes are disqualified (beyond those ballots without votes in the race, which are already factored out by the 28% figure), that leaves about 101,000 valid ones. If Porter wins only 50.5% of them (gaining 10 votes per every thousand) — Mimi would win the race by exactly one vote. Both of those presumptions seem far too pessimistic for Porter — which means that she should win.

We’re not going to call the race — because that’s not what we do here — but personally I’d borrow money to take a straight up bet that, absent a Florida style order to stop counting or some other extremely wild outside development, Porter wins this one.