Every four years, Democrats in Virginia tend to underperform polls of the governor’s race, and Republicans tend to overperform. In five of the most recent polls of the race this year, Republican Glenn Youngkin and Democrat Terry McAuliffe have been tied or Youngkin has had a slight lead. This race will come down to the wire and should be appropriately labeled a “toss-up” by any reasonable standard. However, in the case of a toss-up, Youngkin would historically be on the winning side if the history of Virginia elections serves as an accurate guide.
Here’s a rundown and analysis of the most recent polling of the Virginia governor’s race between Terry McAuliffe and Glenn Youngkin.
Monmouth University (Oct. 16-19, 1,005 RV, Poll Data)
• Youngkin 46%
• McAuliffe 46%
KAConsulting LLC (Oct. 18-21, 661 LV, Poll Data)
• Youngkin 43%
• McAuliffe 41%
Cygnal (Oct. 19-21, 816 LV, Poll Data)
• Youngkin 48%
• McAuliffe 48%
Emerson College (Oct. 22-23, 875 LV, Poll Data)
• Youngkin 49%
• McAuliffe 49%
Suffolk/USA Today (Oct. 21-24, 500 LV, Poll Data)
• Youngkin 45.2%
• McAuliffe 45.6%
If there is anything to learn from looking at polls of this race since September, it’s that McAuliffe has topped out around 48%. The most recent Emerson poll aside, McAuliffe’s ceiling tends to be under 50%, which for the incumbent party is usually bad news. In 2013, McAuliffe won with only 48 percent of the vote. Having already served four years as Governor, McAuliffe runs with some power of the incumbency, and those metrics aren’t looking good.
The other glaring point that most analysts who do not closely follow the Virginia “off-year” elections miss is that Republicans tend to outperform their polling, and Democrats tend to underperform. As evidence, you only need to look at the last two Virginia governor’s races that took place while Democrats occupied the White House, 2009 and 2013.
In 2009, Republican Bob McDonnell was slated to win the race by 13.4 points according to the polling averages. He instead won by 17.5 points in the final result. An overperform of polls by 4.1 percentage points.
In 2013, Republican Ken Cuccinelli was slated to lose the race by 6 points according to the poll averages. Instead, Cuccinelli lost by only 2.5 percentage points, with his final vote coming at 45.5 percent, a full 5.2 percentage points ahead of his polling average. McAuliffe was slated to win that race by 6 points but barely squeaked by with a 2.5 percent victory.
Virginia tends to flip back and forth, historically, with state elections heading the opposite way presidential elections do. 2013 was the exception, where McAuliffe was able to win with less than 50% support, and a libertarian candidate siphoning away 6%.
The long and short of this lesson is that Virginia elections can be hard to poll. Which electorate will show up? Presidential years are exceptions, with higher than average voter turnout and new voter interest. Gubernatorial elections in states like Virginia and New Jersey, the other state with off-year races, typically see a lower turnout and a group of voters who just lost a presidential election eager to vote against the party in the White House.
This year, of course, Republicans have the enthusiasm in Virginia and the excitement of voting for a great candidate. Democrats are looking at weak enthusiasm numbers and even weaker excitement for a washed-up candidate in McAuliffe who couldn’t get people excited if he set them on fire.
As an example of this movement toward the GOP in Virginia, here are some bullet-point items from the Cygnal poll mentioned above:
- K-12 parents are choosing the generic Republican by a major margin (58% R / 38% D on generic)
- Among “Election Day” voters, Youngkin leads 65% to 39%
- Virginia voters are losing faith in Joe Biden; he’s viewed 50% unfavorably and 48% favorably
- Terry McAuliffe is also now viewed more negatively than positively (-1%)
- Women are only +3 favorable for McAuliffe, which is usually a bad sign for a Democratic candidate
- McAuliffe is 71% unfavorable with Independents and only winning 32% of them on the ballot
- 98% of 2020 Trump voters are sticking with Republicans; 91% of Biden voters are with Democrats
Election Day is on Tuesday, November 2, and as everyone knows, that’s the only poll that truly matters.
