To: Interested Parties From: Hilltop Public Solutions – Colorado Date: October 30th Re: What to Watch for in Colorado 2020 In just a few days, Colorado voting will come to an end, and the results will begin to be released. As longtime Colorado political operatives, we are offering up a few things to look for, with some historical context. First, a question, and a prediction. The question: What is the largest statewide margin of victory in the last decade? ​ Answer: 2018, Jared Polis defeat Walker Stapleton 53.4%-42.8% for a margin of 10.6%* ​ ● Technically, John Hickenlooper won by 14.6% in 2010, but that was a fractured GOP ticket; Hickenlooper’s 51% of the vote is the more relevant number. The 2020 prediction: Joe Biden and John Hickenlooper will both exceed Polis’ 2018 victory ​ ​ ​ margin. In what is undoubtedly one of the greatest movies of all time, Remember the Titans, in the ​ ​ penultimate scene, Coach Yoast says to Coach Boone, “Run it up Herman...leave no doubt.” The Democratic Party goal for the 2020 election is to run up the score and leave no doubt that this state has moved from Red, to Purple, to Blue over the past twenty years. The Republicans are clearly on defense, and hoping for something of a repeat of 2002 when Tom Strickland was famously told by his pollster on election day he would be the next Senator from Colorado, only to lose to Wayne Allard by 5%. In other words - this thing ain’t over yet! Below are some things to look for along with historical perspective on Colorado elections. Before we get to the numbers, a primer on election night, Colorado style. While 100% of registered voters are sent a ballot by mail and can mail it back, we also have 383 drop boxes for voters to return their ballots and 342 voter service centers where voters can vote in person. Up until this year, the trend had been for voters to hold their ballots longer, and drop them off in the final few days. In fact, 40% of all ballots were returned in the final 4 days of 2016. That ​ number will be considerably lower in 2020 given the early vote surge. As of the writing of this, Friday afternoon, over 2.3 million ballots have already been cast, received, and counted. That is a massive number, larger than in any prior election. The higher early returns and excitement lead to a second prediction: Colorado will eclipse it’s turnout rate ​ of 2016, when it was 2nd in the nation with 76%, and in fact will exceed 80% of registered voters, putting the raw number of votes over 3.25 million. The total votes cast in 2016 was ​ 2.87 million so this would represent an increase of some 400,000 voters. Polls close at 7pm MT. Very shortly after that, the Secretary of State will release an early batch of results. These results generally make up a majority of those votes cast prior to election day. They don’t make up ALL of those votes, but a large percentage. It would not be surprising to see the SoS announce returns of over 2 million votes shortly after 7pm. After that, the counties start releasing returns at their own pace. For example, Denver releases in 90 minute increments, with more returns at 8:30pm and 10:00pm. With such a huge number of returns announced so quickly, any large leads coming out of the 7pm announcement will be difficult to overcome. 1. How does turnout compare to 2016? So far, 2020 is significantly outpacing 2016. See ​ the chart below, and you can track as additional returns are announced. Days Out 2016 2020 8 866,668 1,681,318 7 1,067,685 1,944,132 6 1,200,672 2,044,208 5 1,406,573 2,123,635 4 1,553,325 2,271,092 3 weekend ? 2 weekend ? 1 1,852,029 ? Election day 8am 2,215,258 ? Election day 2pm 2,404,846 ? 11/9 2,610,897 Final total 2,867,486 As we said above, we are looking for a 2020 turnout of over 3,250,000 votes. 1 2. What to look for early in the Senate race. When those first results are announced, how ​ do we know who will have a good night? (Caveat; it’s too early to know what votes will remain outstanding for election day itself. As of now the early returns will favor Democrats, but that could change over the weekend. Remember 2014...they called the race early for Gardner, who led by 5+% at 10pm; the final result was under 2% as the late votes that came in were strongly Democratic). a. Is Gardner keeping it close in Jefferson and Arapahoe? He lost these massive suburban counties by just 5,000 votes in 2014; they have grown more liberal since. A huge margin here quickly closes down any options Gardner might have. Heidi Ganahl did manage to top Alice Madden in Jefferson County in the 2016 Regent race, and Gardner kept it close in 2014 b. Battle of the bases. Does John Hicknelooper’s margin in Denver exceed Gardner’s combined margin in El Paso and Douglas? Hillary Clinton’s margin in Denver (180k) was so large that it made it nearly impossible for Trump to win. Similarly big numbers by Hick and Biden would be tough to overcome. c. Who wins the new bellwethers? Cory Gardner won Larimer by a few hundred ​ ​ votes in 2014. The only other Republican statewide elected official, Regent Heidi Ganahl, won it 52-48 in 2016, then Jared Polis won it by a solid 13% margin in 2018. Mark Udall carried Pueblo by under 1% in 2014, Clinton lost it by 1% in ​ ​ 2016 yet Bennet carried it by 10%. Garfield is a Western Slope county Obama ​ ​ lost by less than 100 votes in 2012, Gardner carried by 8% in 2014, and Polis won by just 350 votes in his 2018 victory. An interesting county to watch for CD3 as well - Republicans very much want to keep this county Red. 3. How big can Democrats win at the top of the ticket? Colorado has generally been Blue at the top of the ticket in recent elections, except in the 2014 cycle which not only saw Gardner win, but Republicans down the ballot as well. In fact, Cynthia Coffman defeated Don Quick in the AG’s race by 9% while Gardner beat Udall by less than 2%. However, 2016 and 2018 results as well as numerous polls would indicate that barring a stunning comeback, Donald Trump and Cory Gardner are very likely to lose Colorado, and the races won’t be particularly close. Democrats won rather comfortable victories in 2018, while 2016 generally gave Democrats solid, but not overwhelming, wins. And for those watching Senate/Pres races nationally, one interesting factoid: Michael Bennet’s margin above Hillary Clinton, despite being very small, was the 2nd largest in the country behind Jason Kander, the blindfold wearing machine gun assembling veteran who narrowly lost in Missouri. In WI, NV, NH the Senate races and presidentials dovetailed into near exact results. Will 2020 do the same, or can Senate candidates over-perform the presidential candidate in their state? 2 Ken Salazar’s results could give Gardner hope, but the state and nation are both far more partisan than they were in 2004 when Salazar overcame a Kerry loss to win his Senate seat. Recent statewide results: Percent of Year vote Margin 2018 Polis v Stapelton 53.4% v 42.8% 10.6% Griswold v 52.4% v 44.6% 2018 Williams 8% 2016 Hillary v Trump 47.8% v 42.1% 4.8% 2016 Bennet v Glenn 50% v 44.3% 5.7% 2016 Madden v Ganahl 48.9% v 51.1% 2.2% Hickenlooper v 2014 Beauprez 49.3% v 46% 3.3% 2014 Quick v Coffman 42.4% v 51.4% 9.1% 2014 Udall v Gardner 46.3% v 48.2% 1.9% 2012 Obama v Romney 51.5% v 46.1% 5.4% 2010 Bennet v Buck 46.9% v 45.2% 1.6% 2008 Udall v Schaffer 50.8% v 40.9% 9.9% 2006 Ritter v Beauprez 56% v 39.5% 16.5% 2004 Salazar v Coors 50.4% v 45.7% 4.7% 2004 Kerry v Bush 46.7% v 51% 4.6% The most stunning of all Colorado electoral facts: In 2002, Bill Owens defeated Rollie Heath 62%-33%; a margin of 29%. Four years later, Bill Ritter beat Bob Beauprez by 16.4%, 56.4%-40% That’s a swing from R+29 to D+16.4 = 45.4% in four years. ​ 3 4. Colorado’s electorate has changed, massively. Who shows up? In case it wasn’t clear that Colorado has changed, see below. A Republican registration advantage that at one time approached 200,000 has been erased, and Democrats now hold a lead of just over 100,000. But more significantly, over the past 10 years, Unaffiliateds have gone from 34% to 41% of all registered voters; a massive surge, and there are now more than 500,000 more Unaffiliated than Democratic voters. The question for 2020 is how dominant are Unaffiliated voters? In 2016, more Republicans voted than Democrats, and more Democrats voted than Unaffiliated. In 2018, that was flipped, with U’s in first and R’s in last, although very narrowly. Now making up over 41% of registered voters, how much muscle will U’s flex in this high turnout presidential? We are guessing they will approach 40% share of the vote.