Close elections always come down to turnout. And while there are still many uncertainties ahead of November’s presidential election, one thing seems all but certain: It will be close, at least in many of the key states that will decide the election.
So the bipartisan polling team behind the NBC News poll, Public Opinion Strategies and Hart Research Associates, devised an experiment.
What happens to the voting test in NBC News’ brand new national poll if you assume a turnout model that favors the Democratic Party versus a model that favors the Republican Party?
The results won’t really be a surprise. But the exercise is instructive and shows how relatively small shifts in the demographic composition of the electorate could be important in a close election.
Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump are tied in the head-to-head vote in the new October NBC News poll, with 48% each.
Assuming a turnout model more favorable to Republicans gives Trump a 2-point lead, 49%-47%. But someone more favorable to Democrats puts Harris ahead 49%-46%. And neither scenario requires outlandish assumptions.
What would that more favorable Democratic turnout look like? An increase in the number of female voters, and an electorate that is more racially diverse, has more college degree holders, and more from cities and suburbs.
The turnout model that looks better for Republicans is the opposite: a whiter electorate with more men, and an increase in the number of voters in rural areas and those without a college degree.
But what really matters is how little demographic movement is needed to bring about these shifts. It shows how important turnout in elections can be (not to mention the importance of the assumptions polls make about who will emerge).
In the pro-democratic and pro-republican turnout scenario, the difference in the female share of the electorate is only 1 point. In the pro-Democratic scenario, the white share of the electorate is lower than in the pro-Republican one, but only by 2 points.
A difference of a few percentage points in turnout based on age, race, education, urbanicity and a host of other factors can make a huge difference, especially in a race that is within the margin of error in this poll in every scenario. That’s why it’s so difficult to predict exactly what will happen in a close election — and it’s one of the main reasons why there is variation in the polls before the election.
The NBC News poll of 1,000 registered voters, 898 of whom were reached by cell phone, was conducted Oct. 4-8. It has an overall margin of error of plus or minus 3.1 percentage points.
This article was originally published on NBCNews.com
