Hi, everyone. I’m Sam Shirazi, and this is Federal Fallout the Virginia Elections. This episode, we will have Chaz Netticombe back on, and it’s the perfect time because State Navigate has put out a new poll, and I really want to go over all the details with Chaz. So thanks for coming back on.
00:16.60
Chaz Nuttycombe
Hey, Sam, thanks for having me. Thanks for having me on. You know, I think last time it came on, I was there’s less data to work with. And now there’s a little more data to work with now that I’m happy to talk about that our poll has fetched.
00:27.94
Sam Shirazi
Yeah, definitely. So your poll got a lot of attention. In 2025, you were, i would say, among the pollsters that polled every race in Virginia, you were the most accurate pollster. So I think definitely when you drop a poll, I’m going to be paying attention. And this one, i think, in some ways what was what we were expected expecting, but I think had some surprises in there, too. So do you want to kind of big picture go over the poll to begin with?
00:52.51
Chaz Nuttycombe
Yeah, absolutely. And, you know, like what I will preface with is I have a saying, which is I don’t care who wins. I care about being right.
01:01.97
Chaz Nuttycombe
Right. It doesn’t matter. The candidate it doesn’t matter. This is the first poll we’ve done for like a issue. Right. For the constitutional referendum or referendum, whatever. So, you know, i care about being right. That is my job as a forecaster and as the executive director of State Navigate. and And, you know, also my co-forecaster’s job, right, Jack Kersting, is...
01:24.99
Chaz Nuttycombe
You know, we and and a polling team committee, their job, you know, all our job is to just look, this is let’s let’s cut through the noise and and look at the signals. Right. and And let’s try and do the best work we can to let people know where things are heading.
01:41.20
Chaz Nuttycombe
you know what i will say is i i you know i guess kind of gut feeling is i’m not as confident in getting this one right right whether it be the poll or you know i i do think that the yes referendum probably has uh maybe like an 80 chance of winning thereabouts And that’s just because it’s been 100 years since 1928, not 100 years, but pretty 100 years since there’s been true blue constitutional referendum around this Right? Yeah.
02:11.30
Chaz Nuttycombe
since you know there’s been a true blue you know a constitutional referendum had held around this time So this is a whole different beast and I’m kind of going off of what worked for us in that second survey. Right. Technically, the first survey was, you know, a little bit more accurate than that second survey. However, you know, i think we kind of got lucky in that when it comes to like who when it comes to like the raw responses we got in there. and We were very aggressive in this poll with trying to get a raw response electorate, you know, that was close to the target weights we have.
02:53.18
Chaz Nuttycombe
So, you know, like we did a great job with these raw responses. But yeah, so, you know, we there’s a whole bunch of interesting things in this poll. You know, it’s it’s maybe exciting, maybe not exciting. Right. If you saw all the GMU Sharpsville WAPO poll, maybe it’s not as exciting to you. You’re like, oh, OK, well, they’re in the same boat this time. Right. we, we were, first place last year, in Virginia, I think, uh, Sharskul Wapo was in third or at at least fourth. so they did pretty good. you know, I think they had Spanberger plus 12. We had Spanberger 13, but, you know, I think the big difference there was the attorney general race.
03:31.45
Chaz Nuttycombe
so, you know, it, it, Like I was i was texting you know David Ramadan, you know professor at GMU, and you got to work a little bit on the pole that GMU, sharp school did.
03:44.10
Chaz Nuttycombe
And i said a I said something to the the tune of, you know we we win together, we lose together this time, right? i think I think nobody can ever accuse me of of hurting, right?
03:57.23
Chaz Nuttycombe
If I were ever the one to hurt, that would have been like last year or something. You know, it’s like, I had what weights, you know, i had in mind looking at the 2025 election and 2021 and everything, you know, this electorate is a little bit different than 2025.
04:21.56
Chaz Nuttycombe
You know, if you were to look at like, I don’t know, the, you know, like CNN exit poll or whatever, or just the exit poll.
04:30.76
Chaz Nuttycombe
It’s not like C it’s, I think CNN is just one that pays for it. it’s, it’s similar to 2025, but little bit, a little bit little bit different. so, you know, and it, it, a big part is the partisan waiting here is, I think it was plus eight in, that survey, the late October survey, it’s plus 11 here.
04:48.92
Chaz Nuttycombe
Why is that? Well, if you were to look at the second survey methodology stuff, I put a section of, look, this is the process is how we went with the partisan weighting, which is the most important part of your poll.
05:01.19
Chaz Nuttycombe
And the big part in short is the Gallup quarterly national party ID. And so,
05:10.74
Chaz Nuttycombe
You know, the the in Q3 2025, it was plus seven Dem national. Well, it’s plus 10 now as of Q1. And I was really happy to where, you know, the that that I had this data available before we were I knew we had to go in the field.
05:27.77
Chaz Nuttycombe
I messaged the the wonderful people at Gallup like, hey, is this gonna drop? And then they responded as soon as it dropped. It was like maybe April 1st or 2nd or whatever. I was like, thank God, you know. So, you know, we’re using pretty much the same methodology that we did in that second survey.
05:43.75
Chaz Nuttycombe
And, you know, in, so getting to the results, let’s get to results here. Yes, it’s up five, right? That was what the likely voter model and the WAPO Schar School had, if I recall correctly.
05:57.62
Chaz Nuttycombe
And then it is for the governor’s approval, even. what’s What’s pretty interesting here before we get into like the the sexy parts, right, which are those two things, Trump’s approval is actually a point net approval and actually just approval rating is a point better than compared to that second survey.
06:18.65
Chaz Nuttycombe
which is really interesting because his national approval is five points worse. So there’s three potential things here. Either one, we’re going to be wrong and underestimate the Democrats again, maybe slightly, or maybe by a lot, who knows? Or the national polls are wrong.
06:36.04
Chaz Nuttycombe
Or, and I think three is the most likely culprit. There is a floor for Donald Trump and Republicans in Virginia, right? You know, especially with how I think Virginia is not as racially polarized as say Alabama, right? But we still have a level of racial polarization. And I, and I think that’s the thing. We are a Southern state, no matter how much people from further down the Mason Dixon line want to say we’re Yankee land, we still are a Southern state in so many cultural and demographic ways, right?
07:09.72
Chaz Nuttycombe
So I think that is really the thing here is that there is a floor and it looks like, you know, maybe the low 40s is Donald Trump’s floor. So you’re not going to see like, well, it should be five points worse because that’s what the national point. of That’s what the national, you know, poll show. Well, it’s going to be a little bit different compared to like maybe like the Midwest where you have.
07:30.26
Chaz Nuttycombe
you know, a little more elasticity in the electorate, right? I mean, Corey Stewart still quote unquote only lost by 16, right? And the same thing with Winsome Sears winning by, or sorry, losing by 15, what, 15.3%, 15.4, whatever decimal was. I think the likely culprit here.
07:46.67
Chaz Nuttycombe
point four whatever the tenth decimal so i think that’s the likely culprit here but yeah. I just wanted to kind of talk about that cause I thought that was really interesting.
07:58.15
Chaz Nuttycombe
the other, you know, getting into the top lines, yes, campaign, should be favored in this look. There’s financial advantage. Donald Trump is still in the white house and he is nationally increasingly unpopular. The black vote in the early vote has been very strong.
08:13.34
Chaz Nuttycombe
That is somewhat offsetting, but not entirely offsetting. Very strong Republican turnout in rural areas and exurbs that were asleep at the wheel in 2025. But, you know, look, I mean, the elect the electorate is, or the early early vote is, what, maybe two or three points better than at this point 2025.
08:36.61
Chaz Nuttycombe
probably three points actually now, if not four, because as we’re recording, there’s this you know big thing on the reduction in satellite access being shown on our interactive, right? Because it updates every day.
08:49.46
Chaz Nuttycombe
So I think the early vote is like at least three points redder than the overall early vote as we are recording, maybe four.
09:01.12
Chaz Nuttycombe
So, and that’s sort of an interesting thing in our poll where, you know, the people who say that they are going to vote early in person and, or vote by mail, are bluer compared to what we had in our late, that that question is pretty much a bluer result compared to the October survey.
09:22.36
Chaz Nuttycombe
So in the in the October survey, people who said they were going to vote early in person, they have not voted yet, but they plan to, you know, they were breaking for Jones by three points. This time.
09:36.87
Chaz Nuttycombe
it is 10 points for vote early in person. And then it is five point swing when we talk about, you know, comparing like Jones and yes and all that sort of thing for for people who say they’re still going to vote by mail.
09:52.20
Chaz Nuttycombe
So, you know, and I think the reason why this is is because of the reduction in satellite access. I think this is this is probably of a good theory as why this is. so You know, a good signal, right, to watch for every day or the next few are over through, what, Sunday, Monday, when we get the final votes.
10:16.49
Chaz Nuttycombe
Let’s really say, or final early votes, I mean, you could really say Tuesday, I guess, because people are still counting mail maybe on Monday, or almost assuredly they are.
10:26.35
Chaz Nuttycombe
is to watch our interactive and look at the model, which is not trying to figure out, it it’s not saying that yes is winning by almost 20 points, right? Dems are, it’ it’s using Lieutenant Governor results from last year and acts as a sort of partisan model because the Lieutenant Governor result was the closest to what we call in political science like a normal vote, right? Meaning like people how they normally vote for you know their party preference, whereas like a What is it? I’m trying to remember the of the opposite. I think it’s called an earned vote.
10:58.91
Chaz Nuttycombe
It’s from a policy paper I read back in college, but just pretty much, you know, like an earned vote is is kind of like someone who’s getting something on persuasion, especially if they’re incumbent.
11:08.95
Chaz Nuttycombe
But so we use that. So just check the interactive every day, especially after, so you know, the big super light saddle, sorry, satellite Saturday, super Saturday. Right.
11:22.61
Chaz Nuttycombe
And, you know, if the early vote is getting at least two points bluer, I think that is a good sign for our poll. And you can check the, you know, state navigate Twitter account for, you know, those updates starting, starting tomorrow.
11:40.53
Chaz Nuttycombe
But yeah, so that’ll be a big thing to watch for. So, yeah, I mean, the early vote expected to be closer than compared to the early vote numbers in 2025. Yeah.
11:58.23
Chaz Nuttycombe
Yeah,
11:59.82
Sam Shirazi
Well, could I ask you a question about the poll?
12:01.86
Chaz Nuttycombe
yeah shoot.
12:02.97
Sam Shirazi
So, you know, top line number, up five, kind of yes, up five makes sense. You know, that that’s kind of what where the vibes are.
12:11.38
Chaz Nuttycombe
Yeah, everyone’s talking J.
12:11.66
Sam Shirazi
i did want
12:13.34
Chaz Nuttycombe
Jones margin, J. Jones margin, right?
12:15.28
Sam Shirazi
Yeah, exactly. But I did want to note, you know, a tidbit in the poll where you had. 10% of the poll, 9% essentially of the poll being what I call like true independence and Noah’s winning them by 24 points, even though in your last poll in 2025, Jones was winning those by nine points.
12:31.10
Chaz Nuttycombe
Exactly.
12:36.29
Sam Shirazi
So I guess the other question I had is, In exit polls, typically in Virginia, you see about 30 something percent of people describing themselves as independents.
12:44.93
Sam Shirazi
It seems like here you have a more strict definition of what independents are. So can you just explain how what independents are in your poll and why they’re breaking for no, in your opinion?
12:49.58
Chaz Nuttycombe
exactly
12:55.69
Chaz Nuttycombe
Right. So this is the thing when we talk about party ID and and the way that pollsters do it. And this is also how Gallup does it. So, I mean, they do both. Gallup has both. And, you know, and we also show both. But we wait to the push.
13:12.35
Chaz Nuttycombe
Wait to the push. What does that mean? Well, so when we ask, what party do you identify with? Yeah, there’s a lot of people who say they’re an independent. Okay. Well, you know, Americans are very independent minded and they don’t like the two party system.
13:24.46
Chaz Nuttycombe
Big whoop. Well, you still have a lot of those independents, you know, two thirds of those who say that they lean toward one party or another and they pretty much, you know, maybe 75 to 90% of the time, something like that. i don’t know. Depending on the state and the election and your electorate.
13:42.54
Chaz Nuttycombe
will vote for their party preference, even though they say that they do not identify with that party, right? So about one in 10 Virginians are actually truly independent.
13:51.99
Chaz Nuttycombe
You know, we follow up with people who say the first time we ask what party you identify with, they say neither. We follow up with, okay, we understand you’re an independent. Which one do you say you lean more toward? And then, you know, you get like,
14:06.19
Chaz Nuttycombe
You know, typically the Dems have a advantage with that. The one exception is 2021. If I recall correctly, I don’t have those, you know, it’s it’s in the second poll from October, the late October survey, which is our final one.
14:22.08
Chaz Nuttycombe
But I believe actually in that election, there were more people in Virginia who say they identified as a Republican than as a Democrat. And that’s because nationally, more people started to move toward identifying as a Republican than a Democrat when they voted in 2021. But either way, typically in each election, there’s about 10% of voters who say that they do not lean toward either side. These are true, actual, very persuadable voters who swing violently between, you know, probably every four years when there’s a Virginia governor election, right? 10% of the voters who actually pretty much matter when it decides to who rules Virginia.
15:06.53
Chaz Nuttycombe
So, yes, in our late October survey, we had independents going to Jones by nine. Now, what I will say is... You know, that also includes probably some of those independents who voted for Jones before they knew about the stories.
15:24.32
Chaz Nuttycombe
So I think if anything, that number is a little bit inflated. But if you were to take the Jay Jones number of nine points in 2025, you and then you, you know, looked at the no margin here, where no has a 24 point advantage.
15:43.100
Chaz Nuttycombe
And you take the margin and everything. That is a 33 point swing toward now. Now, in the CNN, or not CNN, they they sponsored it, but in the exit poll last year, right, which, you know, is pretty reflective after they weighed it after the election results of the 2025 electorate.
16:01.26
Chaz Nuttycombe
you would have, and you know, it’s it’s not perfect because it’s an exit poll. and There’s better ways to do this, but still, it’s pretty close, I think. You had Jason Mieris winning independents by 8%, right? So either way,
16:15.42
Chaz Nuttycombe
right so either way twenty 20, 33 point swing or anywhere in between or whatever. i mean, that’s enormous. That is enormous ground that the Republicans campaigning as the no campaign have made since November.
16:33.48
Chaz Nuttycombe
So, uh, that’s, that, that is a huge thing here. And the thing that is keeping yes up is because, you know, if you look at the quarterly party ID, is now D plus 10 rather than D plus seven, in Q3, right. When we were making our waiting decisions, you can read more in the article on that.
16:55.93
Chaz Nuttycombe
the The thing that’s keeping yes winning is because, you know, their base is showing up, especially black voters. They’ve been targeting black voters a lot. And I said this during the, you know, the early voting process as we were looking at what areas were turning out more relative to the same day equivalent in 2025. Right.
17:13.85
Chaz Nuttycombe
So, and and why are they targeting black voters? Well, pretty much black voters in this election are going vote pretty much partisan baseline. They’re not, can they’re not moving at all.
17:23.55
Chaz Nuttycombe
Right. Do it a little bit better. The no campaign is doing a little, a little bit better with black voters compared to like win some Sears, but win some Sears lost by 15 points.
17:34.31
Chaz Nuttycombe
You know, the no black voters only 10% say they’re voting. No. you know, no campaign unless they have, you know, a strong election day turnout, which I think they are banking on.
17:45.87
Chaz Nuttycombe
And, you know, independents making up a larger share of the electorate and maybe probably also their Republican base coming out on election day, making up a little bit larger share of the electorate than compared to, you know, if you were to treat this as a gubernatorial election because of the turnout, what it would be. That’s something they’re also counting on, right?
18:04.54
Chaz Nuttycombe
So, you know, if they weren’t counting on all that, then they would need to have like 20% of the black vote, which they’re just, they’re just not getting, point blank period. So, uh, we’ll see how well that ages. Maybe it’s, maybe it’s not, but like, you know,
18:18.43
Chaz Nuttycombe
They try, you know, there’s all these stories about them, you know, sending black voters mailers and trying to, you know, I guess get them to think it’s a Republican a thing if you vote yes or whatever. Right.
18:32.57
Chaz Nuttycombe
Doesn’t seem to have paid off. Excuse me. Paid off. Has not really been effective. Uh, so, you know, like that, that is a big thing. but again, you know, like, so the, the, the yes campaign is mainly targeting hardcore guns and they have been doing a good job at getting them out.
18:53.85
Chaz Nuttycombe
Now, that being said, i mean, I’m not saying this is 2021, but I feel like that was also, the the Terry McAuliffe strategy would suggest this is a base election. Let’s get out our base.
19:07.19
Chaz Nuttycombe
don’t care about persuasion because they’re not winning on the yes campaign is not winning on persuasion in They know that people are upset with president Trump. And if they can get all these hardcore Dems and they’re, you know, sort of, let’s say a support score for Democrats of like a six to eight or six, seven, right.
19:30.11
Chaz Nuttycombe
To come out and vote. Yes. Then they win. Right. I mean, it’s just this is a thing in Virginia elections. You know, this is a special election, whatnot, but probably at the end of the day, a majority of Virginians or sorry, a majority of registered voters in Virginia are going to be voting in this thing.
19:48.27
Chaz Nuttycombe
You know, and i don’t think that all of a sudden we’re going to see an electorate that looks like 2021 where, you know, the party ID is going to be like R plus three to five. Right.
20:01.33
Chaz Nuttycombe
This is still going to be a Dem leaning election. So, yeah, that’s just couple of things there.
20:08.15
Sam Shirazi
Yeah, yeah
20:09.63
Chaz Nuttycombe
Yeah, I just want to talk about the income thing if you wanted to talk about that.
20:13.68
Sam Shirazi
yeah yeah, go ahead.
20:15.71
Chaz Nuttycombe
so, you know, and we’ll, we’ll talk about this in Spanburn approval, when we get to that, but you know, the, the areas when we talk about like what this coalition is going to look like, it’s, it’s, I think it’s good to look at the attorney general race, maybe a mix between baseline attorney general race and governor, uh, in terms of like what the, uh, not, not like, oh yes, it’s going to win by 15 points. But in terms of like, if you’re going to model this out,
20:41.50
Chaz Nuttycombe
you know, like the areas that had the biggest amount of Spanberger-Mieris voters were wealthy voters, right? Wealthy areas, Western Chesterfield, Western Henrico, you know, Cape Henry and Virginia Beach, around there in Jason Mieris’ old territory, right? Kind of wealthier part of Virginia Beach.
21:01.24
Chaz Nuttycombe
Northern Arlington, you know, these wealthy areas in Virginia, right? are swinging heavily from the governor election to the, you know, the the no campaign.
21:30.97
Chaz Nuttycombe
Yeah.
21:32.67
Chaz Nuttycombe
So, you know, let me let me pull out this graph here in the poll. So amongst income, people who make $150,000 more a year, and that’s what, this is self-reported, by the way.
21:46.34
Chaz Nuttycombe
So sometimes people lie on these things. But still, people who make $150,000 and we’re using this recall, we asked about that in the poll they’re swinging People who make to a year,
22:04.31
Chaz Nuttycombe
ten point five percent the lowest income voters not moving so much moving to no by seven percent so I think it’s very similar to what we’re going to be seeing in the attorney general race versus governor race and and whatnot, in this election.
22:20.65
Chaz Nuttycombe
so yeah, and, and there’s stuff to talk about with the the approval there, but we’ll get to that when we, whenever you want to move into it.
22:27.56
Sam Shirazi
Yeah, I did want to ask about that. But let me just ask one more question about the referendum, because I think, you know, it’s it’s essentially a state election because it’s a change of state constitution. And so we think about 2021 or we think about 2025.
22:41.17
Sam Shirazi
However, i mean, I think there’s an argument that it’s essentially a proxy for a federal election. and is it you know Your number is basically similar to the 2024 number.
22:50.93
Sam Shirazi
like Is this basically a rerun of 2024 or maybe like a rerun of 2024 combined with 2020? Is it maybe more of a federal or presidential type electorate in terms of partisanship?
23:26.54
Chaz Nuttycombe
If anything, I think we are the catalyst of it. Right. so, and then it’s like, no, I mean, the, the electoral coalition is going to be different. you know, look, uh, my, my, we’ll see what happens. I feel good about our poll.
23:42.58
Chaz Nuttycombe
I don’t feel as good about this poll compared to 2025. And again, like it’s a special election. We haven’t had something like this in a hundred years, you know,
24:15.10
Chaz Nuttycombe
So, Yeah, that’s that’s all I want to say on that. Yeah, we can talk about margin.
24:18.94
Sam Shirazi
Yeah.
24:32.32
Chaz Nuttycombe
By top line margin, yeah, that’s what our poll shows. But, you know, like kind of what was getting at is my gut feels like this is going to be closer. I don’t know, man.
24:52.66
Chaz Nuttycombe
A lot of unknowns, especially election day, right? It was 55%, uh, sorry, 57% of 2025 overall Our poll would insinuate that that would be probably 47 or 48% of the overall vote if you were to account for normal response error that we had in that second poll in October. So,
25:13.34
Chaz Nuttycombe
so You know, but, you know, we aren the team has worked very hard on this. I think we did an excellent job, especially with the raw responses.
25:23.02
Chaz Nuttycombe
So we’ll see if it is closer. Or maybe we underestimate the Dems again, like I said, toward the beginning of the podcast. Got no idea. All I know is GMU, Shard School, WAPO, you know, them, we are both in the same boat.
25:37.48
Chaz Nuttycombe
So we we we go down together or we win together. So...
25:42.92
Sam Shirazi
Yeah, well, I mean, that’s all really helpful in terms of the referendum itself. And I think we covered a lot. I mean, I wanted to just talk about the specific number with Spanberger because there’s just been a million hot takes about Spanberger and her approval.
25:56.93
Sam Shirazi
And your poll found that Spanberger’s approval was even, even after she won by 15 points in 2025. You know, what is your hot take on the Spanberger approval? And like, why do you think it is even in this poll?
26:10.66
Chaz Nuttycombe
So, you know, i think Dwayne Yancey had a really good article on this. I think part of it is they’re, you know, Republicans have done a good job at getting Republicans angry and maybe some right leaning independents angry with the governor who voted for her.
26:25.30
Chaz Nuttycombe
I think they did a good job on that. you know We can quibble about like, oh, well, it’s all over. you know Mostly bills or only some part of bills that she hasn’t signed or haven’t gone into law.
26:36.10
Chaz Nuttycombe
You could also make the argument is like, well, you know she’s gonna sign that gun bill. So in Republicans care about guns, this is a natural phenomenon in polling. I only know like half of of the saying, but pretty much Republicans boo louder when it’s someone or something that they do not like. You will see that in a survey. They will boo louder. And you can actually really see it, I think, in the questions where we show people the maps and we ask about, you know, you know, just individual questions related to, you know, the message testing that both campaigns have used. And I threw a little fun one in there about the college districts. They boo louder than Democrats who are much more ambivalent. Right.
27:14.60
Chaz Nuttycombe
There’s a lot more soft approval of the governor than soft disapproval, right? Democrats are like, i don’t know, I kind of approve of the governor. So I think that’s a big part of this.
27:26.42
Chaz Nuttycombe
other Other kind of things that, you know, are in in that Dwayne Yancey piece, which you again, I recommend are, I do think the redistricting thing has hurt the governor.
27:36.19
Chaz Nuttycombe
When we look at that swing with, you know the, the higher income voters. We also see higher income voters and, and the swing for like the referendum what I’m talking about.
27:48.90
Chaz Nuttycombe
We also see like a big swing with a higher income voters with, how they voted, uh, in, uh, 2025, you know, in looking at our second poll, uh, they,
28:04.23
Chaz Nuttycombe
you know, are, are approving of the governor now. Right. It’s like, it’s, it’s double digit swings, but it’s not as big as the lower income one, which have larger swings,
28:16.15
Chaz Nuttycombe
And, you know, I think I think Spanberger became the face of affordability. Right. you know, she’s very much that campaign, the catalyst of what is probably the number one ad or number one word you’ll hear in Democratic ads, you know, now through November or but before then through November this year.
28:35.17
Chaz Nuttycombe
And this is this is just kind of like my pet theory. But look, man, I live in Churchill. And, you know, I get to see like some local TV stories and all that.
28:46.47
Chaz Nuttycombe
And, you know, i think that she got in the office, you know, what, you know, like people are getting the power bills in February for the January when that big snowstorm came through.
28:59.03
Chaz Nuttycombe
And everybody had a huge increase in and their energy bills compared to like, well, anytime ever. Now that being said, you know like like Dominion said, you know I think they had that one of their folks said this in a press release. you know they They truly, like like they pointed out like, you know this is the biggest or lowest temperatures since you know the 1950s for this point.
29:23.85
Chaz Nuttycombe
So, you know, the governor can’t control the weather, right? So that’s that’s why people had high energy bills. Because you got to, you know, you got to keep up with the the demand to keep people warm in in very freezing temperatures. My my pipes froze. That was new to me.
29:40.29
Chaz Nuttycombe
That was that was the by fault. But anyway, it’s freezing cold and everybody got these high power bills. And it’s if you are kind of lower income and you voted for the governor and maybe you’re a swing voter who, you know, was like, oh, she’s talking about affordability. She’s going to get in there and fix it.
29:57.71
Chaz Nuttycombe
Well, shoot, you just saw your power bill go up and, you know, it’s so you’re maybe you’re blaming the governor, I think. That’s my pet theory.
30:07.85
Chaz Nuttycombe
So, but you know, there we we don’t know, right? that like I’m speculating you here. Dwayne Yancey is speculating here.
30:17.01
Chaz Nuttycombe
there’s There’s maybe some evidence that we all have our thoughts, but no single poll has actually asked people who disapprove of the governor, approved by the governor with a follow-up question, and maybe we should have done this, but you know i i just wanted... you know when I try and keep polls as short as possible, so that was really why.
30:39.27
Chaz Nuttycombe
But nobody has asked the approvers and disapprovers, why do you approve? Why do you disapprove? And what’s especially going to be happen when you do that is, you know, people, you’re going to have a hard time getting those people who are like, maybe were Spanberger voters and are and are disapproving of her now.
30:57.63
Chaz Nuttycombe
Right. That’s a that’s a small, you know, section of your survey that’s much more independent minded and is not really as high propensity, maybe in terms of their voting behavior and just wants to be left alone and finish a survey as quickly as possible.
31:12.84
Chaz Nuttycombe
Right. so it’s difficult. so look, this is, this is all speculation. I mean, we can throw a whole bunch of stuff at the wall. Maybe it’s a gun bill, right? that’s the big thing. Like I, I haven’t even seen people talk about the gun bill, you know, on Twitter. It’s like, I was looking at, you know, looking at my website traffic today and all, all red is post amount is, is guns and, and like our slash Virginia.
31:33.15
Chaz Nuttycombe
So it’s like, you know, I i think maybe media, like like people on Twitter, like you and me and like other you know journalists kind of have a thing of Twitter brain going on. I don’t know. But...
31:45.05
Chaz Nuttycombe
you know, so, so all this is speculation, but we don’t have any actual poll or survey research or anything for why people are, you know, disapproving, of the governor this much. Now, again, she’s even, uh, you can say, well, she’s not underwater. being said,
32:01.88
Chaz Nuttycombe
She’s even in a likely voter survey that voted for her by 14 points. She is absolutely bet on it underwater with the overall adult population of Virginia and registered voters in Virginia, right? This is a blue electorate.
32:18.89
Chaz Nuttycombe
You have a whole bunch of people who came out in 2024 who lean more Republican and are, you know, pretty much asleep because President Trump is in the White House and they’re going to come back in 2028. so, and, and even then, like if she has even approval, she’s definitely one of the most unpopular governors in the nation.
32:36.45
Chaz Nuttycombe
uh, you know, like if you look at, but if there, we don’t have like a, a average of all governors approvals and everything using all the polls. Unfortunately, 538 is no longer a thing. and although I don’t even think they did it, that’s something we can do actually. I don’t know.
32:52.45
Chaz Nuttycombe
maybe that’s something I should consider at state nav. but you know, Morning Consult, they do accordingly polling. i do think, you know, maybe the favorables are, you know, little bullish on the incumbents and everything.
33:04.97
Chaz Nuttycombe
So i I noted that in the piece, you know, the the poll release. But she could be as high as the third most unpopular governor, or maybe she’s just in the top 10.
33:14.96
Chaz Nuttycombe
But either way, she’s in the top 10, you know, least popular governors in the country. so, you know, people can quibble about, well, is it her fault? Is it not her fault?
33:26.52
Chaz Nuttycombe
Leave me out of this. Don’t shoot the messenger. Right. so, you know, I just like the data, want to present the data, let people know what we’re seeing.
33:35.40
Sam Shirazi
Yeah, well, definitely the poll was interesting. And i think both for the Spanberger approval and and referendum results, really useful to have as we we go into the closing day. So I’ll ask you one last question, because obviously we’ll have to see how early vote pans out.
33:49.41
Sam Shirazi
In terms of the no campaign, if, for example, we see a a rural surge on Tuesday on election day, or we see an our urban surge, I mean, do you think it’s within the margin where kind of those turnout dynamics on election day could matter? And I i wanted to see, are you going to be calling up all the registrars and seeing what the turnout is on election day?
34:08.100
Chaz Nuttycombe
Yeah, absolutely. Look, the NAVCAST is back and back and better than ever. You know, nobody beat the NAVCAST last year. Goal is for nobody to beat it again. so the NAVCAST is going to be polling from the wonderful honor wonderful people at the Virginia Department of Elections who rely on the registrars to report their results.
34:26.56
Chaz Nuttycombe
And it will poll live and calculate the odds of margin of victory and overall odds of winning for yes and no throughout the night starting 7 Yes, we’re going to be calling up the registrars, myself, our elections coordinator, Michael Foley, and our data science chair in our political and data science committee, Charlie Kramer, who, you know, I meet with every week, you know.
34:51.50
Chaz Nuttycombe
And, you know, this so we were the three people calling up all the registrars. I will be doing a YouTube live stream. The only people who be able to get access to the sheet are the tier three subscribers for State Navigate. I’ll be talking a little bit and kind of posting on the Navcast in a chat on just a little bit of some of the numbers.
35:13.79
Chaz Nuttycombe
But if you know you want the actual raw data and get to look at the spreadsheet and everything, you’ll need to become a tier three subscriber. But yeah, going to be live streaming. i’m i would guess... I don’t know. Maybe I am interested in if there will be more views on this thing than not. Especially if it’s close. So I would think there would be more views on the pre-poll closed live stream and everything compared to last year because this one is actually expected to be close. But although you know I think most...
35:43.04
Chaz Nuttycombe
I think most people outside of Virginia thought, or shoot, even people in Virginia thought the attorney general race is going close, and it wasn’t. Yeah, it’s close-ish, but not really, right? Especially compared to polls. So, but yeah, absolutely. You know, subscribe to your newsletter, go to satenavigate.org, go to Virginia, and go to our NAVCAST. And actually, in that poll release article, you have the NAVCAST link handy right there at the top.
36:10.96
Chaz Nuttycombe
Make sure you have that in front of you by you know, like 645 or 7, whatever you want to do And I will be, you know, posting or I’ll be talking on YouTube live, live stream about, you know, the what what we get as I dial up the red stars.
36:29.41
Sam Shirazi
Yeah, I mean, I definitely encourage people to follow State Navigate, follow Chaz. I will be doing that on Election Day and definitely as a result start coming in. I’m going to be taking a look at that too. So I don’t have much more to add other than on Election Day and and through the Election Day, State Navigate, Chaz are going to be really great resources to see what’s going to happen. And yeah, Chaz, thanks for coming back on. And yeah, we’ll see what what happens in the end.
36:52.48
Chaz Nuttycombe
Awesome. Thank you for having me on, Sam.
36:54.30
Sam Shirazi
Yeah, so this has been Federal Fallout and I’ll join you next time.
