This morning I interviewed Eric Davis, professor of political science at Middlebury College, about the Welch / Rainville race. Professor Davis has been at Middlebury since 1977 and really knows the Vermont political tundra. He is not endorsing either candidate. The following is a rough transcription of his thoughts on the Welch race.
Here is Prof. Davis's prediction for the VT-AL seat:
50% probability Welch narrow win
30% probability Welch wins big
20% Rainville narrow win
Is Vermont the most worrisome democratic seat?
No, not according to Davis. The most worrisome to the Democrats are:
1. IA-03, Leonard Boswell, is most troublesome democratic seat.
2. OH-06, the seat that Ted Strickland is vacating.
Vermont is probably in the top 5 though.
Vermont Voting and Registration
Vermont turnout tends to run 10-15% higher than national turnout. Vermont has a 30-day absentee voting period, which parties will use to try to lock in votes from their committed supporters.
There are no numbers from the state based on registration by party, but this is an estimate:
Democratic base in high 30%'s
Republican base in mid 20's
35 - 40% Independents
Vermont Political History
In the 20th century, Vermont was one of the most reliably republican states in the union. Except for the 1964 LBJ election (Editor's note: LBJ did keep his pants on the entire time he campaigned in the state), it never went democratic in a presidential election until 1992.
The old Democratic Party in Vermont was that of machinists in places like Springfield, factory workers around Burlington, and people of French-Canadian heritage. These constituencies are gone today. Now, the Democratic party has a big percentage of the state's affluent professionals. Vermont has the most affluent senior citizens in the country. They are moving from New York and Connecticut, and tend to be Democrats. Vermont netroots are the younger people, though this is a small group.
Interestingly, Lamont did best in the Connecticut primary in the same types of counties where Republicans did best in Vermont 30-40 years ago. He did well in northwestern Ct and the gold coast. Lieberman did best in old-time manufacturing areas like Waterbury.
Geography
The strongest democratic areas tend to be within 10 miles of highway 91 N from the Massachusetts border north to White River Junction, then highway 89 N to Burlington. There is a strong democratic pocket from Burlington to Middlebury. Wyndham county, in the southeast corner of the state, home of Brattleboro, is one of the bluest parts of the nation. It is bluer than Burlington. Strongest Repulican areas are along northern border, Rutland and Bennington county. Rutland county is probably the strongest area in the state for Repulicans right now. There is a group of suburbs around the northern half of Burlington that are relatively conservative - Vermont's version of the exurbs.
The September Factor
Most of fundraising from both Welch and Rainville has been local so far (unlike the Bernie Sanders race, where a lot has come in from out of state). Davis expects both national parties will put $100-200K into this race in September. Then they'll watch the polls to see if they are moving the needle. Republicans in particular will use September as a test.
People in Vt not yet paying much attention. Sanders/Tarrant are dominating the airwaves with their statewide slugfest.
Welch is narrowly ahead but not outside the margin of error. Welch needs to be outside the margin of error before the end of September to keep the RNCC away. Note that given the small polling samples in Vermont, the margin of error is high. So eight points is probably considered a definite lead in Vermont, anything less is questionable.
Rainville signed a clean campaign pledge so she can't go back on, though she may have the NRCC do the dirty work. The NRCC will look for what they consider "vulnerabilities" in Welch: professional politician, trail lawyer.
Bush
Welch wants referendum on Bush. Bush polls 10% lower in Vermont than elsewhere. (Editor's note: Bush has the lowest approval rate in the nation in Vermont: http://surveyusa.com/...)¬
Rainville is going to go on her local appeal. She'll get a 2% bonus just from National Guard members and their families.
That's it for today. Check back Sunday for Part II of the Professor Davis interview.