Musgrove Poised for Victory

As I noted this morning, Daily Kos is out with a new poll today of the hot Mississippi Senate race between Republican Senator Roger Wicker and former Democratic Governor Ronnie Musgrove. The poll has great news for Musgrove in finding a statistical tie between the political combatants. More importantly, the apparent movement of some black undecided voters demonstrates that Musgrove is in a very strong position to win on November 4.

Like with our analysis of the recent R2K Georgia Senate poll, we will go through each of the cross-tabs with some observations and conclusions. Let me say at the outset that for the most part, there was not a great amount of movement between the last poll five weeks ago and this one. However, those salient areas with key movement are particularly pivotal. The previous R2K numbers will be in parenthesis beside the fresh ones.

Head-to-head

Roger Wicker 47 (48)
Ronnie Musgrove 46 (43)
Undecided 7 (9)
MOE +/- 4%

The movement is within the margin of error, but Musgrove has turned a five point hole into a one point deficit, gaining a good three points. Wicker basically stayed the same, dropping one point. For reasons that we will discuss, Wicker has probably run into some trouble over the economy. In a state as impoverished as Mississippi, there was clearly a lot of anger at the Wall Street meltdown. Musgrove came out strongly against the bailout, and Wicker had no choice but to oppose it as well.

Still, the economic problems in the country cannot help a Republican incumbent this year, even in a state as conservative as this one. Note that there are no other candidates in this race: it is a special election, so Wicker and Musgrove are the only game in town.

Wicker and Musgrove favorable-unfavorable numbers

Wicker

53 percent favorable/43 percent unfavorable (54/41) -- Change: +13 to +10

Among men: 57/40 (61/35) +26 to +17
Among women: 51/44 (47/47) +0 to +7

Republicans: 79/18 (77/21) +56 t0 +61
Democrats: 28/67 (29/62) -33 to -39
Independents: 50/45 (51/43) +8 to +5

18-29 year olds: 48/49 (45/51) -6 to -1
30-44: 52/43 (52/44) +8 to +9
45-59: 57/38 (58/36) +22 to +19
60+: 58/39 (61/30) +31 to +19

Musgrove

52 percent favorable/43 percent unfavorable (50/43) -- Change: +7 to +9

Among men: 49/48 (45/49) -4 to +1
Among women: 55/38 (55/37) +18 to +17

Republicans: 31/67 (29/66) -37 t0 -36
Democrats: 76/19 (74/20) +54 to +57
Independents: 52/35 (52/39) +13 to +17

18-29 year olds: 58/36 (57/36) +21 to +22
30-44: 55/42 (50/42) +8 to +13
45-59: 48/46 (48/45) +3 to +2
60+: 47/48 (45/49) -4 to -1

Rather than post each man's favorable ratings individually and go through them, I wanted to put them side-by-side and compare them directly because they are similar both in movement and overall findings. Look at the top number: Wicker is 53/43 while Musgrove is 52/43. For all intents and purposes, these are identical findings. No wonder the two of them are often called the twins! (That, and they really do look alike).

What this means is that both men are well-liked at about the same level: +10 points or so. This is both good and bad. It is good because it leaves them both in a relatively strong position generally in that they well liked at the same level. However, I think there is something to the argument that the extremely negative tenor of the campaign, which, incidentally was on full display at their debate a couple of weeks ago, is being blamed on both men, and not one more than the other.

For the most part, neither man experienced great movement in how they are perceived by different cross-sections of the state population. Of the nine different groups the data is broken down into, Musgrove moved more than three points, up or down, in only two of them: among independents, where his approval rose four points to +17, and with voters 30 to 45 years old, where he went from +8 to an even more respectable +13.

While the other movements were all three points or less, and thus perhaps too small to make inferences from them, he only actually dropped with two groups: among Republicans and people 45 to 59, and both drops were a single point. What this means is that at best, Musgrove's personal ratings are steady, and they have not been brought down by the Wicker and NRCC attacks ads that are being broadcast against him. Indeed, his overall favorable-unfavorable split rose two points.

Wicker's numbers were a tiny bit more volatile, if about the same as Musgrove. His overall rating dropped three net points. Most interesting are the numbers broken up by sex. Among men, Wicker dropped from a +26 to +17, a fall of a considering nine points. Yet, among women he went from 47/47 in early September to 51/44, a seven-point rise.

I do not think I can well-explain either of these results. My suspicion is that Wicker's drop among men is from the economic crisis, and the accompanying dissatisfaction of the meltdown. However, he also jumped up with women. Weird. We will see below if this movement had huge impact on the overall horserace numbers.

Among parties, Wicker strengthened his hand with his base to the tune of five points, but he dropped six with Democrats. This kind of flies in the face of the above explanation, and the results seem almost contradictory: Wicker's personal numbers with his gender base (men) dropped, but his numbers with party base (GOPers) rose. Similarly, he rose with women, while falling among Democrats.

Finally, in terms of the age groups, Wicker experienced a five point drop with 18-to-29 year olds, which well explains his dip among Democrats. This drop can likely be accounted by a portion of what was undecided Democrats turning on the Republican. Interestingly, the incumbent's numbers with people 60 and over dropped 12 points, as his disapproval number with this group went from 30 to 39 percent. This may most likely be tied to people angry about the economy. Or perhaps, as we will see, it might be black voters who are finally breaking out of the undecided column.

Let's now go to the head-to-head splits.

Overall
Wicker 47 (48)
Musgrove 46 (43)
Undecided 7 (9)

Men
Wicker 51 (52)
Musgrove 42 (40)
Undecided 7 (8)

Women
Wicker 43 (44)
Musgrove 50 (46)
Undecided 7 (10)

What was a five-point race in early September is now a one-pointer. All the overall movement was within the margin of error. Movement among men was also minuscule: Wicker lost just one percent while Musgrove gained two percent. Musgrove should be happy with this. He does not need to win men to win this race, just get a certain percentage. As it stands, he should get what he needs. As long as he did not fall with male voters, he's doing alright.

Musgrove's movement among women is more apparent, as he went from +2 to +7 over Wicker among the female electorate. This is interesting because while Musgrove's personal favorable split among women stayed basically the same, Wicker's rose seven points. Still, it seems that no women either declared for him or switched sides from Musgrove to support Sen. Wicker. This is salient as Wicker has aired some commercials making sly reference two Ronnie Musgrove past very-public, very nasty divorce.

Yet, if the female voters like Wicker more now than before, they are not showing it in their voting preference. Nor are they leaving Musgrove as a result of those marriage references. Indeed, Musgrove may have hit a ceiling with this part of his base, but he is not going down so far if this finding is accurate.

Democrats
Wicker 6 (7)
Musgrove 88 (84)
Undecided 6 (9)

Republicans
Wicker 85 (86)
Musgrove 7 (6)
Undecided 8 (8)

Independents
Wicker 45 (46)
Musgrove 49 (45)
Undecided 6 (9)

Let's go through each grouping one at a time. First, among Democrats, the key finding is that undecided Democrats are beginning to break for Musgrove, as he needed. The undecided number went from nine to six percent, but Musgrove gained four percent, and an aggregate of five percent in the overall number. He is consolidating his base, which is obviously crucial for him to win in the end.

Second, Republicans showed basically no movement. Wicker dropped a point, and Musgrove went up a point, both of which are statistically insignificant. Interestingly, the same eight percent total is still undecided after five weeks. Eight percent undecided is a bit high, and one has to wonder if the Wicker camp is worried about these voters. This is especially outstanding because Wicker's favorable/unfavorable rating among Republicans went up +6 points. My gut says that he will be fine, but it is strange that the percentage remained totally static.

Finally, the independent break-down has very good news for Musgrove. We saw above that among favorable/unfavorable numbers, Musgrove's split went up four points, while Wicker's dropped three points. While these are small movements, they might help explain how Musgrove turned what was a 45-46 deficit in early September to a 49-45 lead -- a five-point swing. In the last poll, Musgrove's mediocre performance among indies was one of the biggest reasons he found he himself down five points, and one the most troubling findings presented there. This split is very promising for Musgrove. Wicker can still win if he loses independents, but he can't allow the Democrat to expand his lead among the unaffiliated.

Whites
Wicker 72 (73)
Musgrove 24 (23)
Undecided 4 (4)

For Ronnie Musgrove, the status quo is good, at least it applies to his standing among white voters. All of the conventional wisdom on this race has been that Musgrove must win close to one quarter of the white vote in order to prevail in November. We discussed this issue in great detail in our last big post on this race, and largely agree, depending of course on how black turnout ends up.

The finding here shows more or less no movement. Wicker lost one point and Musgrove gained one. Whether or not the precise small movement is right, the best thing here for the challenger is that he did not lose white support. Last quarter, Wicker spent $2.43 million, as opposed to $995,000 spent by Musgrove. Granted, the DSCC weighed here as well to even out the imbalance, but this is a big gap for just the candidates. In other words, Musgrove has been taking a pounding in his home state on everything from ethics, his connection to that failed beef plant, his first marriage which we discussed above, his past support for changing the state flag which infuriated whites and helped lead to his 2003 defeat when he was running for a second term as governor, and even gay rights, which is implicated in a farily ridiculous commercial Wicker is now airing on state tv. Through it all, white voters, the very ones likely aimed at with these non-stop attacks, appear unmoved. Consider the following:

*In the R2K poll from May 22, Wicker led among whites 65-26 (9 percent undecided);

*In the R2K poll from July 24, Wicker lead among whites 67-26 (7 percent undecided);

*In the R2K poll from September 11, Wicker led among whites 73-23 (4 percent undecided).

What do we see here? Well, first of all, Wicker is obviously dominating among whites. Duh. Furthermore, between late July and September, the incumbent senator was able to chip away three percent from the former governor. This last poll, has basically the same finding, with Musgrove going up a tick to 24 percent.

More importantly, what these numbers show is that Musgrove has a base of white support that has hung with him throughout the cycle. He has always been between 23 and 26 percent, which is precisely where he needs to be on election day. That Wicker has been unable to move the needle down on Musgrove over nearly five plus months makes it questionable whether he will be able to do it in the next 17 days. Musgrove might not have big white support, but through it all he has held onto what he needs, and perhaps he can move back to his May number if the mini-movement from this new poll is accurate. Assuming the four percent undecided break like the rest of the decided voters (3-to-1), Musgrove will end up at exactly 25 percent, a very good showing for a Democrat running statewide in Mississippi.

Blacks
Wicker 5 (7)
Musgrove 83 (75)
Undecided 12 (18)

More than anything else, this specific breakdown explains the movement in this poll. Unlike just about every piece of data in the new poll, black support in the poll is clearly distinguishable, and well outside the margin of error. Musgrove went from leading 75-7 (+68) to 83-5 (+78) -- a jump of ten points. We can see that numerous black voters have been peeled from Senator Wicker, and probably just about all of the formally-undecided voters who picked a side, went with Musgrove.

Let's look at that undecided number for a movement. In our last long post on the Mississippi Senate race, we wondered if the Musgrove campaign might have been worried about what was a persistent and alarmingly high chunk of black voters who declared themselves undecided. Over the last three R2K polls from May, July, and September, the percent of undecided black voters was 18, 17, and 18 percent. This was compared to 9, 7, and 4 unecided percent among whites.

We postulated at the time that there might have been some validity to past criticisms of Musgrove from men like Democratic congressman Bennie Thompson (MS-02), who have argued that Musgrove had not reached out to blacks enough in the past, and as a result, a lot of black voters might not be fully inclined to back him. This was probably a worry for Democrats. However, if this current poll is accurate, the concern might be ultimately unfounded. One-third of undecideds moved off the fence, and in turn Musgrove gained eight points.

What then could explain this? Markos had a good point on this when releasing the poll. He called it a reverse-Bradley Effect. In other words, whereas in the past (and perhaps even still today), many white voters would refuse to give their true feelings to a pollster on a race so not to appear racist, many black Mississippians today might feel the same way themselves. While we can't know this for certain, it does make sense. There are many, many blacks in Mississippi who lived in the state before the civil rights era, and while they may be ecstatic over Obama's candidacy, some might not be willing to reveal their preference to a telephone pollster given the state's rocky history with race.

Interestingly, the presidential contest sheds positive light on this viewpoint. Over the same past three polls, R2K found that blacks were 16 percent undecided in May, 15 percent in July, and 13 percent in September in the big race. Today, the undecided number is at 12 percent, exactly the same as the Senate race.

I think this proves two things. First, it shows that perhaps there was a small sector of the black vote which had a hard time accepting Ronnie Musgrove, maybe around 5-6 percent. However, with those voters going Democrat now, that leaves 12 percent, perhaps the same 12 percent in the presidential contest. Second, these voters may indeed be a demonstration of a reverse Bradley Effect, and they may be a final bloc that won't tell a pollster who they are backing this year.

Now, speaking to what this data actually means, we can simply say it is exactly what Ronnie Musgrove needed to see. He is both consolidating the black electorate, and even whittling away Wicker's black support to its bare bones. If the undecided break as the rest of the state, Musgrove could end up at a whooping 94 percent of the black vote. And remember what we said about this scenario last month:

What if turnout is equal to the state's composition?

This scenario is certainly possible, though I do not think very likely either. Assuming that the vote is 63 percent white and 37 black, mirroring the state's own composition, there are various ways Musgrove could pull out a win.

If he got 25 percent of the white vote, he would need 92.6 percent of the black vote. This is doable, but it would be tough. If it ticks up to 24 percent -- and if the latest poll is accurate, this is possible; with 4 percent undecided, it is fair to say that could break 3-to-1 to Wicker, making the final breakdown 76-24 -- Musgrove would then need about 94.3 percent of the black vote. Still a steep hill to climb, but not impossible.

And remember, all of this is assuming black turnout is at 37 percent, the percentage of blacks relative to the overall state population. According to this latest poll, Musgrove is on pace to get 25 percent of whites, and 94 percent of blacks. This would put him over the top. Again, these numbers are inexact, but the key is that Musgrove is in the position he needs to be in 17 days out.

18-29 year olds
Wicker 40 (42)
Musgrove 52 (49)
Undecided 8 (9)

30-44
Wicker 48 (49)
Musgrove 47 (44)
Undecided 5 (7)

45-59
Wicker 51 (51)
Musgrove 43 (41)
Undecided 6 (8)

60+
Wicker 49 (50)
Musgrove 41 (39)
Undecided 10 (11)

Not going to spend much time here. Needless to say, Musgrove consolidated support among young voters, which make up the Democratic base. While most all of the movement is within the margin of error, it is all in the right direction for the challenger.

Also of interest is that the two are now tied among those 30-44 years old, after Musgrove was down five points in September. This goes hand-in-hand with the positive movement we saw above with this age group and its views of the former governor.

Finally, while there is a high undecided number with older voters, a group which should break for Wicker in the end, there is a big undecided number with young voters which should offset for Musgrove the so-far undecided 60+. Additionally, Musgrove is now within single digits in this group, not a great sign for Roger Wicker.

Finally, I won't break out the data by region; I will just say that Musgrove has doubled his lead in the Delta to 55-40. This is Rep. Thompson's area, and it is heavily black. In Wicker's home base in the northeastern part of the state around Lee County, Wicker leads 52-40, after being ahead 52-37 five weeks ago. Again, this is movement within the margin of error, but it should be troubling for Wicker that he has not been able to expand his advantage in the First District which he represented in Congress for seven terms. This might go with our view that Musgrove has a hard base of white support that has been fairly unshakable so far.

Conclusion

I will keep this uncustomarily short. As we have said over and over, Ronnie Musgrove needs to accomplish two things to win this race:

(1) Get approximately one-quarter of white voters; and
(2) Win the black vote overwhelmingly, with at least 91 percent of that group.

If this poll is right, he is well on his way to hitting both goals and becoming Mississippi's new United States Senator.

And this does not even begin to take into account the $64,000 question: what black turnout will be. All of this polling data is based on the assumption that black turnout will be 37 percent. This is a rise of three percent over what it was in 2004. We have no idea what it will be next month. Personally, I think it will break 37 percent, but that's an amateur's guess. If it does, however, then Musgrove would almost have to be favored at this point. But since we know, we have to remain in the unknown for 17 more days.

Nevertheless, as things stand today, Ronnie Musgrove is poised to win, and pull off what might be the biggest upset in a night that should have many unexpected results.