Early vote turnout in North Carolina has been epic. As in other states, a Covid-driven flood of absentee-by-mail votes arrived at local election boards where processing began at the end of September. By my information, 68% of voters in Buncombe County (largely Asheville) have voted already (the final 2016 turnout was 71%). Overperformance there means the other, redder 15 counties in NC-11 will have some catching up to do if Republicans expect to send Madison Cawthorn to Congress to replace Rep. Mark Meadows (R).
For those who missed his appearance at the RNC convention, Politico recaps:
Madison Cawthorn, the paraplegic survivor of a near-fatal car crash, achieved instant star power after a June primary in which he toppled the candidate endorsed by both President Donald Trump and former GOP Rep. Mark Meadows, who resigned the seat to become the president’s chief of staff. Armed with his newfound fame, Cawthorn has centered his campaign on a scathing critique of his own party, calling it xenophobic, feckless and devoid of empathy — all while aligning himself closely with a president accused of embodying those very traits.
Cawthorn, 25, dropped out before completing a full year of college, and save for time spent in Meadows’ district office, has had no adult job. He casts himself as a real estate investor on the basis of having bought land with the cash settlement he received from his accident. He otherwise is a walking talking point with no experience and no ideas of his own. But confident, even after allegations of “sexually predatory behavior” in college.
Opposing the experience-free Cawthorn is Democrat Moe Davis, a native of nearby Shelby, NC:
A 62-year-old former chief military prosecutor at Guantanamo Bay, Davis has also taught law, served as a judge and worked as a congressional aide on national-security issues. On the trail, he repeatedly cast Cawthorn as a clueless 20-something “with no education, no training, no experience that qualifies him for the job.”
He seems shocked that anyone could see Cawthorn as qualified to serve in Congress. In an interview, Davis rattled off a list of times he said his opponent seemed to be unaware of basic facts, including when he suggested he would be sworn in this month instead of in January; and an interview in which he suggested Congress could have over 500 members after the next census.
Cawthorn’s ads, Politico observes, have poor production quality that only reinforces his inexperience. Lack of seasoned operatives, say party strategists, make the race closer than it should be. Davis’s social media postings have been relentlessly negative, focusing more on prosecuting a case against Cawthorn than on selling himself to voters. Both are first-time candidates and it shows.
Cook’s ranks the district “lean Republican” at R+9.
Polling is sparse for this race. FiveThirtyEight’s modeling shows Cawthorn favored to win. But the redrawn NC-11 puts Asheville/Buncombe fully back in the district after most of the last decade, and at roughly 35% of the district registration.
If Democrats manage to flip NC-11, it will be on Biden’s coattails, on the strength of Buncombe’s early turnout (which passed 2016 totals on Saturday), and on how independent voters split. D vs. R registration and voting patterns are never good measures here where many Democrats vote Republican in federal races. Both Democrats and Republicans have lost registration in recent years, with both conservative Democrats and disaffected Republicans leaving their parties. Current district registration is roughly 29% Democrat, 33% Republican, and 38% Unaffiliated (independent).
Republicans bat last (on Election Day). However, 66% of district independents pulled a Democratic ballot in the March primary and 36% of those reside in lefty Asheville where early voters are outperforming the rest of the district. Women are outperforming men district-wide and are likely to be first-time voters and unmarried.
If NC-11 proves flippable, that could do it for Davis, even if by a hair.