What Went Down In The 2018 Midterms

California’s Senate results are eyebrow-raising. Sen. Dianne Feinstein leads fellow Democrat Kevin de Leon just 54 percent to 46 percent — a lot closer than most people thought it would be. Is it huge turnout among progressives? (De Leon was challenging Feinstein from the left.) Is it that Republicans just instinctively voted against their old nemesis Feinstein? My guess, looking at the county-by-county results, is the latter.

In Arizona, it looks like the remaining vote is almost entirely from Maricopa, Pima and Apache counties. Those are three of the four most Democratic counties in the state. Given that Sinema is just 1 percentage point behind McSally in what’s currently reporting, I like her chances.

Beep boop …

I might be an emotional robot, but tonight isn’t causing me much anguish. I had calibrated my expectations based on FiveThirtyEight’s Deluxe forecasts for the House, Senate and gubernatorial races before the night began … and it seems they were a pretty good guide.

None of the races tonight were cause for alarm (😲🚨), although I was shocked (😲) by Democrat Max Rose’s win in the New York 11th, mostly in Staten Island, and by Democrat Kendra Horn’s win in Oklahoma’s 5th District, which covers much of Oklahoma City. I was also shocked by Republican Ron DeSantis’s win in Florida’s gubernatorial race.

I was surprised (😮) by a few Republican wins in statewide races. Particularly, Republican gubernatorial wins for Mike DeWine in Ohio and Kim Reynolds in Iowa, as well as Republican Mike Braun’s Senate win in Indiana. I was also surprised by the Republican win in Kansas 2.

Still, it looks like most of the races fell within my expected ranges. As my editor-in-chief said (yes, robots have bosses), it looks like polls are still a “pretty darn good instrument overall” if you are a robot that wants to avoid emotional turmoil.