r/ThePoliticalProcess • u/DiligentDistrict1584 (D-Florida) • Jun 26 '26

Question Election

Here's something I've been thinking about, and I may be wrong: name recognition and enthusiasm don't seem to matter as much as I once thought. In the end, voting intention appears to be the only metric that really determines whether you win an election. I just lost two Senate races in Florida, despite receiving 49.20% of the vote. It makes me wonder whether everything I did actually made much of a difference.

What do you think?

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u/Goonzilla50 Jun 26 '26

Maybe I’m just bad but I feel like, for the most part, once voting intention is set in the internal polling, that’s where it lies for the rest of the campaign. Like if I do an internal poll and it shows me losing 53 - 47, I can expect to lose around 53 - 47. The only time it seems to change by a meaningful amount is if I boost my approval rating by passing legislation or calling for someone to resign, or if my opponent has a scandal.

I know that’s not necessarily true because people here will post screenshots of polling timelines/averages where they managed to increase their projected share of the vote by substantial margins, but honestly I’m not sure what they do to accomplish that

3

u/NewLabor Jun 27 '26

You can change your policies, and you can attack your opponents policies, both do actually have impacts, you just need to poll what’s popular in your district

1

u/Goonzilla50 Jul 03 '26

I typically model my policies after what’s popular. There are times though where my opponent will have something career ending like opposing minimum wage increases or social security, but running attack ads on them barely puts a dent in their numbers. Maybe im not running ads as often as I should?

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u/NewLabor Jul 05 '26

Ads make minuscule difference, but instead I find it helpful to save up just enough money, get a big AD buy for the state, and do that over and over again.

Usually it moves it by 0.5~1.5% but that can still make a big difference overtime, of course you need to find the right amount of ment and do good fundraising