{"id":143553,"date":"2018-11-08T09:31:46","date_gmt":"2018-11-08T14:31:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/?p=143553"},"modified":"2018-11-08T13:35:01","modified_gmt":"2018-11-08T18:35:01","slug":"morning-political-scientists-2018-election","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/2018\/11\/morning-political-scientists-2018-election\/","title":{"rendered":"The Morning After: Political Scientists on the 2018 Election"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The midterm elections featured an electorate that is polarized and unhappy, with the economy not playing as important a role as it usually does.<\/p>\n<p>Health care and immigration were the key issues, along with President Donald Trump, and although there were national issues, regional predispositions played their usual important roles.<\/p>\n<p>Those were a few of the takeaways from a forum yesterday at UConn, held less than 24 hours after the House of Representatives returned to Democratic control, the Senate remained with the Republicans, and here in Connecticut, Democrat Ned Lamont was elected governor.<\/p>\n<p>Trump clearly was in the minds of voters around the country \u2013 no matter what their feelings about him are, said a panel of UConn political scientists.<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n  <p>People campaigned as friends or opponents of Donald Trump. There is something for everyone to be happy about and not happy about. <cite> &#8212 Ron Schurin<\/cite><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>Early exit polling suggested that about two-thirds of the voters said their vote was about the president, according to Jennifer Dineen, associate professor of public policy and director of the graduate program in survey research.<\/p>\n<p><iframe title=\"Public Policy Professor Jennifer Dineen On The 2018 Election, November 2018\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/HbBQgn5r88s?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>\u201cMore of those voters said they came to show opposition rather than support for the president,\u201d Dineen said. &#8220;Last time I checked, nearly 4 in 10 voters said their vote was meant as a sign of opposition to President Trump.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The presence of Trump made this election more nationalized than those in recent history, added Paul Herrnson, professor of political science.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cPrior to 1994, there were very few nationalized elections \u2013 post-Watergate and the Great Depression \u2013 that\u2019s really about it,\u201d he said. \u201cI would say the election was nationalized in some ways, but not a tidal wave.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Trump\u2019s emphasis on immigration might have helped the Republicans do well in the Senate, although that was not always going to be the issue the party emphasized in the final weeks before Election Day, according to Dineen. The party wanted to key in on the economy, but Trump insisted that immigration should be out front more.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe saw immigration being a big part of the narrative leading up to the election, as the caravan in Central America has been making its way up\u201d to the U.S. border, said Dineen.<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n  <p>&#8230; the biggest reason for possible change is the composition of the House of Representatives, which is changing to be more reflective of America. <cite> &#8212 Jennifer Dineen<\/cite><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>Herrnson believes the 2016 election will be remembered as the \u201cdawn of a new era\u201d for women running for Congress.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe percentage of women running has grown over the last few cycles, but took a jump in 2018,\u201d he said. \u201cWomen comprised 24 percent of those trying to get elected to Congress among first-timers, meaning non-incumbents. When women run, women win.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>In Connecticut, the results were not positive for Republicans, noted Ron Schurin, associate professor of political science.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThey have lost their third close gubernatorial race, and each of the three times, they were leading all night long until the large cities and the &#8216;limousine liberal&#8217; towns came in and turned it around,\u201d Schurin said.<\/p>\n<p>In 2008, the Connecticut Republicans were not leading in the General Assembly, but they gained year after year since, increasing their representation to tie their numbers with Democrats in the Senate in 2016, according to Schurin. &#8220;They thought they were going to cross the line in both this year, but it went in the opposite direction \u2013 and badly in the opposite direction.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p><iframe title=\"Political Science Professor Ron Schurin On The 2018 Elections, November 2018\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/UhsC2IybkBY?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>But, overall, he added, &#8220;people campaigned as friends or opponents of Donald Trump. There is something for everyone to be happy about and not happy about.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>What does the future look like?<\/p>\n<p>\u201cOne of the things I find the most interesting, the most exciting, and really the biggest reason for possible change, is the composition of the House of Representatives, which is changing to be more reflective of America,\u201d said Dineen. \u201cIt will have policy consequences, and also impact on voting coalitions for 2020 and beyond.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The forum was moderated by\u00a0Vin Moscardelli, assistant professor of political science.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&#8216;People campaigned as friends or opponents of Donald Trump. There is something for everyone to be happy about and not happy about,&#8217; said political science professor Ron Schurin at a post-midterm panel.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":123,"featured_media":143561,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"wds_primary_category":0,"wds_primary_series":0,"wds_primary_attribution":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2226,2225],"tags":[2078],"magazine-issues":[],"coauthors":[2113],"class_list":["post-143553","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-clas","category-uconn-storrs","tag-political-science"],"pp_statuses_selecting_workflow":false,"pp_workflow_action":"current","pp_status_selection":"publish","acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-12 05:06:41","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/143553","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/users\/123"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=143553"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/143553\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":143606,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/143553\/revisions\/143606"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media\/143561"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=143553"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=143553"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=143553"},{"taxonomy":"magazine-issue","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/magazine-issues?post=143553"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=143553"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}