MSNBC: 2022 Mid-Term Odds Do Not Favor Democrats Amid Record Voter Turnout

Todd: “A good Sunday morning. Just 16 days until the election, 7 million Americans have already voted and we have some brand-new NBC poll numbers to share with you that indicate interest in this election is at an all-time high. Look at this. We record 70% of voters saying that interest in this election is at 9 or 10. That is higher than ‘18, higher than ‘14, higher than ‘10. And what’s significant about 2018? That was the highest midterm turnout in 100 years. This indicates we’re going to be even higher than that. Overall, the battle for congressional control, it’s a dead even 47-46. But if you go under the hood of our poll, this brand-new poll, you will see that among likely voters, Republicans have an advantage; and among the final group of persuadable voters, Republicans have the advantage. That is why it feels as if the wind has shifted a little bit here. We asked them, ‘What message would you send with your vote to Congress?’ Democrats, the number one message clearly is ‘protect women’s rights.’ It goes along with all of those abortion rights ads we’ve been seeing among Democratic candidates. When you ask Republicans what message would they send, it’s a bit mixed, quite a few of them. One that does stand out though is ‘fix the economy,’ ‘reduce the cost of living’ on that front. Now, presidential job approval is one of those numbers that seems to be indicative of which way the wind is blowing. So, President Biden sits at 45%. Where does that stand contextually? It’s two points lower than Barack Obama in 2010. It’s two points lower than Donald Trump in 2018. Both were wave elections against the party in the White House. Digging deeper here, we’ve got some all-time midterm highs that should serve as red flags for the Democrats. The wrong track, 71%, all-time midterm high since we’ve been polling. How about presidential disapproval on the economy sitting at 57%? Again, we hadn’t recorded that ever that high in our poll. And the third one, the direction of the economy, in the next year, is it going to get better or worse? 50% say it’s going to get worse. Again, an all-time high in midterm polling. Going further here, this interest in the election, we told you, it’s high on both sides. This 69% number for Democrats is astonishing. It’s 78% among Republicans. That is an extra astonishing number, if you will. And the big gap here, African-American interest among Democrats. This is why you’re going to see a lot of Barack Obama in the next two weeks. If the Democrats don’t get interest in the election up among African-Americans, they’re going to have some problems, particularly in some of those key Senate races. There is one lone bright spot here for Democrats. Biden is seen as a bit more — his agenda a bit more agreeable than Trump’s, though everybody is negative here. ‘Do you agree with Joe Biden most of the time?’ 45% mirrors his job rating, 50% disagree with his agenda most of the time. How about Donald Trump? 36% agree, 56% disagree most of the time. If you want to call that a bright spot, there is one there for the Democrats. Here’s another one here, ‘Most important issue facing this country.’ Number one, for the second poll out of three, ‘threats to democracy.’ Number two and three are both economic-related, ‘jobs and the economy’ and ‘cost of living.’ But this issue of threats to democracy rose to number one this summer after the start of the January 6th hearings.”