This has been a hellish year, one for the record books. The Election is 3 days off. There has been no seismic interruption in the last 24 hours, and none is likely to matter in the next 48 hours.

The weather across the US should be good for voting, except perhaps in part of New England where it will not affect Presidential results. Conditions in Swing States by and large look favorable, if a bit chilly some places in the Southeast and Midwest.

The proud state of Texas is done with Early Voting. Our brothers and sisters in the Lone Star State blew the doors, walls, and roof off with their Voting Strong this year. Records all around.

More 2020 Early Voters than Total Votes in all of 2016.

We don’t know the R’s and D’s yet, but we do know with considerable exactitude how many Texans have actually cast their votes already.

And we have accurate final data county by county from 2016 and 2018 Texas Federal Elections past.

Willie Nelson Grand Ole Opry “On the Road Again”

This feels like a psychedelic party with superstar Texan Willie Nelson sailing on mind altering substances with down home musical accompaniments, but we can hazard a way out there Texas Election Call now. Catch Me If You Dare.

How many more Texas votes are there? Texas Tribune says 25% of total votes were cast on Election Day in 2016. Texas has already collected 9.672 million votes at the end of Early Voting yesterday, October 31, 2020. That would mean there are 3.224 million more votes to come on Election Day.

Total 2020 Texas turnout in my book will be 12.896 million when all is said and done.

The Texas Secretary of State says there are officially 16, 956, 977 registered Texas voters in 2020. That would make a 2020 Presidential turnout of 76.1%. Howdy, Pardner!

The Texas Tribune has done some amazing reporting on early turnout and data by county. Kudos to them and state Election officials who aren’t stalling release of critical results. A model performance so far.

The 10 Texas Heavy Counties account for 57.3% of all registered voters, 55.9% of last early day voters, 59.1% of all in person early voters, 59.8% of all early mail in voters, 59.2% of total early voters, and 61.5% of all newly registered voters in 2020.

The Texas Heavies are in order of voter mass: Harris, Dallas, Tarrant, Bexar, Travis, Collin, Denton, El Paso, Fort Bend, Hidalgo. Just for reference, not calculations here, the next five in order are Williamson, Montgomery, Galveston, Brazoria, and Cameron.

Willie & Fans Roll Me Up & Smoke Me When I Die

It seems like a pipe dream to even bring this up. There is an absolute maximum of 7.28 million Texans who could still vote this year, 3.99 million in the Top 10 Heavies. The Combined Deep Redness of the Rest of Texas (all 244 counties) has only 3.29 million more registered souls. There is no secret stash of undiscovered shy Trump voters to ride in on a Trump Train or Boat Parade next Tuesday from small town and rural Trump Country. Rick Perry’s Texas Tomato Soup Counties, all 246 of them.  Their Red reservoir max vote reserve is smaller than in the 10 Heavies. Oops.

We know what happened for Trump in Texas in 2016. He got 2,115,425 votes in the 10 Heavies (45.2%) of his total. He got 2,569,622 votes in the other 244 Texas counties (54.9%) of his total votes. Trump’s total percentage of the Texas vote was 52.3%. For this trip, let’s say Trump will win the Rest of Red Texas on Election Day by 55-45 (the same as he did in 2016). No, even better, by 20 points which is a Texas stretch, but let’s play it out.

Non Heavy Texans already have cast 3.95 million votes early in 2020. Trump emerges with a 20-point lead, or about 790,000 votes more than Biden and the Democrats.

As a nod to the steep and lasting demographic changes in Texas since the last Presidential election, like those altering the 2018 Senate race, and not including any whiff of negative fallout for Trump since then due to his 2020 Pandemic response and economic uncertainties, let’s use the 2018 Margins for just the 10 Top Texas Counties, the Heavies.

Based on the complete exact 2020 Early Vote only, not counting any Election Day votes, the Democrats have already banked 1,072,043 more votes than Republicans before Election Day. Based on the exact Early Vote count in the 10 Top Counties, the Democrats have rolled up an 18.7% margin (using 2018 party results).

Every metric shouts that Trump is not more popular in Texas now than he was in 2018 in the near-term afterglow of a huge Tax Cut, good economic news, and no Virus plaguing Texans. But the Republicans are banking on a uber strong ground game and personal voter contact. Let’s say that even in the 10 Heavies, they cut the Democratic advantage on Election Day itself further to just 12%.

Let’s also assume Election Day 10 Heavy vote share is only 50%, and not 57% as it has been in 2020 Early Voting. There will be 1.61 million Heavy County votes. We end up with an additional Democratic Margin from Election Day of 193,000 more votes in the Heavies.

244 County Red Texas will also have 1.61 million more votes on Election Day, and we will assign a Trump advantage of 60-40 or 20% for this bundle. That means the Republicans pick up 320,000 votes on Election Day in the rest of Texas.

Here are the four subtotals:

10 Heavy Early Votes:             1.072,000 Democrats
Rest of Texas Early Votes:       790,000 Republicans
 
Election Day 10 Heavies:        193,000 Democrats
Election Day Rest of Texas:     322,000 Republicans

What this all adds up to is a mind-blowing result that when all the Texas votes are counted, Democrats win by 153,000 votes. Bigger than Trump.45’s 2016 margins in Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin. Combined (107,000).

Texas sets its modern voting turnout records in numbers and percentages. 13 million Texans take the reins of their Democracy in one 3- week period. Texas goes Blue for the first time in A Dog’s Age. America adjusts to a new and better normal.

Austin, Texas Honors A Native Son

That would be Earth Shaking. A monumental political flip. Sam Rayburn and Lyndon Johnson, Texas’s twin Master Politicians, are both smiling. Molly Ivins is laughing her ass off in Heaven.

And I need some more of whatever aromatic Willie has got on him at home.

Trump would be a very burnt slice of toast.

A fantastical whimsy, but we will see it play out in real time in 72 hours. Wanna’ bet?