Talk:2018 United States elections/Archive 1

Biased heading ?
"These midterm elections will take place in the middle of Republican President Donald Trump's term, assuming he serves a full four years." Just wondering if the last part of this sentence is necessary or if it adds bias to the article. Nathanlds (talk) 21:38, 4 August 2017 (UTC)

No. It's true, it would be in the middle of his term is he does serve for years, just like how 2010 would be in the middle of Obamas term if he did fully serve his 1st term. Macraesam17 (talk) 09:03, 5 October 2017 (UTC)

Although I have no problem that this part of this sentence has been removed. Macraesam17 (talk) 09:04, 5 October 2017 (UTC)

Roy Moore
I believe the map is no longer accurate, as Roy Moore defeated Luthor Strange in the Alabama Republican Primary. I guess that makes Alabama a retiring Republican (assuming Strange doesn't run as a write-in candidate)? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 38.109.119.254 (talk) 18:21, 6 October 2017 (UTC)

The schedule
Texas has a primary in March and the ballot deadline is Monday!!!!! There's nothing else until May, which means that we're going to start having lots and lots of fun sometime in March....Just thought y'all could use the heads-up Arglebargle79 (talk) 01:58, 10 December 2017 (UTC)

State elections
Wisconsin special election for a state senate Wisconsin has happened i think we add it — Preceding unsigned comment added by 212.205.0.10 (talk) 09:34, 18 January 2018 (UTC)

Section "Alt-right" biased
I have added to the only sentences in the section, as I believe it to be biased. Bettering the Wiki (talk) 09:03, 23 February 2018 (UTC)
 * I see has removed it, which I take as a valid response. Bettering the Wiki (talk) 23:49, 23 February 2018 (UTC)

RFC on Russian Interference
Should the article include Russian interference in the 2018 United States elections as a subsection and in the lead? Casprings (talk) 01:30, 13 August 2018 (UTC)

*Include Whatever we may think of the USA that the amateurish Russian trolling operation seems to have impacted their election, it really looks like it may have. At the very least, the popular impression that the election may be illegitimate is notable enough that it should go in the lede. Simonm223 (talk) 17:15, 27 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Include As nom. Clearly WP:N and one of the more important aspects of the ongoing election.Casprings (talk) 01:31, 13 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Include Clearly ongoing, clearly noteworthy. – Muboshgu (talk) 01:32, 13 August 2018 (UTC)
 * I don't agree with the way it's currently included, though. It should come after a listing of all the elections. The Russian interference isn't the most key part of the elections. The elections are. – Muboshgu (talk) 02:36, 13 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Concur with the above. As it is, it's POV pushing and given undue weight. Mélencron (talk) 20:52, 15 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Include, as it's part of the election. Closeclouds (talk) 01:56, 13 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Include but per Muboshgu, the present position is wholly wrong. Russian interference is not the most important part of these elections. Pincrete (talk) 14:18, 14 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Include, I tend to agree with Casprings on this issue, but I see that Muboshgu has a valid point. I will be keeping my eye on this page, I recently had to undo some vandalism here. Triangleman3 (talk) 14:44, 14 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Oppose inclusion "Russia is currently interfering with the election" is POV-pushing; even if it's true it's unclear that it's important. The section as written is a WP:POLEMIC and far too prominent. power~enwiki ( π,  ν ) 22:41, 15 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Written in a neutral way, like "Christopher Wray, Dan Coats, etc. have indicated that Russia is continuing to attempt to influence elections" and including some info on how and why (if we can write that neutrally) should be fine. As written, I agree, it's not okay. – Muboshgu (talk) 22:53, 15 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Indeed; while I strongly oppose vandalism, the vandals have a point in the way they word the sentence under question. Bettering the Wiki (talk) 23:04, 15 August 2018 (UTC)
 * I'm sure it's possible to write the section that would be appropriate for the body of the article; there's currently no discussion of the election at all (apart from this), just links to more-specific elections. That would have to change if this is kept; some sense of the trends of the election as assessed by secondary sources (lots of Democrats are running for Congress; what do people think of Trump?; etc.) would also need to be discussed. power~enwiki ( π,  ν ) 23:01, 15 August 2018 (UTC)
 * I agree with that. And as for how to present the election interference, we could use stories like this one that I just read. – Muboshgu (talk) 23:03, 15 August 2018 (UTC)
 * It is still a valid point that you are making an argument to rewrite, not to exclude it. The RFC is clearly asking rather it should be included, not which edit.Casprings (talk) 23:04, 15 August 2018 (UTC)
 * You're proposing to change this from the Broad-concept article it is now to something entirely different; it's not unreasonable to want a plan to write a good article of that form before endorsing it. Simply adding a news-feed of Russia-election news stories with no context as to their importance is of no benefit, and I oppose adding it. power~enwiki ( π,  ν ) 23:17, 15 August 2018 (UTC)
 * I am proposing to add something that is clearly historically significant to this election, as it was to the last one.Casprings (talk) 23:23, 15 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Note: Related RFC for the U.S. House Election and the U.S. Senate Election. Casprings (talk) 23:07, 15 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Exclude as UNDUE, especially for the lede section. A brief mention may be warranted in the body text (not as a full subsection), duly attributed to intelligence sources. — JFG talk 12:52, 16 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Include in both. Closeclouds (talk) 13:04, 16 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Exclude as given undue weight and appears to be POV pushing; include only as a subsection with a link to the main article or as a link within the "see also" section. Mélencron (talk) 13:20, 16 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Include - It is extraordinary that election interference by Russia is still ongoing. One would expect that it would have been stopped by those in the U.S. government responsible for defending the country. The significant news coverage in the past two months negates any WP:UNDUE arguments. It should be mentioned in the lead as well.- MrX 🖋 13:49, 16 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Include: I don't support inclusion of this section in the House and Senate articles, since those articles are basically huge lists that have a lot of ground to cover, but I do think it makes sense here. Orser67 (talk) 19:18, 16 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Include, but we should actually describe what they are doing They typically promote the most extreme sides of an issue; often both sides. That's much more informative than the series of quotes we have currently.Adoring nanny (talk) 00:53, 23 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Weak Exclude (summoned by bot ) for the present time, but support inclusion as a "see also" link or even as a non-lead few sentences short of a standalone subsection. Based on the reports I've seen, evidence of demonstrated Russian interference comes down to spending five-figure amounts on social media posts; ergo, to include this in the lead while not including the seven figure amounts being spent on social media posts by hundreds of PACs, donors, and parties would be somewhat UNDUE (though I don't subscribe to the POV argument previously iterated by some exclude !votes). And while I agree, generally, with the argument below that there is a clear and obvious difference between covert and overt involvement, and between foreign and domestic, I don't think the difference is so significant as to overcome the relative scale of intervention as it's been documented. At the risk of getting into WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS, I'd note our article on the French presidential election, 2007 does not slap Alleged Libyan financing in the 2007 French presidential election into the lead and that potentially involved an eight-figure amount of cash and the indictment of the former president. However, I'd be open to revisiting this in the future as the subject evolves. Chetsford (talk) 04:37, 26 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Are you sure you are referring to the upcoming 2018 election? Your comments seem to be about the "amateurish Russian trolling operation" that occurred over the 2016 elections. Can you clarify? — JFG talk 09:51, 28 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Yeah, I was thinking 2016 and that was a total brain-fart. Will strike through. Simonm223 (talk) 11:56, 28 August 2018 (UTC)


 * Weak Exclude on the grounds of WP:CRYSTAL for now. But if there are reliable sources that can demonstrate that Russia is in fact interfering with the mid-terms with enough certainty to put it into Wikipedia's voice I could be swayed. Simonm223 (talk) 11:58, 28 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Simonm223, I would note that the WP:CRYSTAL argument was dealt with here. As the efforts are ongoing, WP:CRYSTAL does not apply.Casprings (talk) 04:11, 30 August 2018 (UTC)
 * User:Casprings - CRYSTAL is not completely done away with, as much of that article and topic is speculative. Its partly crystal, partly not and hard to say much since not much has happened.   Frankly, I'm dubious about denying CRYSTAL because of near-certainty of junk on FB or Twitter, and of calling that 'interference' as it's an open medium and junk from many nationalities is basically the norm there.  (Including odd stuff from the white house.)  Whether the odd stuff would be labelled as interfering with elections (including junk from the white house)... is going to be down to specific incidents and multiple RS required, because this is a POV-push area.  After the election there would be factual reports -- but beforehand, the content is fuzzy and the motives suspect.  Cheers Markbassett (talk) 05:47, 30 August 2018 (UTC)
 * It's an oddly American chauvinism to create an open platform, market it all over the world, create no controls around it and then to be upset with foreign actors use it to express opinions back at the United States. Let me know when you have evidence of actual electoral tampering at the primary level or open elections and I'll gladly change my !vote. Simonm223 (talk) 12:06, 30 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Exclude - It does not suit WP:Lead as it does not have much coverage in the article or major influence. It seems mostly WP:SPECULATION at this time, a few non-election mentions, and a single Florida incident.  There is basically posturing and nothing else for 2018 so no it should not be a lead item.  Cheers Markbassett (talk) 05:27, 30 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Include - Interference by Russia in US elections is historically significant and considered so important that leaders of the intelligence community testified to Congress in Feb. 2018 as to assessment of this threat. That means that it is important enough to include in the Lead, as a broad issue that can affect elections across the country. Before 2016, the US was not aware of foreign nations trying to influence elections through propaganda on social media and other sources. Parkwells (talk) 16:29, 30 August 2018 (UTC)
 * User:Parkwells NOT THE FIRST. It has happened before, except for the social media part. Foreign governments trying to influence elections goes from the French in Election of 1796, British efforts thru 1800s, Germany in the 1930s, up thru allegedly Ted Kennedy seeking Russian anti-Reagan support in 1980s, and Chinese donations to Bill Clinton.  Influencing decisions outside an election seems better — easier and more certain and available more than once per 4 years.  But election meddling has happened numerous times before.  It is after all what motivated the repeated creation of laws about it.  Cheers Markbassett (talk) 13:50, 1 September 2018 (UTC)


 * Note: “AND IN THE LEAD”? Please say something there.  Just to highlight that it is part of the question the RFC is asking.  SO if people do not explicitly speak about WP:LEAD, their results about that will not be clear.  Cheers Markbassett (talk) 13:14, 1 September 2018 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the history lesson, but I do not equate remarks by a French ambassador with widespread, hidden efforts to promote divisiveness through attacks in media. I think the fact that the intelligence community testified about the threat of Russian activity is sufficient to have this topic included in the Lead about the 2018 mid-term elections.Parkwells (talk) 13:48, 2 September 2018 (UTC)


 * Include. Per WP:LEAD, the lede should summarize the article, which in this case contains a length and well-sourced section on Russian interference. Even if there was no interference (which does not seem to be the case), the mere fact that there is so much analysis and reporting in reliable sources about the potential for such interference would justify its inclusion in the article and by extension, the lede. Patar knight - chat/contributions 07:07, 10 September 2018 (UTC)


 * Include because there is no reason not to. The undue argument does not make sense, especially in light of so much ongoing and substantive media coverage on this issue of meddling. Kerberous (talk) 16:25, 12 September 2018 (UTC)
 * Include content in body plus a mention in the lead section. Well-sourced, highly significant; no policy-based reason to omit from either one. Neutralitytalk 00:41, 16 September 2018 (UTC)

Extended discussion
As a separate point, if I were to say Charles Koch and David Koch intend to interfere with the election., it would be (rightly) removed. power~enwiki ( π, ν ) 23:20, 15 August 2018 (UTC)
 * External countries conducting a campaign to influence elections covertly are historically significant. The Koch brothers are taking part in activities that are a normal part of American politics. While that "normal part" of American politics might deserve an article, it doesn't have unique importance for any particular election article.Casprings (talk) 23:26, 15 August 2018 (UTC)
 * I don't think this compares to Russian interference in the Polish–Lithuanian royal election, 1764. power~enwiki ( π, ν ) 19:32, 16 August 2018 (UTC)
 * I actually think that some sort of (short) section covering fundraising and the role of outside groups like the Kochs or (picking a liberal-leaning group off the top of my head) EMILY's List would be appropriate. Given that the Kochs live in the U.S., I would agree that it would be inappropriate to say that the Kochs are "interfering" in elections. Orser67 (talk) 19:25, 16 August 2018 (UTC)

Electoral interference is - Foreign groups funding campaigns. Foreign groups tampering with ballots. Electoral interference is not - Bernie Sanders colouring books. Memes telling people to write praise Trump so that cartoon Jesus will punch a cartoon devil. If we have evidence of the former it might be notable. If this is just more social media trolls, I would say it's not notable in the slightest yet. Simonm223 (talk) 16:33, 30 August 2018 (UTC)
 * The only one of those items that is currently up there that seems actually about a verifiable incident of actual electoral interference is the one from Florida that was later found to be bullshit. Right now it's a list of unverified assertions by various vested politicians; I still think it should go. Simonm223 (talk) 16:31, 12 September 2018 (UTC)

Definition needed
What's a midterm election? Which countries have midterm elections? What's the purpose, imapact? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Newb787 (talk • contribs) 03:36, 24 October 2018 (UTC)

Inserting politically motivated reports
I am concerned with some people inserting potentially "biased" information made from politically motivated articles. Such as this edit and this edit Batran99 (talk) 02:31, 25 October 2018 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 6 November 2018
"In analysis, the 2018 mid-term elections will be known for it's new array of ads, unlike what we've seen in the past."

This sentence is incoherent and ungrammatical. In particular, please change "it's" to "its". 2001:569:782B:7A00:30AC:60DE:36DD:3C2D (talk) 07:11, 6 November 2018 (UTC)
 * Good suggestion. Thank you! Jack N. Stock (talk) 07:28, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

Reverts over RFC Consensus to include Russian Interference in the lede
There have been repeated reverts over the consensus above to include Russian interference in the lede by User talk:Polinht and User:Determom. I would ask both users to stop reverting what is consensus and, if they wish to change consensus to talk about it here. Casprings (talk) 12:59, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

Government control in table?
I don’t usually work on these kinds of articles, but would there be anything wrong with including state government control in the table I.e. trifectas and whatnot? It seems relevant and I imagine that there’s a source somewhere that addresses it if need be. Jay eyem (talk) 13:01, 6 November 2018 (UTC)
 * Support including state legislatures as relevant. I'm sure that there are many sources that address it. The only thing is each state's legislature is different, and many may not be comparable. Especially if your focus is 'government control', which I'm not sure is feasible and may be contentious.&thinsp;&mdash; Mr. Guye (talk) (contribs)&thinsp; 20:56, 6 November 2018 (UTC)
 * I'm not clear on how trifectas are contentious. The exact table I'm referring to is the bottom table on Political party strength in U.S. states. It would just be two more columns in the table that is already there. Jay eyem (talk) 23:21, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

Results as a metric of the health of representative government?
The results should include more than simple tallies of the number of seats decided between the two parties. Especially insofar as the House of Representatives is supposed to be responsive to the will of the voters, some higher level information should be presented. How well did the election achieve that goal of allowing the voters to express their will? I think one important metric would be proportion of the actual voters against the resulting legislature. Though some seats are still undecided (as of this writing), it appears the Democratic Party will have slightly over 50% of the House. Right now the figure is 51% with 3.9% of the seats not yet determined, but let's say they split the difference and the final figure is 53%. If the Democratic Party also received 53% of the total vote for House seats, then that would say the elections are working well, but if they actually received more, then that is a metric of unwellness that should be tracked over time. (In recent House elections this metric has been reported on the order of a 5% difference in some sources, but I'd prefer to see the raw numbers on Wikipedia.) Shanen (talk) 23:29, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

House of Representatives
As of right now, the paragraph at the end of this section is still written in future tense, as though the election were still in the future. Somebody with far more information than I have needs to rewrite it to reflect the election's results. JDZeff (talk) 19:30, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

Much better now; thanx! And, I hope that it will be updated again when those last few races are officially decided. All in all, this looks like a job well done! JDZeff (talk) 19:05, 9 November 2018 (UTC)

Turnout at highest percentage of eligible midterm voters since 1914
What are the reliable sources for the turnout? Abductive (reasoning) 16:57, 7 November 2018 (UTC)


 * Record voter turnout in 2018 midterm elections. CBS News. "with 49 percent of eligible voters participating in the election. ... 'if we can beat the 1966 49-percent [midterm] turnout rate, you'd have to go all the way back to 1914 to get a turnout rate above 50 percent,' McDonald said last week."


 * Need more sources, and more specific info and totals. --Timeshifter (talk) 19:32, 8 November 2018 (UTC)


 * 2018g - United States Elections Project.
 * https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1tal3fAaKnEj_7Yy_7ftrNg4dJy4UxGk3oKSd3uPb13Y/edit
 * These are not final numbers as of this writing. --Timeshifter (talk) 19:47, 8 November 2018 (UTC)


 * The author (Michael McDonald) of the above 2 links says the numbers are still rising and may pass the 1966 turnout:
 * https://twitter.com/ElectProject/status/1060717877744070656 - see followup tweets from him.
 * --Timeshifter (talk) 06:28, 9 November 2018 (UTC)


 * It has passed 1966 turnout of 48.7%, and is still rising. See Google Docs spreadsheet (link higher up) and Michael McDonald tweet:
 * https://twitter.com/ElectProject/status/1061351586579005441
 * Here is my current entry in the article below. Section heading in bold:

Historic turnout

--Timeshifter (talk) 02:25, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

A Commons file used on this page has been nominated for deletion
The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page has been nominated for deletion: Participate in the deletion discussion at the. —Community Tech bot (talk) 01:13, 20 November 2018 (UTC)
 * 2018 US House Election Results.png

Kansas Governor race
Should it be indicated that the governor of Kansas was seeking re-election but was eliminated in the primary which makes the map, although correct, misleading. CaptainActualist (talk) 21:23, 10 November 2018 (UTC)
 * The map only goes by political parties, not individuals. GoodDay (talk) 00:50, 23 November 2018 (UTC)

RfCs: uncalled races, open seats, "seats before"/"seat change"
Please comment:


 * RfC closed. Result: "There is a clear consensus for option 3: an article should state that a candidate has won an election when the election is called by reliable sources (All sources? Most sources? A particular source?) for United States elections. Some editors expressed support for requiring that more than one source call the election. There is no consensus owing to the lack of discussion by a number of the RfC participants on this, so there is no prejudice against opening a new RfC to discuss this further."
 * RfC: Definition of "open election" or "open seat"
 * RfC: "Seats before" and "seat change"

Thank you. Levivich (talk) 00:58, 30 November 2018 (UTC)

No foreign vote tampering, but influence operations persisted
Putting in a section note. Does not seem unusual or contentious to me but I see it's been contentious and RFC above so I am mentioning I have put at the bottom of Alleged foreign interference section mention that the DNI 22 Dec report said no tampering, but foreign influence campaigns persisted - including from China, Iran, Russia. (No details in the bit I saw.) I didn't see any discussion or mention of this or the earlier DHS informal saying about the same thing, so I skipped the DHS item and just put in the DNI one. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 20:50, 25 December 2018 (UTC)

Federal elections graph
Is there a reason the graph at the beginning of the Federal elections section jumps around in years? It seems to me it should be chronological. FloridaArmy (talk) 19:41, 22 December 2018 (UTC)
 * The graph I believe you are referring to shows all midterm elections since 1994 in chronological order, so I'm not sure what you mean. There's also a table that shows partisan control of each Senate class after the 2018 elections. Orser67 (talk) 21:01, 25 December 2018 (UTC)

Random unsourced policy issues mentioned in the lede
The editor Orser67 has restored a version of the lede full of unsourced content that has not been covered in the body:


 * Major issues debated during the campaign include immigration, abortion, the American Health Care Act of 2017, the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017, the Trump administration, gun control, energy policy and alleged Russian interference in these elections.

On November 29, the same editor insisted that an issue "that isn't mentioned in the article and... isn't cited" should not be in the lede, and that "the lead should generally only summarize what's in the article". Currently, the body of the article only emphasizes the important role that health care, taxes, immigration and race played in the election. As a result, the lede should only cover those issues. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 17:49, 22 December 2018 (UTC)
 * I agree. We can't summarize what doesn't exist in the first place.- MrX 🖋 18:52, 22 December 2018 (UTC)
 * I removed the three issues that aren't mentioned in the body from the lead. I agree that they shouldn't have been added to the lead, and I wasn't the one to do so originally. Orser67 (talk) 21:14, 25 December 2018 (UTC)