The BDN Opinion section operates independently and does not set news policies or contribute to reporting or editing articles elsewhere in the newspaper or on bangordailynews.com
Michael Cianchette is a Navy reservist who served in Afghanistan. He is in-house counsel to a number of businesses in southern Maine and was a chief counsel to former Gov. Paul LePage.
“Past performance is not indicative of future results.”
That’s the disclaimer the Securities and Exchange Commission requires mutual funds and others add to their marketing materials to, in essence, remind us that investment carries risk. It is one of those painfully obvious statements the government issues to protect us from ourselves, like the Food and Drug Administration’s recent warning to not cook chicken in NyQuil.
But past performance is often the appropriate basis from which to make educated guesses about the future. And if past performance says anything, it is that the GOP is going to have a really good Election Day.
Since the end of World War II, a first-term president’s party has gained congressional seats in the midterm election only once. That was 2002, when President George W. Bush’s performance on Sept. 11, 2001 was still fresh in everyone’s mind and he remained remarkably popular.
If you look at FiveThirtyEight’s presidential approval tracker, Joe Biden has the worst “net approval” rating of any president since Harry Truman 652 days into their term. “Net approval” is “total approval” minus “total disapproval.” As of Wednesday, Biden was at -11.3. Donald Trump was -10.9 on his 652nd day, while Barack Obama and Bill Clinton were at -4.7 and -3.1, respectively.
Trump lost 41 seats in the House of Representatives to Democratic pick-ups in 2018. Republicans gained 63 seats against Barack Obama in 2010 and 54 against Bill Clinton in 1994.
Obama’s first midterm saw the GOP take the Maine Legislature for the first time in decades and a victory for a guy known as Paul LePage.
Clinton’s 1994 midterm led to a Republican Maine state Senate. The GOP was just six seats shy of a majority in the House. And the Democratic elder who had previously been elected governor — Joe Brennan — could not retake the Blaine House.
Will past performance be indicative of future results?
Gas prices are approaching $4 a gallon in Maine. In 2016, the “all-in” standard offer for Central Maine Power was 14.1 cents per kilowatt-hour. It is now 50 percent higher at 21.2 cents per kilowatt-hour. Bad news for the president’s party.
But there are sparks of good news for Democrats. The unemployment rate in Maine is very low. As former Gov. Paul LePage points out, a portion of that comes from the fact that the “labor participation rate” — the number of people of working age actually trying to work — has fallen several points since he left office.
In sum, it’s a mixed bag with Republican leanings.
So, I’ll make my predictions. And if my past performance is indicative of future results, I’ll get some right and others wrong.
Bruce Poliquin wins the 2nd Congressional District, again. At least on the first round of tabulation. However, once the votes for Tiffany Bond are reallocated to U.S. Rep. Jared Golden through ranked-choice voting, the latter returns to another term in Washington.
U.S. Rep. Chellie Pingree keeps her seat.
The U.S. Senate finds 52 Republicans in the majority for the latter half of Biden’s first term, while Speaker Kevin McCarthy leads a U.S. House GOP majority of 230.
Maine Republicans take one of the two legislative chambers in Augusta. The other will be balanced on a knife’s edge. In a surprise twist, Republican nominees take the constitutional offices of secretary of state, state treasurer and attorney general.
And then the big fight. LePage-Mills. Who you got?
No bet on my end. It will be a coin flip and down to the wire. But watch Lewiston. For both LePage and Gov. Janet Mills, Lewiston victories led them to the Blaine House.
And from that past performance, I will make my prediction of future results.
