EuroWeekly March Presidential Election LiveBlog!!

[Lime]

EuroWeekly Election LiveBlog
Early Results Show upc/Sanjurkia Leading but Election Could be Close

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Hello and welcome to EuroWeekly's live election coverage! We'll be tracking the votes as they come in to help paint a picture of where this election is headed. So far after the first hour of voting the upc/Sanjurika ticket is leading with 17 votes compared to the 12 votes for the Ellenburg/Sincluda campaign. This is broadly in line with the polling conducted during the campaign period, although the upc/Sankurika ticket is slightly behind on where the polls predicted.

At this very early point during the voting it looks like the upc/Sankurika ticket remains the favourite to win the election, although these results do still suggest there is a narrow pathway for the Ellenburg/Sincluda ticket. They've received a flurry of endorsements just before and after voting opened, including from former President Rand and current Senator Fillet minion. Can they turn these endorsements into a final momentum push which allows them to overtake upc/Sanjurkia?

If you'd like to contribute to today's liveblog with your thoughts on the election then please send me a message on Discord! Everyone would love to hear your thoughts and analysis. I'd also really appreciate it if some people could join me in tracking the voting throughout the day, just at each hour mark taking a note of the voting totals for each ticket. It'd be really great if we could get as close to an hour by hour recording as possible. Again just send me a message on Discord if you'd like to help out!

 

[Lime]

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Welcome back to our liveblog coverage! At the two hour mark, the upc/Sanjurika ticket has extended its lead over the Ellenburg/Sincluda ticket with the margin between the two tickets now at 7 votes. While the Ellenburg/Sincluda ticket did gain an extra 2 votes, the upc/Sanjurika ticket received a further 4 votes which allowed them to extend their lead over their opponents.

With 35 votes cast we're likely looking at around 50% of the expected turnout having voted now. This further narrows the pathway of victory for the Ellenburg/Sincluda campaign with simply fewer votes available for them to catch up and then overtake the upc/Sanjurika ticket.

I'm now happy to introduce the first guest on the Liveblog, recently returned citizen @Gem! What's your view of the election as it stands now Gem?

 

[Gem]

Thanks, Lime!

What I think of this election, and I think this is supported by some of the polling data we saw leading up to now, is that Ellenburg and Sincluda have done very well with newer citizens and our most active citizens, but Europeians who've been around for awhile and citizens who are somewhat checked out of politics are overwhelmingly going to UPC and Sanjurika. This split is also represented in the endorsements received by each ticket—where UPC and Sanju pulled in high-profile endorsements from Vor, Pichto, and Maowi; and Ellen and Sinny received a flood of endorsements from mostly new and/or newly-returned, highly enthusiastic citizens.

The biggest challenge the Ellenburg/Sincluda ticket faced coming into this race was the résumé imbalance. Ellen has an enormous NationStates résumé but one of the shortest Europeia résumés of any recent competitive presidential candidate. On the other hand, UPC and Sanju are enormously well-known and well-liked within our region and have each held numerous positions of note over the course of several years.

Because of this, I think most older citizens and less-engaged citizens are voting UPC/Sanju almost by default. On the other hand, many newer citizens and those who've been most engaged recently have found Ellen and Sinny's recent accomplishments as Minister of Culture and Outreach, and their very well-recieved platform and vision, to be quite compelling. Many of these voters may also not have been around to experience UPC and Sanju's most popular terms.

And I think this reflects itself on the results thus far. Early in the voting, when the most engaged citizens are likely to vote, we saw almost a 50/50 split between the two tickets. After the first 20 votes, though, UPC and Sanju began picking up votes at a rate twice that of Ellenburg and Sinny. I definitely can see Ellenburg/Sincluda making a resurgence, though. Our least-engaged and gameside citizens are a largely unpredictable factor, as they rarely respond to polling, and if Ellen and Sinny have a substantially better GOTV campaign than UPC and Sanju, a 7-vote margin is definitely closeable, albeit difficult with over half of expected votes already in.

 

[Lime]

That's a really interesting perspective Gem which I hadn't considered before. So perhaps we may see some gamesider votes start to come in which could change the dynamics of this election so far. Although as World Assembly Delegate it seems likely that upc would have some strong name ID advantage over Ellenburg. We'll just have to wait and see!!

The votes have been slowly trickling in, and the margin between the two tickets has now extended to 9 votes. While the upc/Sanjurika ticket hasn't been running away with the vote they have managed to maintain their lead and even modestly add to it. The Ellenburg/Sincluda ticket appears to have stalled at this moment in time being unable to maintain let alone close the gap between the two tickets. With 45 votes cast there still seems likely to be at least another 15 votes to be cast given recent Presidential elections, possibly even more than 15 based on the previous election. The Ellenburg/Sincluda campaign must be hoping for another very high turnout election to give them the best possible chance of victory.

We've reached out to both campaigns to request a comment on the election so far. We've received confirmation that we'll be receiving a comment from one campaign soon, and are waiting to hear back from the other campaign. We'll be providing those comments to you as soon as we can. A reminder again that if you want to give your thoughts on the election so far then please feel free to give me a message on Discord.

 

[JayDee]

those who've been most engaged recently have found Ellen and Sinny's recent accomplishments as Minister of Culture and Outreach

I've gotta disagree with this. Early polling is a good indicator of where our more active/engaged citizens are leaning and those polls were also favorable towards upc/sanjurika if not moreso than the election polls are.

 

[Lime]

There's been a few more votes come in since our last update, narrowing the gap ever so slightly to 8 votes. We have received a comment from the Ellenburg/Sincluda campaign who've told us:

"We are obviously hoping that we can close the gap, and seeing as though we are only 7 hours in, we feel there is still a shot. We realize that the road to close the gap will be difficult, but we have yet to give up hope. We are actively fighting for a late surge to get us back into the game."

So the Ellenburg/Sincluda ticket hasn't given up hope yet and is still actively fighting to win more votes to narrow and possibly even overcome that gap.

I'm delighted to introduce now our second (or third if you count JayDee!) liveblog contributor @Lloenflys! What are your thoughts on the results so far Lloen? Do you agree with the comments made by Ellenburg/Sincluda that there's still left time to turn this election around?

 

[Lloenflys]

Thanks for the invitation to participate Lime! In the twenty minutes since you posted, the UPC/Sanjurika ticket has gained another 2 votes to move out to their largest lead of the night at 10 votes, right on a 60/40 split. It's funny how a few votes can change perceptions ... when the lead was more at about 7, I still felt like there was a decent chance for the Ellenburg ticket to find some votes and potentially swing the result. While I'm always someone who thinks there's a chance for surprising results, being 10 votes down with 50 total votes cast is a pretty tough position to be in and it is starting to look like the election is pretty solidly in UPC's hands. I don't think it's controversial to say that is how things are likely to end up.

I do want to say I think that the Ellenburg/Sincluda team has run a very solid campaign that they can be justifiably proud of. UPC/Sanjurika are both extremely well-liked, well-respected members who a lot of people seem to feel have paid their dues and whose "turn" it is to lead (at least that's the vibe I've gotten from talking to people about this election). In the face of that, Ellenburg put together a very strong campaign, did the best he could to leverage his considerable strengths as a candidate, and has garnered a very solid number of votes. In the end it seems likely that the final result will come up short for him, but this is far from an outright rejection of his candidacy or his ideas. I'm sure he'd rather be winning, but he doesn't have anything to be upset about with the result he's putting up tonight.

I also want to say I'm grateful to these campaigns for giving us a competitive election as we emerge from the three terms of JayDee-mania. Whether we in fact end up with President UPC or if Ellenburg pulls off an amazing comeback, I'm confident the region will be in good hands moving forward.

 

[Lime]

Thank you for that insight Lloenflys! I must say I completely agree with you, and given both the experience and popularity of both upc and Sanjurika I think the Ellenburg/Sincluda campaign has ran a superb campaign to be a real viable alternative to what was a heavily favoured ticket. Indeed, I could easily see an Ellenburg Presidency in a term or two on the basis of this campaign alone, but if he can gain even more experience in the Cabinet I think that alongside this campaign would set him up very well to win a future race.

As Lloenflys noted, there have been further votes cast since our last update. The upc/Sanjurika ticket has gained 3 votes while Ellenburg/Sincluda has gained an additional two meaning the margin between the two tickets has increased to 9 votes. With 53 votes cast in total, at this stage it appears safe to say that the election leans upc/Sanjurika but with likely plenty more votes to be cast we cannot yet call this election. However, the race undoubtedly leans towards a upc/Sanjurika victory from where the results stand right now.

We have also now received a comment from the upc/Sanjurika campaign who have told us:

"The results so far have been a pleasant surprise! We’re not ready to call the election yet either though, looking forward to seeing how the rest of the voting period plays out."

This will likely be the final update from me tonight. Thank you to everyone who has been reading along and to Gem and Lloenflys for sharing their thoughts and insights. Please if you would like to say anything on the liveblog feel free to leave your thoughts down below. I'd also now request if people could take a note of the vote tally at each hour mark so that we can have as close to 24 coverage of the vote as possible. Either leave the vote tally down below or shoot me a DM with them. It'd be great if we could fully fill in that graph!

I'll be back with coverage tomorrow, and I hope you can join me then!

 

[Lime]

Hello and welcome to the second to last update from this election liveblog. The votes have continued to come in overnight but the story hasn't changed much. upc/Sanjurika have continued to extend their lead over the Ellenburg/Sincluda campaign and at this stage with voting closing in 20 minutes time, it is more than safe to project a upc/Sanjurika victory.

While the voting was close during the first hour of voting, the upc/Sanjurika was able to build and then maintain a significant lead over their opponents during the first few hours of voting. They were then successful at extending that lead over their opponents, denying the Ellenburg/Sincluda campaign a chance of a comeback victory. With 63 votes cast so far, the final results looks to be very close to the 60/40 margin projected by opinion polls before voting opened.

As this election comes to a close and a upc Presidency will soon be ushered in, I'll ask my fellow contributors @Gem and @Lloenflys if they have any final thoughts on this election season and what a upc Presidency could look like.

 

[Lime]

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The final update from me on this election liveblog. We saw no change in the final hour of voting, meaning the upc/Sanjurika ticket has won this election with 39 votes (61.9%) to 24 votes (38.1%). In the end, the results were very very close to those projected by the opinion polls before voting opened. The final turnout was 63 votes, a decline from the 79 votes seen in the last election, but still a high turnout which should be celebrated.

Thank you all who read these updates from me throughout the voting period. Thanks also to @Gem and @Lloenflys for sharing their thoughs on this election, and thank you to both @upc and @Ellenburg for providing a campaign comment for the liveblog.

That's it from me, thank you for reading once again. And I'll leave you now with the scenes of delight from the upc/Sanjurika campaign HQ as they win this Presidential Election!

Goodbye!

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[Lloenflys]

Thanks Lime! I appreciate having had a chance to participate in this election's live blog!

I am a little surprised that the vote distribution over the final hours of voting seems to have skewed so heavily to upc. I would have expected a more random distribution but it felt like most of the votes at the end piled in one direction. I wonder to what extent that was a "bandwagon effect" where people were already aware (through discussion in Eurochat or conversation with friends) that upc had a pretty solid lead, and so they decided to go with the flow. Alternatively of course it could have just fallen that way by chance. It doesn't really matter but it seemed to be an interesting result that at least had me curious.

What will be particularly interesting for me is watching how upc handles the frills of the Presidency. We as a region have been used to the communication style and presidential method of JayDee, and we've had that now for 210 days in a row ... it's been a long time since someone else was President! Will upc's style be a shock to the system or will it feel like more of the same? Also, and this will be mostly unseen to most of us comfortably tucked away in our Euro bubble, but what will interregional relations look like with the changeover? UPC was of course a well-respected figure interregionally in JayDee's administrations as well so this is not a complete sea change for any of our allies or antagonists, but nonetheless things are different at the top and that inevitably will lead to some different interpersonal dynamics. It will be interesting to watch that process play out and see what happens over the next 70 days with our interregional relationships.

I'm looking forward to the upcoming cabinet reveal, and to seeing everything the incoming administration has to show us!