One in six voters said this was their first time voting in a midterm election, according to early exit polls, CNN reports. In 2014, 36.4% of eligible voters voted in the midterm election, down from 2010 when 40.9% voted, per TIME.
The big picture: Two-thirds of voters showed up to the polls because of President Trump. According to CBS News, 39% of them said they showed up as a protest of Trump. A majority of voters said they think the country is headed in the wrong direction, per the AP.
After Priorities USA, a Democratic-aligned super PAC, saw that "Dónde Votar" ("where to vote") is the top Google search trend in the U.S. today, it translated its voter mobilization ads to Spanish in Arizona and Florida.
Why it matters: Even though people were searching for "where to vote" in Spanish, Google was providing them with English results. This type of quick reaction to real-time Google search trends not only gives voters the information they're looking for, but gives Democratic groups like Priorities more visibility on Election Day. (Of course, that doesn't mean one party will necessarily benefit more than the other from this.)
SB Nation, the sports network from Vox Media, is launching 32 new podcasts, one dedicated to each NFL team. It’s also working to create localized podcasts for all teams within big sports markets around the country.
Why it matters: Vox Media is investing heavily in its podcast and television studio businesses to grow its revenue and audiences. The company is slated to triple its podcast revenue this year from 2017, according to Marty Moe, President of Vox Media, Inc.
Fox News host Sean Hannity joined President Trump on stage at a campaign rally in Missouri last night, despite tweeting that reports he would be doing so were incorrect.
MSNBC's Steve Kornacki, author of "The Red and the Blue: The 1990s and the Birth of Political Tribalism," told Axios about his prep plans ahead of Election Day.
How Steve preps: "I'm in my office right now. I am staring at a notecard that's got the — what am I looking at here? — I've got Illinois: I've got the different potentially competitive districts in Illinois. I've got the component counties. I've got the share of each county that's part of the district. I've got the share of the district the county accounts for. I've got the 2016 Trump and Clinton numbers, and I've got a very rough turnout estimate for each."
More money will be spent on advertising this election cycle than any previous midterm cycle, according to the Center for Responsive Politics (CRP), which powers the election data website, OpenSecrets. While final tallies are still coming in, "it's safe to say that this is a new midterm record," says Andrew Mayersohn, Committees Researcher at CRP.
A number of fast-food and casual-dining restaurants around the country, like McDonald’s and Bob Evans, are actively recruiting senior citizens who employers say are more sociable and punctual than teenagers, Bloomberg reports.
“Hiring seniors is a good deal for fast-food chains. They get years of experience for the same wages—an industry median of $9.81 an hour last year, according to the BLS—they would pay someone decades younger.”
— Bloomberg's Leslie Patton
The big picture: The labor market is tight. Bloomberg, citing the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, reports that the amount of working Americans between the ages of 65 and 74 is expected to grow by 4.5% between 2014 and 2024. Meanwhile, the rate of people working between the ages of 16 and 24 is expected to plunge by 1.4%.
David's Bridal is prepping a bankruptcy filing as it works to restructure around $760 million of debt related to its 2012 takeover by private equity firm Clayton Dubilier & Rice, according to Bloomberg.
The bottom line: This would be the latest in a recent string of PE-backed retail bankruptcies, but Bloomberg says there are "no plans for major store closures or liquidations."
U.S. soybean sales to China — "the largest market for one of America's largest exports" — are down 94% from last year's harvest, as retaliatory tariffs stemming from President Trump's trade war have Chinese consumers turning to less-expensive trading partners, reports the NY Times.
Qualtrics, a Provo, Utah-based maker of enterprise survey software, set IPO terms to 20.5 million shares at $18-$21.
Why it's a big deal: Not only is this around twice the $200 million that Qualtrics originally filed to raise, but also could double the $2.5 billion valuation that it received in its most recent round of venture capital funding.
The backdrop: The 30-second ad, a shorter version of a clip Trump tweeted last week, depicts undocumented Mexican immigrant Luis Bracamontes, who received the death penalty for murdering two police officers in 2014. Unlike Trump's tweet, the ad does not falsely blame Democrats for letting Bracamontes into the country, but it does attempt to connect Bracamontes and his crimes to the migrant caravan traveling through Mexico to the U.S. border.
President Trump railed against CNN "Fake Suppression Polls" in a Monday morning tweet, and later warned that illegal voters will be subject to the "maximum criminal penalties allowed by law."
So funny to see the CNN Fake Suppression Polls and false rhetoric. Watch for real results Tuesday. We are lucky CNN’s ratings are so low. Don’t fall for the Suppression Game. Go out & VOTE. Remember, we now have perhaps the greatest Economy (JOBS) in the history of our Country! ... Law Enforcement has been strongly notified to watch closely for any ILLEGAL VOTING which may take place in Tuesday’s Election (or Early Voting). Anyone caught will be subject to the Maximum Criminal Penalties allowed by law. Thank you!
Why it matters: On the eve of the 2018 midterm elections, a number of CNN polls have shown Democrats ahead by double digits in a generic congressional ballot.
Since tomorrow is political journalism's Game Day, we talked with three of the cable stars of election night about how they prep. Today, we interview Fox News chief political anchor Bret Baier, who'll co-anchor "America’s Election HQ: 2018 Midterms" with Martha MacCallum, from 6 p.m. until the wee hours.
What he's saying: Some of the prep is "kind of osmosis, as we're covering all these races," Baier said. "But we have this massive briefing book ... and all kinds of stats in there. So there'll be a little studying over the weekend ... But on game day, on Election Day, it's about staying calm and moving things around."
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