This is really an apples vs. oranges comparison times two, no, times three.
First, he’s comparing 2018 with 2016 which was a presidential election.
Second, he’s comparing a primary/special election with a general election.
And third, he’s comparing a 2018 race between two new candidates with a 2016 race where the GOP candidate was a 16-year incumbent.
This race had only about 10,000 less votes than the 2014 general election which Tiberi won going away, 150,000 to 61,000. A lot of Tiberi’s 2014 votes were probably from voters who don’t register, or even vote, GOP, just because he’d been in office long enough to help a ton of constituents.
Balderson will get considerably more votes in the general election rematch, but the total vote is likely to not be significantly higher than the 210,000 that voted in 2014, maybe 230-240,000 but almost certainly not anywhere near the 2016 total vote. The question is whether the Dems can find enough to more than match his higher total. Maybe not, after all the excitement they’ve already generated, but it’s an open question obviously.
Total BS....