iStock/Thinkstock(WASHINGTON) — While there are many questions about the legal implications of the FBI’s investigation into a new batch of emails from longtime Hillary Clinton aide Huma Abedin, the latest discovery has the potential to impact the hundreds of local political races that voters will be deciding on next Tuesday.
Hans Noel, an associate professor of government at Georgetown University, told ABC News that “it’s really hard to know” how last Friday’s announcement by FBI Director James Comey plays out.
“For a day there, I think a lot of Democrats were very discouraged and a lot of Republicans were very enthusiastic. Most of the biggest reactions were from people who had already decided, I suspect. As the news has developed, I think everyone has found something to back up what they already believed,” Noel said.
James Campbell, a professor of political science at the University at Buffalo in New York and author of Polarized: Making Sense of a Divided America, believes the investigation into the new trove of emails “will definitely help Republicans from the top to the bottom of the ticket.”
“Just as his earlier announcement…helped Clinton in July, this hurts her candidacy by raising the matter again,” he explained.
The down ballot implications will likely be seen in the form of depressed turnout rather than people switching their votes from Democrat to Republican, Campbell said. He noted that in recent races, between eight and nine out of every 10 presidential voters is a straight ticket voter.
According to John Hudak, a political scientist and senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, the email investigation could do more harm to down ballot candidates than the presidential nominees.
“It’s probably not going to risk Clinton’s loss but it could jeopardize some of her coattail effect,” Hudak said.
He continued, “I don’t think there are many voters who are out there saying, ‘I was willing to support Maggie Hassan in New Hampshire, but now that this email thing broke I’m going to go vote for Donald Trump [and the Republican ticket].'”
Clinton has been actively including other Democratic candidates at her campaign stops, regularly making pitches to voters that they should cast their ballots for the local Senate and House candidates while also selling her own candidacy. Candidates, like Hassan, are commonly included in her campaign events, or at least they had been before this latest turn of events.
Hudak said that her team was likely thinking that “if Clinton runs up the score in a lot of these states she’s going to win, it might help carry a couple of Democratic senators on her back,” but that may no longer be true.
“That was something the campaign was thinking seriously about, but if this situation cuts a couple of points into her margins in some of these states, it might be a little more difficult for her senate or house races,” he said.
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