Tuesday's Net Neutrality National Referendum

Radical supporters of net neutrality have chosen to try and make the mid-term election a national referendum on net neutrality.

• FreePress' close ally, The Progressive Change Campaign Committee (PCCC) has created a website NetNeutralityProtectors.com, which lists 95 House and Senate candidates that have taken their net neutrality pledge: "I believe in protecting net neutrality -- the First Amendment of the Internet..."

To make it easier to track the electoral performance of candidates who have take the PCCC/FreePress net neutrality pledge, here is a Net Neutrality Election Tally Sheet, listing the 95 candidates so that one can print out and record the outcomes on election night.

To put this preview in perspective, net neutrality supporters have been able to get:

• Only 10 candidates in the 37 U.S. Senate races to take their NN pledge -- all Democrats; and
• Only 85 candidates in 435 U.S. congressional races to take their NN pledge -- again all Democrats.

To get a handle how the PCCC/FreePress net neutrality supporters are projected to fare on election night Tuesday, the Tally Sheet includes the election predictions of the non-partisan independent Cook Political Report:

• Of the 10 Senate NN pledgees:
  • 0 are safe/likely/leaning Democrat:
  • 7 are safe/likely/leaning Republican;
  • 3 are tossups.
• Of the 85 House NN pledgees:
  • 0 are safe/likely/leaning Democrat:
  • 83 are safe/likely/leaning Republican;
  • 2 are tossups.

In sum, if the non-partisan Cook Report predictions are close to accurate:

• Of the 950+ candidates running for Senate or House seats, only 95 or 10% have taken the PCCC/FreePress net neutrality pledge.
• Of the 95 who have taken the NN pledge, the non-partisan Cook Report projects that 90-95 will likely lose their elections.

Simply, radical supporters of net neutrality once again have vastly over-represented the amount of political and popular support there is for mandated net neutrality, open Internet regulations, or Title II regulation of the Internet.