US presidential election minus 14 weeks

The first Harris-versus-Trump forecast model to open for business suggests a significant but by no means decisive advantage to Trump.

With The Conversation keeping this site’s regular US correspondent busy, a quick post of my own on the US election campaign, and a forum for the discussion thereof. The big news from my perspective is that, after all the noteworthy forecasters closed for refurbishment following Joe Biden’s withdrawal, Nate Silver has lifted the lid on his Harris-versus-Trump model.

The model launches with a 61.3% win probability for Trump and 38.1% for Harris, the balance presumably reflecting the possibility that one candidate or the other doesn’t survive until November. These numbers suggest a model with a judiciously wide zone of uncertainty around projections that superficially look very encouraging for Trump. Silver’s model records an essentially dead head on the national popular vote, and doesn’t credit Harris with a better than even chance unless she lands at least two points clear. State-level projections find Trump more likely than not to flip Wisconsin (just), Michigan and Pennsylvania (a little further ahead), Nevada (a little further again) and Arizona and Georgia (both about as strong for Trump as North Carolina, which he carried in 2020).

The Economist’s model is still on ice, but its page explaining its methodology is well worth reading. Its charts comparing the predictiveness of its poll-based and “fundamentals” models going back to 1948 are particularly interesting in finding that the latter have the superior record – certainly at predicting the result 150 days out, but even unto election day itself. However, one of its parameters does not seem to me to be quite as fundamental as all that, being a poll-based measure of presidential approval.

The question of polls-versus-fundamentals was the focus of a critique by Nate Silver of the new model developed by FiveThirtyEight, the enterprise formerly synonymous with Silver but now bought out, LucasFilm style, by Disney. Its new incarnation is overseen by G. Elliott Morris, of whom Silver says he is “not a fan”. This was producing remarkably bullish results for Biden up until it was put on ice, which evidently wasn’t persuading too many senior Democrats. As well as criticising a lack of transparency, Silver observes that the model seems to be overwhelmingly favouring fundamentals, despite its supporting data suggesting that fundamentals should in fact be viewed as less predictive than polls. Its thesis, Silver argues, is that – as of July 21 – “Joe Biden is a reasonably clear favorite to win the popular vote because he’s an incumbent, and it’s too early to really update that assumption based on the polling or anything else”.

Author: William Bowe

William Bowe is a Perth-based election analyst and occasional teacher of political science. His blog, The Poll Bludger, has existed in one form or another since 2004, and is one of the most heavily trafficked websites on Australian politics.

1,063 comments on “US presidential election minus 14 weeks”

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  1. Nope, apparently not upon further reading 😆

    The Harris vetting team has already met with Govs. Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania, Tim Walz of Minnesota and Andy Beshear of Kentucky; Arizona Sen. Mark Kelly; and others. The team has also asked vice presidential nominee candidates for previous ads they’ve filmed.

  2. Just on that Voice ad, there’s no authorisation at the end. The bit with Kamala Harris saying good new good news just after Biden announces that he’s stepping down seems out of place (it comes across as disrespectful to Biden, like Harris was wanting him to step down). Using different songs also seems strange. I doubt it’s an official ad, I suspect it’s been created by a supporter.

    Much of it is very good though.

  3. One more piece of good news for the Democrats: the prisoner swap with Russia. Assisted by other countries, it highlights the stupidity of not working with allies, and makes Trump look bad in turn.

    There is another significant aspect of it IMO. The swap includes not only US and German citizens, but Russian dissidents who have challenged the corruption and absolutism in Russia (and the Ukraine war),

    IMO this matters because if you are going to talk about a “rules based order” you need to back it up with standing up for aspects of that order that go beyond your own national self-interest. It helps with credibility.
    https://www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/aug/01/whos-who-in-the-prisoner-exchange-between-russia-and-the-west

    (Frankly defending a “rules based order” should also include reining in Israeli PMs who ignore international law while bombing Palestine, but that is another bridge that POTUS Harris will need to cross if Biden doesn’t.)

  4. B. S. Fairmansays:
    Friday, August 2, 2024 at 11:52 am
    Hard to believe that it was only 12 days ago that the rules changed. Nobody is talking to Trump coming within an inch or two of having his head blown off 3 weeks ago. The media cycle is crazy fast.
    ======================================================

    Yep, far more discussion now on how old and demented that grey matter inside his head might actually be. I can’t see how that discussion will go away for Don Old though. As it was his team who first used it and gave it huge exposure in their attacks against Biden. Now many of the same attack points they levelled against Biden are being reflected back and asked about Don Old now.

    If Don Old becomes President. He will become the oldest person to be voted in as POTUS. Beating Joe Biden’s the current holder of that title. Does the USA really want to break that record in consecutive terms?

  5. JD Vance is the gift which keeps on giving – he is up to his neck, as is his wallet, in the RWNJ fringes…

    Sen. J.D. Vance (R-OH) has been making headlines for his “rocky rollout” since being named former President Donald Trump’s running mate last month. The bad headlines and poll numbers have been driven by Vance’s extreme comments about “childless cat ladies,” abortion, and more. Well, along with extreme comments, Vance has some extreme investments.

    Vance has had a six-figure stake in Rumble, an online video platform. The company has played host to Russian propaganda and to far-right personalities like Stew Peters and Tim Pool. It has also featured even more extreme content, including explicitly neo-Nazi images and themes like this song touting the “Reich” and calling for Jews to be placed in ovens from a “dissident rapper” with a dedicated page on the site. The site features a plethora of channels and videos dedicated to the concept of “white genocide,” which is a core belief for white supremacists. It also hosts channels for explicitly white supremacist organizations including VDare and Patriot Front, which has led masked demonstrations around the country.

    https://talkingpointsmemo.com/where-things-stand/jd-vance-is-an-investor-in-a-far-right-video-platform-filled-with-neo-nazi-content

  6. Badthinkersays:
    Friday, August 2, 2024 at 12:45 pm
    Willie Brown’s advice was VP Whitmer for the win.
    This Walz looks like a butcher, Shapiro is wimpy.
    Beshear had CoIs from way back when his pappy was Governor, acted the Fascist during Covid. I’d say John Edwards level flake, at first glance, won’t survive closer inspection.
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andy_Beshear
    ====================================================

    When you say “acted the fascist over Covid”. I assume you mean he promoted lock downs when required and tried to encourage vaccination uptake. All things that sensible people would consider reasonable. In fact it was the fascists that probably protested against these measures. They certainly did in Victoria, using very violent symbolism when doing so too.

  7. Harris is levelling up or even getting ahead in swing states and seems now to be ahead on the national vote. Trump won’t be flipping Wisconsin, Michigan or Pennsylvania and the latest poll I read Arizona is now, close and Harris is slightly ahead in Nevade and Georgia. Having said that, the US have many polls, that are often all over the place from one polling group to another but that is the last lots of votes that are seen. The realism is that people want anyone but Trump or Biden. Now Biden isn’t there people now have a choice. While people will wait a little time on Harris just to see, in the end she will win comfortably.

  8. Americans can vote for Harris and then vote her out in 4 years time if they don’t like her. Trump is not offering the option of that in 4 years time though. A vote for Trump is a vote to end democracy.

  9. America is not ready for a Female/Female ticket. Not that I don’t think they would get the votes, it is that they won’t get the dollars.
    Nor is America ready for a Black Female/ Gay White guy ticket. That would be like pouring petrol on a fire ants nest, the Rights get out the vote would be massive.
    Anyway, we will know who Harris has picked in 36 hours or so….

  10. “Vance has had a six-figure stake in Rumble, an online video platform. ”

    The Wheels on the bus go round and round …….. until they come right off. 🙂

    Oh, and you can bet if its a Trump bus then none of the riders will be wearing seatbelts cause its their right not too!!!!!

    Fwark …. did the Repugs do any vetting at all of Vance ….. or did they just kowtow to Don Olds whim??

    Yah, it would have been Trump trying to run the show as a one man band / proper cult leader who “deserves” to pick his VP. 🙂 He must be hating that prisoner swap. Seems that HE wanted to be the ONE to do that and get the kudos for something only HE could do.

    I am starting to think that the Trump campaign may be up for some infighting and possibly rapid personel changes before the election.

  11. Imacca,
    You can believe there is a lot of infighting, blame-shifting and possibly even physical fights going on the Repug deck.
    The smell of fear is inundating whole buildings.

    The SS Drumpf is sinking way off course and there are no lifeboats, and not enough life-vests. You can imagine the rest.

    It’s delicious.

  12. Puff, the Magic Dragon @ #468 Friday, August 2nd, 2024 – 1:12 pm

    Imacca,
    You can believe there is a lot of infighting, blame-shifting and possibly even physical fights going on the Repug deck.
    The smell of fear is inundating whole buildings.

    The SS Drumpf is sinking way off course and there are no lifeboats, and not enough life-vests. You can imagine the rest.

    It’s delicious.

    Trump used to get pulled up by his advisers and tried to look half reasonable when things got tight. He hated doing it, and looked it. But he tried.
    He doesnt have the same advisers now. And I suspect Trump isnt as capable at being reigned in. He loves the response he gets when he goes hard. He soaks it up.

    So I suspect he will double and triple down as things get tight. The MAGA cult will get more revved up. And hopefully the trad GOP and right leaning independents will turn out and vote Harris and the centre left and left turn up in droves.

  13. Good point, TK.

    He doesnt have the same advisers now.

    How many are in or on their way to jail? (Bannon must be hating this.)

  14. “So I suspect he will double and triple down as things get tight. The MAGA cult will get more revved up. And hopefully the trad GOP and right leaning independents will turn out and vote Harris and the centre left and left turn up in droves.”

    Its a very plausible scenario.

    Something i think underlies the Harris campaign though, is that by running a mainly forward looking campaign, they will have more options and actual capability to do it, if they have to pivot in a different direction because of changes to the Trump / MAGA lineup.

    “Bannon must be hating this.”

    Oh the Humanity!!! 🙂

  15. Fwark …. did the Repugs do any vetting at all of Vance

    Trump is a fly by the seat of your pants, hit the deck running, then bluff and bluster out and on to the next thing. That is how he ran his life, his business and the country for 4 god awful years.

    I see the allure. Peeps do get sick of the over cautious. And when you think of the diet so many have – you wonder how much their voting is risk taking due to being sugar high and having sh!t on the liver.

  16. There has been a suggestion that Trump might drop out, but that would leave Vance as the presumptive nominee and I am not there would any way of replacing him. Imagine what the result would be if that happened.

  17. This prisoner exchange thing has possibilities. For example, assume that Trump loses and is imprisoned despite his “immunity” gift from the supreme court. Meanwhile some American is imprisoned in Russia. A future prisoner swap deal could see the American returned home and Trump given a comfortable existence in his preferred country, Russia. A win-win for everyone.

  18. Confessions @ #463 Friday, August 2nd, 2024 – 1:06 pm

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X_-ZPhrblvo&ab_channel=TheLincolnProject

    Once this election is over, that will be three elections in a row where the question was T****. I have no doubt that T**** will be remembered. The question is, how? While there are a few more years to go, I’m hoping that the arc of his life will eventually serve as a warning. (His last chapter/s being spent in jail.)

  19. “Talk of Harris only recently claiming to be black for political purposes is racist bullshit that should be washed back down the sewer it came from.”

    It’s not racist per se – i.e. if the statement were true, why would that make the person calling it out racist?

    But it just so happens that it appears completely untrue!

    We don’t have to make everything racist or not racist even if the person making the statement is, in my opinion, racist.

  20. Puff

    “Reading on this blog the demands by rightwingers that a black American woman prove she is black is nauseating.”

    I would fully agree with you if that were the case, racism is 100% unacceptable in my view, but who has been ‘demanding’ that on here?

    It appears to me that you are conflating two different things. Even Trump wasn’t talking about ‘proof’, he was talking about whether Harris embraces the mantle of being black only when it suits her politically – now that may be considered untrue or even wholly inappropriate by many, but that’s a world away from demanding “a black American woman prove she is black”.

  21. If Harris wins and gets a proper grip on the Mexican border to make it at least a net neutral topic for Dems, then TEXAS is achievable in 4 years time for her (all things being equal, obviously not if the economy’s trashed and she’s losing by a landslide).

    Perhaps more than Florida.

  22. “Blexas” is possible, after all, California was something of a red state in Nixon and Reagan’s time until the Republicans got too ridiculous over there in the 90’s.

    And like California has big blue cities like San Francisco, San Jose, Los Angeles and San Diego, Texas has increasingly large cities in Houston, San Antonio, Dallas and Austin.

    It would take some stars aligning to actually make it flip though. But it has come close in recent statewide elections, such as the 2018 midterm Senate election, where Ted Cruz (R) nearly lost to Beto O’Rourke (D) by a margin of 50.9-48.3.

  23. I am watching Biden and Harris greting American prisoners fron Russia.
    3people are greeted by Biden and Harris at 11:40 pm in the night.

    A Russian terrorist and hitman were released from Germany and Slovakia

    Reporter: What is your message to Putin
    Biden: Stop

  24. he was talking about whether Harris embraces the mantle of being black only when it suits her politically

    Interestingly his Dad pretended that the Trump family had Swedish instead of German ancestry in order to make Trump businesses more palatable to Jewish customers. Trump himself continued that fictional claim until at least the 1980s, when he included it in his autobiography.

  25. People maybe should be asking questions about Trump’s German-ness. Swedishness, family fascisticness, secret birth overseas.

  26. Also I watched Trump’s interview with the Black Journalists earlier. Something I noted that really rattled him was when the audience laughed and jeered at him. Yes, he can speak over individuals, but when the audience was against him, he genuinely froze.

  27. Kirsdarke

    Yes, he can speak over individuals, but when the audience was against him, he genuinely froze.

    It’s how I think that a narcissistic coward would react.

  28. Finally caught up on the thread today. A lot of both bile that’s nothing to do with polling discussion, and wishful thinking.

    I’m afraid Trump is still a long way from being a sinking ship, let alone the certain loser that many on here now see as inevitable. That’s the trouble with spending all your time online in echo chambers that reinforce your own view, you don’t see events and candidate comments even, how floating voters do.

    Much of what is ‘quoted’ on here from such sites is opinion,spin and distortions, not fact. The same would apply to quotes from far right-wing sites or youtube channels, but they don’t get much airtime on this, er, very left-leaning forum. 🙂

    If you want to beat him, you first need to understand both him and those who are, and may be, inclined to support him – once you get in their shoes you can offer an alternative in an appropriate way to peal away enough voters to win in the key battlegrounds.

    Merely insulting him and anyway who dares to vote for him is a sure way to lose. But fortunately for Harris, posters on here aren’t running her campaign.

  29. If Harris is smart enough – and I think she probably is – she will avoid the trap of needlessly antagonising those who will never vote for her anyway.

    Because abstention in USA elections is very high – and every 0.1% of voters she makes angry and motivated to get off their backsides after all and vote, could be another state narrowly lost.

    Think Hillary Clinton and her ‘deplorables’ comment, for example. I really, really wanted her to win that election – and still think she was a genius and would have been an excellent President on foreign affairs particularly – but she shot herself in the foot with this and other missteps and just remained aloof from disenchanted voters.

    I know the Comey investigation into Clinton got Trump over the line but she shouldn’t have been that vulnerable to losing at that point anyway.

  30. The key to Biden’s 2020 win was huge Black turnout, that didn’t happen for Hillary Clinton
    And it was due to Biden being the nominee, not Harris’s presence on the ticket.
    Without Joe, Harris really needs Black turnout in Virginia, Arizona, Michigan, Georgia, Pennsylvania, Ohio.
    Since she did nothing for Blacks in California when she was A/G, nothing as junior Senator, afaik, and definitely nothing as VP, she’s got to give those 30+ million eligible descendants of North American slaves a reason to go to the booth for her.
    So far, she’s flailing.

  31. @BTSays at 6:15pm

    So far Kamala is going good in that regard. Her campaign is directing all their attacks on Trump and the Republicans themselves, not their voters.

  32. Harris has framed T**** beautifully. The election for POTUS is a popularity contest, and Harris has put T**** into Elementary School schoolyard. Name calling is his stock and trade, so the schoolyard should be his domain, but the best he’s come up with is, “I’m not weird. You are!”

    That she’s setting the narrative, hurts him. That she’s put him in a schoolyard, hurts him. That she’s laughing at him, hurts him. She’s doing well. I hope it continues.

    Mavis, I didn’t realize the “weird” narrative stemmed from Walz. That Harris seems able to let her best people do their best is a strength that the best leaders have. Leadership trickles down.

  33. @Late Riser at 6:51pm

    I’ve picked up something similar from listening to James O’Brien over in the UK over the past few years. When a right-wing Brexiteer bully phones in and they end up in a petulant playground bad-faith argument, James fully engages, saying things like “Well I bet my dad could beat up your dad.”

  34. RFK

    It makes sense that what’s left of his vote takes more from Trump than Harris, whereas it was 50-50 previously.

    RFK was relatively popular amongst blacks who are suddenly fired up for new candidate Harris and don’t need an alternative to the two old guys any more. There may be a lesser effect of this amongst some Latinos as well, Kennedys are a well-known Catholic family who have always had appeal to Latinos. Not sure if part of it hails back to JFK standing up strong in the Cuba missile crisis – that’s pure speculation on my part, only just thought of it.

  35. Kirsdarke

    I’ve only listened to a handful of James O’Brien’s videos. Taking the pretense out of an argument (that what’s happening is a good faith adult discussion) and showing it up for the childishness that it actually is, is a good counter, especially if it avoids sarcasm.

    The other aspect is the word “weird”. It’s clever. How do you counter it? It’s not the word “stupid”, or the deplorable word Clinton used, or any straight up insult. What “weird” does is “other” (verb) T****. It’s tough to come back from that.

  36. Trump lost the last election fair and square. Given the way he conducted himself after the result of that election, how in the hell are swinging voters going to be drawn to him now?

    We can now see it all clearly since Biden withdrew!

    Who thinks Trump will concede defeat this time?

    No freaking way lol

  37. Centre:

    Of course he won’t. Harris could win in an Reagan-esque landslide and Trump will still claim to be the victor. And his braindead supporters will all lap it up as usual.

  38. BTSays @ #485 Friday, August 2nd, 2024 – 4:29 pm

    If Harris wins and gets a proper grip on the Mexican border to make it at least a net neutral topic for Dems, then TEXAS is achievable in 4 years time for her (all things being equal, obviously not if the economy’s trashed and she’s losing by a landslide).

    Perhaps more than Florida.

    Kamala Harris has promised to implement the bipartisan Border Bill if she is elected President.

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