US presidential election minus 10 weeks

Soft polling from the crucial state of Pennsylvania costs Kamala Harris her favourite status in Nate Silver’s forecast model, though The Economist has her maintaining the edge.

Polling from the last few days offers some evidence that Kamala Harris is enjoying a modest post-convention bounce, with Nate Silver’s aggregate having her lead on the national popular vote out from 2.3 points to 3.8 points. However, Harris has taken a turn for the worse on Silver’s forecast model, on which Donald Trump is now rated a 52.4% chance of winning with Harris on 47.3%, restoring him to a marginal favouritism he lost at the start of the month. This is entirely down to state-level polling from Pennsylvania, where “it’s been a while since we’ve seen a poll showing her ahead”. However, Harris remains a 56-44 favourite in The Economist’s model, which has hitherto tracked Silver’s very closely. Adrian Beaumont has more at The Conversation.

Adrian Beaumont update at 2:08pm William’s link above referred to an article I published on Sunday.  I’ve done another US article for The Conversation today which incorporates Nate Silver’s latest forecast.

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.

419 comments on “US presidential election minus 10 weeks”

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  3. meher baba @ #1 Friday, August 30th, 2024 – 6:21 am

    They should have picked Shapiro. It was a no- brainer.

    With the ongoing Israel-Palestine-Middle East situation at a flash point and Josh Shapiro’s staunch support for Israel, which the pick of Tim Walz has squared away with the large demographic of Arab-American voters in swing state Michigan.

    Yeah nah. Walz was the right pick. Not to mention the Oppo research on Shapiro that the Republicans had already released that they would have turned into a full-blown campaign against him.

  4. Looking at the polls for Pennsylvania, it seems like Nate Silver is trying to drum up some better odds at the tote.

  6. The post-DNC polling picture is coming into focus, with a brace of new polls out today that show Kamala Harris’s surge continuing. The latest USA Today/Suffolk poll gives Harris a five-point edge over Trump, 48 percent to 43 percent, while Reuters/Ipsos has Harris four points up, 45 percent to 41 percent.

    Swing-state polling, however, remains extremely tight: Emerson’s latest batch has Trump up in Arizona, North Carolina, and Wisconsin; Harris leading in Georgia, Michigan, and Nevada; and Pennsylvania statistically tied. Fox News’s Sun Belt findings, also out yesterday: Harris ahead in Arizona, Georgia, and Nevada, and Trump up in North Carolina—all within the margin of error.

  7. Mention of Shapiro in this contribution from Silver –

    It’s possible that RFK’s dropout and endorsement of Trump is having more effect in Pennsylvania and the other Rust Belt states than elsewhere, which have older, whiter and more disaffected electorates. And as I said, it’s also possible that all of this is noise and/or that the model is overdoing the convention bounce adjustment. But while Tim Walz has had a strong rollout as Harris’s VP, I can’t help but wonder what her numbers would look like with Josh Shapiro instead.

    https://open.substack.com/pub/natesilver/p/pennsylvania-may-be-a-problem-for?r=1sgi1v&utm_medium=ios

  8. Down ballot mostly doing better than the top…

    Senate Polling:

    Michigan:
    Slotkin (D): 47%
    Rogers (R): 41%

    Nevada:
    Rosen (D): 50%
    Brown (R): 40%

    Arizona:
    Gallego (D): 49%
    Lake (R): 42%

    Pennsylvania:
    Casey (D): 48%
    McCormick (R): 44%

    Wisconsin:
    Baldwin (D): 49%
    Hovde (R): 48%

    Emerson / Aug 28, 2024

  9. If you’re following 538, they’ve adjusted their model and there’s a somewhat verbose explanation as to why. We also learn about the new model.
    https://abcnews.go.com/538/538-adjusting-election-model-harris-versus-trump/story?id=112563822

    We accomplish this averaging by using something called Bayesian model stacking. In a nutshell what we’re doing is running two separate versions of the 538 forecast, each producing 10,000 simulations of each party’s vote share in each state. Then, we use the math explained in equation 13 here to estimate how much weight we should put on the polls-based forecast given how much time is left until the election — and thus how much uncertainty is left in the polling average relative to the fundamentals.

    Enjoy. (I think)

  10. 11am AEST for the Harris interview on CNN…


    By Patrick Svitek
    Vice President Kamala Harris said Thursday in her interview with CNN that she would appoint a Republican to her Cabinet if elected president this November.

    “I have spent my career inviting diversity of opinion,” she said, according to the network. “I think it’s important to have people at the table when some of the most important decisions are being made that have different views, different experiences.”

    The full interview, which includes Harris running mate Tim Walz, is set to air at 9 p.m.

  11. Aug. 29, 2024, 4:50 p.m. ET1 hour ago
    Jonathan Weisman

    In clips released early by CNN from its interview with Harris, the vice president distanced herself from the so-called Green New Deal, but she embraced the timelines for shifting the country from carbon-producing energy, as laid out in the Inflation Reduction Act. She believes, Harris said, “that the climate crisis is real, that it is an urgent matter, to which we should apply metrics that include holding ourselves to deadlines.”

    Aug. 29, 2024, 4:27 p.m. ET1 hour ago
    Reid J. Epstein
    Harris also dismissed a question from the CNN host Dana Bash about former President Donald J. Trump saying that she had sought to alter her racial identity over time. “Same old, tired playbook,” she said, according to CNN. “Next question, please.”

  14. From previous rhread:

    Harris up 4-5% in new poll by USA Today/ Suffolk University

    https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2024/8/29/2266537/-Harris-up-4-5-in-new-poll-by-USA-Today-Suffolk-University?pm_campaign=front_page&pm_source=trending&pm_medium=web

    “Harris is up 48%-43% in a new poll from USA Today/Suffolk University (moe 3.1%). This pollster is pretty highly rated.

    http://www.usatoday.com/…

    The poll of 1,000 likely voters, taken by landline and cell phone Sunday through Wednesday… is now measuring likely voters; previous polls were of registered voters. Without the customary rounding of results, her edge would be closer to four points than five, 47.6% to 43.3%.”

    “Harris improved by 24 points among younger voters, 18 points among Latino voters, and 17 points among Black voters comparing to their June poll with Biden:

    Voters 18 to 34 years old moved from supporting Trump by 11 points to supporting Harris by 13 points, 49%-36%.
    Hispanics, a group the Republican campaign has been cultivating, moved from supporting Trump by 2 points to supporting Harris by 16 points, 53%-37%.
    Black voters, traditionally one of the most overwhelmingly Democratic groups, moved from supporting Biden by 47 points to supporting Harris by 64 points, 76%-12%.”

    “Harris also had a +26 point swing among voters with the lowest incomes, <$20k (going from Trump +3 to Harris +23).
    http://www.suffolk.edu/…
    "

  16. Trump’s Arlington scandal gets worse and worse—and worse

    https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2024/8/29/2266505/-Trump-s-Arlington-scandal-gets-worse-and-worse-and-worse?pm_campaign=front_page&pm_source=top_news_slot_1&pm_medium=web

    “And much more about what happened at Arlington has come to light:

    Members of Trump’s team had a verbal and physical altercation with a member of the cemetery staff who has now been identified as a woman.

    The woman was reportedly pushed aside by a large male member of Trump’s campaign staff when she tried to prevent the campaign from taking cameras into Arlington’s specially protected Section 60 area, where recently deceased veterans are buried.

    In advance of the visit, Trump’s team was told personal aides could come but not campaign staff. They came anyway.

    Trump’s team was expressly told that “photographers, content creators or any other persons” attending for a political campaign were not allowed, according to a statement from the cemetery. His team brought them anyway.

    In statements after the event, Trump’s team insulted the cemetery official repeatedly, saying that she was “suffering from a mental health episode,” “despicable,” and “a disgrace.”
    ”

    “According to The New York Times, the woman who was assaulted by members of Trump’s campaign has reportedly declined to press charges. And the reason she declined is as distressing as everything else about this story.

    Military officials said that the cemetery worker feared that pursuing the matter with the authorities at Joint Base Myer-Henderson Hall in Virginia, which has jurisdiction over the cemetery, could subject her to retaliation from Trump supporters. [Trump campaign spokesman Steven] Cheung said in a statement on Wednesday that “that is ridiculous and sounds like someone who has Trump Derangement Syndrome.”
    ”

    ““You guys in the media, you’re acting like Donald Trump filmed a TV commercial at a gravesite,” Vance said at a Pennsylvania campaign stop on Wednesday.

    Which is exactly what Trump did.”

  18. sprocket_ @ #11 Friday, August 30th, 2024 – 7:48 am

    11am AEST for the Harris interview on CNN…


    By Patrick Svitek
    Vice President Kamala Harris said Thursday in her interview with CNN that she would appoint a Republican to her Cabinet if elected president this November.

    “I have spent my career inviting diversity of opinion,” she said, according to the network. “I think it’s important to have people at the table when some of the most important decisions are being made that have different views, different experiences.”

    The full interview, which includes Harris running mate Tim Walz, is set to air at 9 p.m.

    It has to be Adam Kinzinger.

  19. A couple of points.

    First, if Harris/Walz can encourage Democrat leaners in ‘red’ rural districts to vote, when they haven’t in the past, then the early returns in the vote counting will not be so massively skewed Republican, and Trump’s nonsense about a big lead disappearing will no longer hold. This is what their bus trip through rural Georgia is also about. Win-win.

    Secondly, Confessions’ post (6.39 am) about voter enthusiasm is also extremely important, as none of the aggregators’ weighting algorithms are likely to be taking this fully into account. If 10% more of Democrat leaning voters actually vote, then its a landslide, no matter what 538 or Silver say.

    Billbowe does not have that complication in his sums, except for by-elections, because of compulsory voting. In the USA it is, of course, a critical factor, and difficult to assess.

  20. Yabba@8:24am
    Data Guru Marvels At Stunning Increase In Voter Registration Since Kamala Harris Took Over: ‘You Just Don’t See That’

    https://www.mediaite.com/news/data-guru-marvels-at-stunning-increasing-in-voter-registration-since-kamala-harris-took-over-you-just-dont-see-that/

    “CBS News’s Chief Washington Correspondent Major Garrett spoke to political data firm Target Smart’s Tom Bonier on Tuesday about new numbers showing a stunning increase in voter registration among key Democratic Party voting blocs.

    “We’re tracking something really interesting going on right now. It’s a surge in voter registration in key groups ahead of the November election. Among young Black women, registration is up more than 175%. You heard that right. More than 175% in 13 states. That’s compared to the same time in 2020. This, according to the data firm Target Smart, registration has also increased among young Latinas and Black Americans,” Garrett began, adding:
    “Tom Bonier joins us now. He’s a senior advisor at Target Smart. Tom, it’s great to see you. Thanks for coming in. 175%. Could that possibly be right? If you must have triple-checked this or many more times than that.”

    “You’re right to repeat the number because I more than triple-checked it. It’s incredibly unusual to see changes in voter registration that are anywhere close to this. I mean, there might be 175% is almost tripling of registration rates among this specific group. You just don’t see that sort of thing happen in elections normally,” Bonier replied.

    “And what does that tell us, if anything, about either enthusiasm, attention, propensity to vote for these newly registered participants?” followed up Garrett.

    “Tells us a lot. The reason that we look at this voter registration data is because the polls will only tell us so much. The polls tell us how people are going to vote. They don’t tell us if or who is going to vote. It’s a big question,” Bonier answered, adding:

  21. CNN is terrible at bothsidesing- their panel in the promo clip posted above have one Bryan Lanza – a Trump campaign spokesman.

    Asked to comment on her statement about including a Republican in her Cabinet, he said wtte “San Francisco liberal, take your guns off you, ban fracking and by the way did I mention San Francisco Liberal..”

  22. ”
    sprocket_says:
    Friday, August 30, 2024 at 8:36 am
    CNN is terrible at bothsidesing- their panel in the promo clip posted above have one Bryan Lanza – a Trump campaign spokesman.
    ”

    IMO, Bothsidism works when both parties represent centre-right and centre-left (as per western definition) of political spectrum.
    It doesn’t work when one side is bat-shit-crazy.

    In USUKA countries , there is no pretence of “speaking truth to power” when Tories are in power.
    They pull out bothsidism only when Tory positon is totally indefensible.
    What I am trying to say is that the media don’t criticise Tories like they do to Progressives when they are in power.

  23. If 10% more of Democrat leaning voters actually vote, then its a landslide, no matter what 538 or Silver say.
    ————————————————
    Well, it could go the other way too. If you want to look outside the polls, then you may chose to look at previous elections where Trump was on the ballot to get a feel for which leaning voter turnsout and who outdoes their polling.

    Throw in Dobbs.

    Then a dash of voter suppression and intimidation.

    Plus an avalanche of foreign influence lies on social media supporting Trump.

    And you can be as subjective a pundit as you like.

    Emerson and FoxNews swing state polls tell us it is evens atm… and the momentum with Harris.

  28. Trump’s happy snap at ANC. Why the thumbs up from Trump? It’s a weird photo – everyone looking so happy like they are at an amusement park instead of a solemn memorial to fallen soldiers.

    https://www.msnbc.com landing page

  29. >Why the thumbs up from Trump?

    Redundant, but anyway: Because he’s a weirdo with no dignity or sense of decency at all, and his campaign photographer is there taking photographs for the campaign!

  32. The family of Master Sgt Andrew Marckesano are pretty pissed off.

    The fallout from the episode was gathering pace on Thursday after the family of a fallen special forces Green Beret soldier reportedly said footage of his adjacent grave was taken without their permission, and politicians and other military families stepped up to offer condemnation.

    “According to our conversation with Arlington national cemetery, the Trump campaign staffers did not adhere to the rules that were set in place for this visit to Staff Sergeant [Darin] Hoover’s gravesite in Section 60, which lays directly next to my brother’s grave,” Michele Marckesano, sister of Master Sgt Andrew Marckesano, who died in 2020, told the New York Times.

    “We hope that those visiting this sacred site understand that these were real people who sacrificed for our freedom and that they are honored and respected accordingly.”

    https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/aug/29/arlington-cemetery-altercation-trump-visit


  34. Late Riser says:
    Friday, August 30, 2024 at 7:45 am

    If you’re following 538, they’ve adjusted their model and there’s a somewhat verbose explanation as to why. We also learn about the new model.
    https://abcnews.go.com/538/538-adjusting-election-model-harris-versus-trump/story?id=112563822

    We accomplish this averaging by using something called Bayesian model stacking. In a nutshell what we’re doing is running two separate versions of the 538 forecast, each producing 10,000 simulations of each party’s vote share in each state. Then, we use the math explained in equation 13 here to estimate how much weight we should put on the polls-based forecast given how much time is left until the election — and thus how much uncertainty is left in the polling average relative to the fundamentals.

    What an absolute wank. Noise in, buzz words, noise out.

  35. Opinion polling in the US context describes ambiguity. Silver is very good at thinking about the ambiguous or cryptic. National polls are hardly relevant to the win/lose result, even if they predict the total vote splits. State-level polling is helpful, but has to be tuned for turnout/motivation to vote. Aggregations have to be tuned for biases. Silver is good at that too. He speaks of probabilities and uses maths to do it. He shouldn’t be discounted. He sees the data as a moving feast…which is fair enough.

  36. I don’t think it matters much to thinking voters if Trump flips on any issue. He will lie to avoid clarification. He is the useful idiot front man for the extreme right.

  37. Another excellent poll for Harris/Walz. This is the first MC/Bloomberg poll out post-convention.

    WISCONSIN
    Harris: 52% (+8)
    Trump: 44%
    —
    PENNSYLVANIA
    Harris: 51% (+4)
    Trump: 47%
    —
    MICHIGAN
    Harris: 49% (+3)
    Trump: 46%
    —
    GEORGIA
    Harris: 49% (+2)
    Trump: 47%
    —
    NEVADA
    Harris: 49% (+4)
    Trump: 45%
    —
    NORTH CAROLINA
    Harris: 49% (+2)
    Trump: 47%
    —
    ARIZONA
    Harris: 48% (=)
    Trump: 48%

  38. Stooge
    I am all for the monti carlo method when dealing with multi dimensional data, it highlights the uncertainty of it all. The real issue with the Sliver stuff is the weighting of the data, it is all just a guess, further the big issues in the USA is participation.

  41. There was a recent poll in Ohio. Trump was up by 13 points.

    Has the Harris/Walz evening interview started yet? Let’s pray that they don’t make fools of themselves.

  43. ScromoIIsays:
    Friday, August 30, 2024 at 11:03 am
    There was a recent poll in Ohio. Trump was up by 13 points.

    Has the Harris/Walz evening interview started yet? Let’s pray that they don’t make fools of themselves.
    ==========================================

    Says the concern troll.

    Though i would be more worried about your man’s desecration of war cemeteries. Has done himself lots of damage in the polls there i suspect.

  44. Victoria says:
    Friday, August 30, 2024 at 10:31 am
    Nate Silver has been getting it wrong for years. Lol

    His methodology focuses on relative certainty/uncertainty. It’s clever. He talks about the likelihood of the range of results. Good idea.

    Essentially he tries to use past form to assess the likelihood of future events, which recognises that while the future is in principle ‘unknowable’, it’s still possible to make assessments about the range of possibilities and assign relative likelihood to them. In this respect Silver has not been either right or wrong. He’s been thinking about how to make better guesses. Clever.

  48. The CNN Harris-Walz interview, in 3 parts.

    Part 1
    https://youtu.be/Dl9gPBasyv4
    Part 2
    https://youtu.be/Rus0ght1j34
    Part 3
    https://youtu.be/HQkojD8zLr0

    A bunch of “gotcha” questions are handled professionally, and campaign points are made well, and repeatedly. In cricket terms, questions are hit well, and runs are scored. While there are no boundaries, and certainly no sixes, neither politician is troubled by the bowling. One question (on T****) is met with a dead bat, “Next question.”

    That’s about it.

  50. Anyone looking for a great read about American politics should look at the Huey Long biography “Kingfish” by Richard White. There is a more detailed one by Harry Williams if you prefer.

    Nixon, McCarthy, Trump and LBJ had nothing on Huey. Hands down the most ruthless, relentless, toughest and roughest politician I’ve ever read about. It’s a fantastic read. Makes you realise why Trump etc always talk about ejections being stolen. The US has a great history of it.

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