2024 Prediction: SLT Edition [Corrected]
My turn.
Unlike James, I don’t think I have consistently made predictions over my two decades-plus of blogging. In some ways, I don’t even like doing it, because it ranges from the analytical to guessing. Plus, it is easy to let preferences bleed in or to have the punditry lead you to hope to make some cool choices in the hopes that you score a win (as I kind of did in 2016).
I know that part of me simply hopes that Harris wins. This is, as I hope is clear, far more about my very real concerns about a second Trump term than it is simply about partisan or policy preferences. My anxiety level as a political scientist who specializes in democracy would be a lot lower were Nikki Haley the GOP nominee. Trump’s contempt for democracy is clear.
I think that the Democrats will end up having a superior ground game to the Republicans (who have gutted a lot of their former structure in service of Trump’s grifting). On that point see the observation made by Harvard Political Scientist Ryan Enos about the Trump offices in Bucks County.
See, also:
- Wired: Donald Trump’s Ground Game in Michigan Is Mostly Glitchy Apps and Vibes.
- NOTUS: Trump’s Pennsylvania Ground Game Is MIA. Harris’ Operation Is a Juggernaut. Will It Matter?
- The NYT: The Ground Game: Harris’s Turnout Machine vs. Trump’s Unproven Alliance
If the polling is on target, and the races in PA and MI in particular are truly tied, then the ground game would almost certainly be decisive.
There is also the matter of the polls. I had a sense that there was herding going on, and Nate Silver commented upon this recently.
This is a clear-as-day example of what we call herding: the tendency of some polling firms to move with the flock by file-drawering (not publishing) results that don’t match the consensus or torturing their turnout models until they do. Some pollsters, like the New York Times/Siena College, don’t do this, and are proud to own their work even when it differs from the polling averages.
[…]
In this election, the incentives are doubly bad, because the polling averages in the swing states are close to zero — so a pollster can both herd toward the consensus andavoid taking a stand that there’s a ~50/50 chance they’ll later be criticized for by publishing a steady stream of Harris +1s, Trump +1s and ties. Lately, a lot of national polls have also shown near-ties after usually showing Harris leads earlier in the race. We wonder if there’s been an increasing amount of herding there too, perhaps involving the use and abuse of likely voter models4 — national polls have tightened and moved toward Trump considerably more than state polls have become Trumpier over the past month, except in Nevada and Florida…
Also, a reminder about margin of error from Silver:
By contrast, the median sample size in individual polls in these states is 800 voters. In a 49-49 race in a poll of 800 people — assuming 2 percent goes to third parties — the theoretical margin of error for the difference between Trump and Harris is ±6 points. If that sounds higher than you’re expecting, that’s because the margin of error that’s usually reported in polls is only for one candidate’s vote share. For instance, in a poll of 800 people, Trump’s margin of error is about ±3 points, as is Harris’s. However, basically every vote that isn’t a vote for Trump is a vote for Harris. If Trump gets 52 percent of the vote instead of 49, that implies Harris will receive 46 percent.1 So the margin of error on the difference separating Trump and Harris is ±6.
I cannot stress enough that this means that the polling could be accurate and yet the outcome could be decisive for either side. If that happens, prepare yourself for a lot of people demonstrating, yet again, that they do not understand polling (especially the difference between an actual tie and statistical tie, not to mention, yet again, the whole probability thing).
The evidence has long suggested Trump has a pretty hard ceiling at around 47% of the popular vote. And yes, while I am painfully aware that the popular vote does not determine the outcome, I am of the view that it is logical to infer that all of these very close races (such as 49%-49% and 48%-48%) are more likely to break towards Harris if Trump does have a ceiling.
I also think that pollsters felt burned by both 2016 and 2020 in terms of underestimating Trump’s vote share. And, therefore, they are more prone to consciously or unconsciously be conservative in their modeling in that regard. Better to get it wrong in Trump’s direction than to suffer the wrath, again, of overly hopeful Democrats having their dreams crushed once more.
See, also, Silver’s NYT piece from over a week ago: Nate Silver: Here’s What My Gut Says About the Election, but Don’t Trust Anyone’s Gut, Even Mine.
Polling firms are pilloried on social media whenever they publish a result deemed an outlier — so most of them don’t, instead herding toward a consensus and matching what polling averages (and people’s instincts) show. The Times/Siena polls are one of the few regular exceptions, and they depict a much different electorate than others, with Mr. Trump making significant gains with Black and Hispanic voters but lagging in the blue-wall states of Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania.
Even pollsters like to be liked.
Then there is stuff like Ann Selzer poll in Iowa: Iowa Poll: Kamala Harris leapfrogs Donald Trump to take lead near Election Day. Here’s how.
A new Des Moines Register/Mediacom Iowa Poll shows Vice President Harris leading former President Trump 47% to 44% among likely voters just days before a high-stakes election that appears deadlocked in key battleground states.
The results follow a September Iowa Poll that showed Trump with a 4-point lead over Harris and a June Iowa Poll showing him with an 18-point lead over Democratic President Joe Biden, who was the presumed Democratic nominee at the time.
On the one hand, this could be an outlier. On the other, Selzer has a sterling reputation. FiverThirtyEight‘s Galen Druke discusses the Iowa poll here (and the race in general).
If this is accurate, it could presage a substantial win for Harris.
As a general matter, I have assumed, going back to when Biden was still the candidate, that late-breakers would vote Democratic because of Trump’s ceiling.
Trump’s general poor messaging in the last week or so just makes me think that his ability to win late deciders has been low. For example: the MSG rally, talking about Liz Cheney staring down guns, musing about the press being shot, and the like.
So, here’s my cautious prediction.
BTW, I could talk myself into a number of maps, including the reasonable best-case scenario for Harris:
And the reasonable best-case for Trump:
Note: I was so busy getting the colors right that I clicked Kansas too many times and then didn’t notice. Plus I have been fighting with the site all morning, causing further distractions away from proof-reading maps (and the fact that I never typed out the EC vote in the text made it easier to overlook). Sorry about the confusion.
You have Kansas as a Harris win. Either you have misclicked, or I am misinformed about Kansas.
The best prediction I have seen:
https://x.com/littmath/status/1853469091689857304
Unfortunately, with Pennsylvania voting for NWA, and both Virginia and Illinois voting for Washington, it would likely go to the House.
Kansas blue?
@Eddie InCA brought up Kansas and Iowa yesterday.
@Kathy: I’m pretty sure Steven simply made a mistake here. He called it a cautious prediction, and he shows blue Kansas on all the maps, even the one where Trump wins the election.
Kansas going blue would be part of some absolutely wild scenario that would only happen in the course of a total Harris blowout.
I have my preferences, but I have no data sufficient to push me one way or the other on the probable outcome. As to a wild-ass hope with no real reason to believe it: Florida.
If Kamala takes North Carolina – it’s within MOE and had has been all along – I think we’ve got it. If we have NC we can live without PA as long as we get NV or AZ. NC doesn’t settle it as conclusively as PA, but it’d be a great early sign.
@Kylopod:
Would you believe I missed it?
BTW, I keep getting timeout errors only at OTB and rather intermittently. Mostly when posting or refreshing, but sometimes just plain loading the site.
@Kathy:
I’ve been having exactly the same problem all day. My long post this morning in the other thread took several tries before I successfully submitted, and I kept making slight alterations to the text so it didn’t tell me I was sending duplicate posts, which has happened before when I’ve had technical problems submitting posts (it’s why my post spells out the word “seven” instead of just writing 7).
There are 93 EV collectively in the seven states usually considered swing this election. Assuming the other states go as expected, Kamala wins by any combination that gets her 44 of these, 43 sends it to the HOR.
There is no way Kamala can win with only 2 out of the 6 largest (ignoring NV) or lose with 4 of those 6. So the only way it matters which states Harris wins is if she gets 3 of those 6.
With 3 of the 6, Kamala wins with a PA win unless it is PA/AZ/WI in which case she would need to add NV.
Without PA, she would need either NC or GA and likely NV also.
ETA: To sum up: NV is seldom even relevant, PA is crucial – whoever carries PA is very likely the winner.
@Kylopod:
I keep having the same problem.
https://x.com/ThePoliticalHQ/status/1853847837525651587
I don’t know if this is a good indicator rn. Seems like ppl are turning out today on Philadelphia.
Also, seems like Pelosi is confident, they’ll have the House.
https://x.com/ryanstruyk/status/1853774438572892433
@Kylopod:
Me also, I have even been getting “no internet” messages – made me needlessly reboot my router and modem.
@Kylopod:
Me also, I have even been getting “no internet” messages – made me needlessly reboot my router and modem.
I think you missed one but of nuance here. If pollsters miss in Trump’s direction, and Harris wins, not one Dem will give a shit–Trump, the GOP, and the RW Twitts will be focused on the unfairness of it all, and the cheating, and Hugo Chavez, and Serbia (for some reason) and Chinese paper, and Soros (. . .).
But if they miss in Harris’s direction, and Trump wins, both sides will pile on, because it’s just more evidence that pointy-headed elite Marxist pollsters are trying to smother the voice* of real Americans.
Seltzer released her poll and was immediately targeted by Trump as a ‘hater’ engaging in voter suppression.**
*not plural
**kicking people off voter rolls mere weeks before an election is not voter suppression, it’s the rule of law. But a private firm releasing survey data is voter suppression. Marinate.
@Kathy: @charontwo: and Min and Kylopod
Make that five of us. Since yesterday with me.
I was being OCD about the colors and clicked Kansas too many times and didn’t notice.
@Kylopod:
@Min:
@charontwo:
@CSK:
What worked better yesterday was using the Opera browser with the VPN on.
I don’t have it on my work PC and can’t install anything on it (company policy). So it’s just hit and miss until I go home. No VPN at work, either.
Kylopod mentioned in James’ thread that the October surprise turns out to have been Tony Hinchcliffe’s comments about Puerto Rico and how they broke through even to people who don’t think a lot about politics. I wonder if anyone will study the phenomenon of what breaks through to ordinary people and why. This particular case is fascinating, because it happened despite the ongoing offensiveness of the words of Trump and those in his orbit that often don’t break through, and because Biden’s word stumble about garbage shortly after did not break through, even though the media publicized it highly. A big piece of evidence for the latter is that the MAGA response to Biden’s comment–Trump driving the garbage truck and his supporters wearing garbage bags–has been viewed by the non-political not as a response to Biden, but rather as MAGA doubling down on Hinchcliffe’s comments. (A quote by one woman: “If Trump didn’t agree with [Hinchcliffe], then what was he doing in that garbage truck?”).
@Kathy: I use Opera (no VPN, though), and it’s been happening to me, as well. Today, of ALLLLLL days, I need my OTB!!! 😉
@Monala:
Another data point in how the extremely online, closed loop, right wing media bubble is damaging Republicans. They really don’t get that they are neither normies nor “regular Americans.”
The similarly out-of-touch pundit class may cater to the right’s weirdo grievances; most Americans are just rolling their eyes.
@Kathy: The site has definitely been wonky all day.
Not the best day for it!
@CSK: Same issue for me, but I was riding the bus to the college I volunteer as a classroom aide for, so I don’t know if it was the system at fault or a weak connection. I never pay any attention anymore. I have wifi through my lease, so I just assume any problems come under “you get what you pay for.” (I pay $50, inclusive, for gas, wifi, water and sewer, and garbage and recycling, so I’m not paying a lot for any of it.)
@Steven L. Taylor, @Kathy, @CSK, @charontwo, @Kylopod, and others:
I will post a “behind the scenes” update about our web infrastructure in the next day or two.
The issue appears to be with Cloudflare. This was an added layer of security I added (based on a suggestion from our hosting company) when we migrated the site.
I plan on removing it soon. I don’t have a good understanding of what happened, but it’s clear that everything seems to trace back to Cloudflare.
@Jax:
Maybe the VPN is the magic ingredient. It’s the only reason I ever run Opera to ebgin with.
@Steven L. Taylor:
@Matt Bernius:
I want to make it clear I’m not complaining. You guys do a lot to keep the site running and, more important, to keep a high quality of front page posts and conversation. From time to time there will be issues. Most of the time if I post about them, it’s to find out whether it’s my connection or setup, or whether it’s a more generalized issue.