Capitol Hill Blue Forums Political Issues Politics In General Is it too soon to be talking 2020?

538's electoral college vote prediction model.

They run 40,000 scenarios each time. The graphic shows the top 100 results.

Last weekend it had Biden winning 70 scenarios, Trump 29, with one toss-up.

Today it's Biden 77 to Trump 22, and one toss-up.

538 election forecast

statistical models ... yep

now which one of the 77 scenarios do you think is true and valid today? ever flip coins and get heads 8 times in a row? what happened to 50-50?

I have great faith my analysis and conclusion the American electorate are in large part stupid and ignorant remains true and valid today as it was yesterday ... still looks too close to call (with a MOE + or - 5 for the statisticians)

For the last 3 months according to RCP averages Biden has been at 49/50 while Trump at 42/43. Which leaves only around 8% undecided at this time or over the last 3 months. That's quite different from 2016 when you had fluctuations for Trump between 35-44 and Hillary between 41-46 with the lead for Hillary ranging from minus 1 to plus 7. You also had a huge undecided column of between 15-20% depending on the day.

In 2016 Hillary never rose above 46% in the polls whereas Biden has been flirting with the 50% mark for the last 3 months. On 20 Sep 2016 Trump was at 41%, today he's at 43%. Hillary was at 42%, today Biden is at 49%. Although Trump is doing 2 points better this year than in 2016, Biden is 7 points better than Hillary was in 2016. The third party vote is down from 12% in 2016 to a meager 4% this year.

I think the difference is due to 12% of independents voting third party, against both Trump and Clinton because they dislike both and didn't want neither one to become their next president. This year, they dislike Biden a whole lot less than they did Clinton while their dislike of Trump remains steady. So Biden in my opinion is picking up at least half of that 12% who opted to vote third party in 2016. Hence the difference between 43 and 49%.

I wonder about this:

1 in 4 Americans Trust Trump About Vaccine

As we get closer to the election, Trump pushing the vaccine could actually hurt his chances for getting reelected. Only 50% of Republicans now say they would get a vaccine. (80% of Democrats) There are a lot of anti-vaxers in Trump's base.

So they don't trust him about the safety of a rushed vaccine, yet they are willing to let him run the country unchecked for the next four years virtually unchecked by anything? Cognitive dissonance much? I wonder if a number of them will carry that distrust into the voting booth.

Good interesting information.

The up-for-grabs vote
"Nearly 50 percent of all registered voters in the poll say there’s no chance at all they would support Trump in the election, while close to 40 percent of voters say the same of Biden.

That leaves, according to the NBC News/WSJ pollsters, 11 percent who appear to be up for grabs between the two candidates.

These up-for-grabs voters have mostly negative views of both Trump and Biden, and their 2020 preference is divided among Trump (27 percent), Biden (20 percent), neither (27 percent) and not sure (24 percent)."

https://news.yahoo.com/tumultuous-month-news-biden-maintains-130000063.html

More interesting info in the link above.

Lots of folks have negative opinions of both parties and neither candidate is a particularly stellar choice.

I'm still banking on an anti-Trump surge. Pollsters and the media are downplaying the numbers to keep it looking like a horserace.

All Biden has to do to win is stay alive.

Poor ReTHUGliCONS, the mothership RNC keeps having to send money to Florida and Texas. The RNC should never have to send money to TexASS.

...and then there is this: Record-breaking donations pour in from the left after Ruth Bader Ginsburg's death Decent Americans
can't stand you right-wing politicos and want you g-o-n-e.

Looking at the horse race numbers alone is a mistake I think. For me the most important numbers are by comparison the 20% of undecided, stating they'd vote third party in 2016 to just 8% today.

You're correct the number of folks who dislike both major parties are growing as both major parties shrink. I don't think there is or will be an anti Trump surge. What I think is nationwide we had 6%, some 9 million voters who voted third party in 2016 because they disliked both major party candidates intensely. Right now I would say none of those 9 million have changed their minds or dislike of Trump and at least half have sided with Biden to pretty much zero with Trump.

Trump's dislike factor is the same as in 2016, Biden's is much less than Hillary's and she still won the popular vote by 2 points. That is Biden's advantage, at least so far. He is disliked much less than Hillary was while Trump's dislike portion remains steady, the same as in 2016.

maybe a half glass full person you are

VP Biden will win the national regardless of any variables (Sen Johnson report coming soon or USAG Barr's pro-Trump biased synopsis of US Att Durham's report, or Trump's failure to stop Russian meddling). The electoral vote I still fear is a toss-up. regardless of statistical machinations.

Battleground states although this doesn't list all.

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/elections/trump-vs-biden-top-battleground-states/

Not listed, Ohio

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2020/president/oh/ohio_trump_vs_biden-6765.html

Georgia

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2020/president/ga/georgia_trump_vs_biden-6974.html

Texas

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2020/president/tx/texas_trump_vs_biden-6818.html

With the above states being placed in the tossup column, Biden leads 233-132. Now Biden leads outside the margin of error in Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin and Arizona. These states would be at least classified as lean Democratic with Wisconsin and Arizona probably likely democratic. If they stay the same, being outside the margin of error, I see no reason as of today why they shouldn't, that give Biden 290 electoral votes. States within the margin of error include Ohio, Texas, Florida, Georgia and North Carolina. Those 5 states are your true tossup's at this point.

The key, keep the so called blue wall states, Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin plus add Arizona and the rest are irrelevant. Who would have thought placing Ohio, Texas, Florida, Georgia and North Carolina into the irrelevancy category.

This is as of today, not in November.