VP Debate Night, 2024

 I. The State of the Race.

I have not had a reason to update my map since late July. For all the daily weirdness of the Trump campaign, the race has been pretty stable. Kamala Harris is a slight favorite. She will probably win the popular vote but there are enough very close states to keep the winner uncertain.

The simple version of the race is this. Harris is likely to win states worth 226 electoral votes. She has to win 44 more votes among the seven swing states. At the moment, I classify them this way:

Leaning Harris: Wisconsin, Michigan, Nevada and (just slightly) Pennsylvania.  

True Toss-ups: North Carolina and Georgia.

Leaning Trump: Arizona

So Harris probably has just enough votes to win the election as it is polling now. There are five weeks to go. While there will certainly be unexpected news, there aren't many big events left on the calendar. Which leads us to tonight.

II. The Vice-Presidential Debate.

The VP debates are almost never consequential. The most memorable moment in their history was when Lloyd Bentsen insulted Dan Quayle for presuming to compare himself to John F. Kennedy. Bush-Quayle crushed Dukakis-Bentsen that November.

Tim Walz has been a great candidate so far. His favorable numbers are by far the best of all four candidates and he hasn't committed any gaffes. No dirt has come to light and his super power of normalcy has been a refreshing change of pace.  

J.D. Vance has brought absolutely nothing to the Trump team. He has said a lot of dumb things and never, ever looks comfortable on the campaign trail. People do not like him and they are right to not like him.

But the previous paragraphs only set the expectatio0ns for tonight. Vance is a pretty smooth speaker when he has a script and he had the oddly misplaced confidence of a much smarter man. He could do well tonight. Well enough to exceed expectations at least. And in a pinch, he is not afraid to lie.

III. The Questions That Should Be Asked.

1. To Tim Walz, "Vice-President Harris and you have derided Trump's plan to place a tariff on all imported goods. But Joe Biden has kept many Trump-era tariffs in place. What metrics would you use to determine the difference between good and bad tariffs?"

2. To J.D. Vance:  "After spreading the false rumor that immigrants from Haiti in Springfield, Ohio were eating pets, you said  that you felt the need  "to create stories so that the media actually pays attention to the suffering of the American people." How should voters know when you are telling the truth and when you are making stuff up?

3. To Tim Walz. "Does the United States of America admit too many, too few or just the right number of legal immigrants to this country?  What criteria would you use to determine what that number should be?"

4. To J.D. Vance: "If you become president in the next four years, would you sign a national ban on abortion and if so, what would be the parameters of that ban as to length of pregnancy and exceptions for medical emergencies."

5. To Tim Walz, "Are there any specific programs or areas of the military budget that you believe should be reduced or eliminated?

6. To JD Vance, "Was the 2020 presidential election free and fair and who was the lawful winner of that election?"

7. For both candidates, "What benefits does the United States get from its relationship with Israel and are there any changes that you would make to how the United States provides aid to Israel?"

With five weeks to go the election is probably about a 60/40 tilt in favor of Kamala Harris. Tonight probably won't change that dynamic. I don't think it will much change how people feel about Tim Walz. But J.D. Vance could do a lot of good for himself by just being normal. I'm not sure he has it in him.

How I See It, How Trump Should See It.

 Well, it has been a week. Six days ago, Kamala Harris dominated her first (and probably only) debate with Donald Trump. She was great on a lot of levels but my favorite part of her performance was how she reminded people just how tiring Donald Trump's whole shtick is. She baited him repeatedly and he walked into it every single time.  Because he's a baby. 

Since then he has spent his time insisting that he won the debate, doubling down on racist lies about Haitian refugees eating pets and refusing to do a second debate. (Probably his best decision in quite awhile.)

The post-debate polls have been generally good for Harris. As for my official prediction, I'm sticking with Harris 292, Trump 246. I think the popular vote result will be similar to 2020 and there will not be many changes in the electoral college either.

I. How I See It.

A. Swing Stones Leaning Blue

I am reasonably confident that Kamala Harris will win Wisconsin, Michigan and Nevada. I also think she is more likely than not to win Pennsylvania. These states will get her over the finish line with 276 votes.

B. True Toss-ups

The polls in Arizona, Georgia and Arizona have been close. I can imagine any of these states going either way. If Trump sweeps them, the election will be close and he will try like hell to steal it. Every state that Harris wins here will make it harder for Trump to do another insurrection. (It's so sad that we have to think this way, but we do.)

II. How Trump Should See It.

In my previous post, I divided the swing states into three northern states and four "southern." That was because Harris needs to sweep the three northern states (WI, MI, PA) to get to exactly 270 votes and win the election.  For any northern state that she loses, she has to make up the equivalent number in the four southern states.

For Trump the math and the geography work a little differently.  Trump should win at least 219 electoral votes. To get to 270, he needs 51 more.  The easiest path there is to sweep Pennsylvania, North Carolina and Georgia. So for today's purposes, we'll call those three states The Eastern Swing States. 

For ever electoral vote Trump loses in the east, he has to make up for them in the four "western" states.

Here are the combinations that put Trump in the White House. Because GA and NC are both worth exactly 16 votes, they are interchangeable in these scenarios.

IIII. How Forecasters And Markets See It.

I think Harris is about a two to one favorite now. Let's call it 66% chance of her winning. Harris has run a very good campaign and Trump continues to step on rakes. Harris has a fundraising advantage and unlike last time the Democrats will be out knocking on doors this fall. 

Trump is going to lose the popular vote but he can still win enough swing states to get to 270. His biggest problem right now is that a lot more voters have made up their mind against voting for him than have made up their mind against voting for his opponent.

Almost all of the forecasters like Harris better today than the did a week ago.  Even Nate Silver has her chances up by a full five percent from right before the debate.

Nate Silver and his former baby, 538.com  are still 17 points apart because they moved in the same direction this week.  But like Harris about five percent more than they did before the debate.

As for betting markets, Predictit.com favors Harris 57 to 47 and Poly Market has the race must closer with Harris leading 50% to 48%.

Harris could not have asked for a better week. She continues to do well, the public is warming to her and her opponent continues to be a decrepit whiner.  

Seven weeks to go, citiens.

Debate Night! 2024

The second debate of the 2024 general election will be begin in under four hours.  It is the first debate to include Kamala Harris.  As I usually do, I will post some questions that I would like to hear the candidates be asked tonight.  But first, a quick word about the state of the race.

I believe that Harris will win the popular vote by something between three and six points. I believe she will sweep the Blue Wall states of Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania. I also think she will win Nevada. I think Georgia, North Carolina and Arizona are true tossups that either candidate could win if the election were today. So my hunch is that she will win one or two of those, but not all three.

This is slightly more bullish than the average forecast, as you can see below.

I. The State of the Race.

The race is very close. Most recent national polls have been within two points. Harris has led in the majority of them, but that doesn't tell us much since she probably needs to win by a point and a half or two points to become president. The professionals and hobbyists who look at this stuff in some detail tend to put the likelihood of either candidate winning somewhere between 40 and 60 percent.

Which of course is making everyone on Politics Twitter mental.  The uncertainty is grating and not everyone is taking it in stride. But I don't think there's much difference between 60/40 and 40/60 when there are eight weeks to go. Here I have round up the predictions from various models and prognosticators. And I'll include myself because well, why not?

That's quite a spread, but of course the two most optimistic forecasts are amateurs with a rooting interest. The real divide seems to be between 538.com and it's prodigal son, Nate Silver. 538 gives Harris a nearly 56 percent chance of winning but Nate only a 38.4 percent chance of winning

II. Questions That Should Be Asked.

1. To Donald Trump, "Who won the 2020 election for president?" 

I'd like to get even more specific and ask Trump which states he is willing to admit that he lost last time. But last week Trump seemed to make some news in admitting on a podcast that he lost "by a whisker." He probably said that to avoid the podcast host from beating him up on election denialism. I think the moderators need to push further on this today because well, shit, democracy matters.

2. To Kamala Harris, "How would you have handed the withdrawal from Afghanistan differently than Joe Biden and Donald Trump did?"

I continue to believe that the withdrawal from Afghanistan was the most successful large-scale operation carried out by the American military this century. Many disagree with me on that, although, none of them can name one more successful.  But this is an issue and I want to hear both her talk about it and Trump respond to it.

3.  To Donald Trump. "You are awfully fond of Vladimir Putin,  the House of Saud, Xi Jinping and Kim Jung Un. Do you believe it is important for America to promote democracy abroad?"

I am recycling this from my post about the June debate, because I think it's a great question.

4. For Kamala Harris: "Why specifically did you change your views on fracking since 2019?"

5. For Donald Trump: "The first time you ran for president you promised to balance the budge and pay off the debt in four years. Your current campaign is predicated on a lot of tax cuts and a lot of new spending. The only new revenue source you have endorsed are tariffs on all imported goods. Have you crunched the numbers on all of these plans and how much do you think the national debt will be four years form now if you are elected."

6. For Kamala Harris " Do you think that any tariffs currently in place contributed to the inflation of the past few years and will you repeal or reduce any of them?

7. For Both Candidates:  Three out of four of your parents were immigrants. Mr. Trump's father was born about 2 year after his parents arrived in this country from Germany.  Why do you think so many voters s have hostile feelings about recently arrived Americans and what will you do to change that?

As always, I would also like to have them answer the questions on the test to become a naturalized citizen but I don't think we will get anything like that tonight.

III. If This Were a Baseball Game.

As the election proceeds, I will play around with probabilities from a different passion, baseball.  

To think of think of the election as a baseball game. We'll treat the remaining weeks as innings. And we'll make Harris the home team, since we are root, root, rooting for her and if she doesn't win it will be a shame. 

So with eight weeks to go, the game goes to the second inning today. 

A. 538 Baseball Forecast: The game is tied in the top of the 2nd. There is one out and no runners on base.

B. Nate Silver Baseball Forecast.  The visitors have a 2-0 lead in the top of the second. There are two outs and no runners on base.

Bottom Line: A lot of baseball left to be played.

 

The Election Reduced to One Chart.

Today is Labor Day, the traditional beginning of the general election season. I have no changes to make to my previous forecast of Harris winning 292 Electoral Votes to 246 for Trump.   (This means Harris winning Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Nevada and Georgia while Trump wins Arizona and North Carolina.)

I. Polls, Betting Markets, Forecasts and Wishes.

Harris holds a modest lead in most national polls. Five Thirty Eight, the Economist and Nate Silver have up by about three and a half points. Real Clear Politics has her up just under two points. 

The Prediction Markets are very close. Predictit favors Harris slightly (54 cents to 49 cents) and Polymarket favors Trump slightly. (50% to 47%)

Most of the forecasts favor Harris by narrow margins. Five Thirty Eight has her winning 57 percent of the time. The Economist 52 percent of the time. Nate Silver has Trump winning something like 52 percent of the time but he has all but admitted that his model is suppressing Harris' vote too much because it's within two weeks of the DNC. (Put differently, she didn't get as large of a post-convention bounce than his model expected.)

So, you know.....close.

I for one am slightly more optimistic than these models. I think Harris has about a 65 percent chance of winning. I am of course biased in her favor. I want her to win. But the reasons for my optimism is that her personal approval ratings are about 10 points better than Trump's. That will make it difficult for him to change minds in his favor. 

Right now the median undecided voter is a normie who is sick of Trump's shtick. I believe they will be willing to turn things over to the next generation. Trump's job, as cynical as this sounds is, is to make that person afraid to turn things over to Kamala Harris. I think his attacks will get uglier over time but I don't think it will work on enough people for him to win.

He does not have the personal charisma, political skill, fund raising or even the personal energy to make that happen. He is old and declining. It shows more and more when he speaks and it is reflected in the less robust campaign schedule that he has been keeping compared to four and eight years ago. 

But campaigns are there to be won and stranger things have happened. A bit of bad news can always hurt the incumbent party and Harr is not yet running away with this thing. 

II. The Electoral Math.

We pretty much know what the result will be in 43 states and the District of Columbia. If we also assume that Harris will win Nebraska's 2nd congressional district and Trump will win Maine's 2nd congressional district, we can assume that the election starts with 226 electoral votes in the Democratic column and 219 in the Republican column.

That leaves seven swing states to decide the contest. There is an easy way to divide them-Northern and Southern. The three Northern swing states were all won by Biden last time and they generally poll to the left of the four Southern swing states.

If Harris wins all three Northern swing states, she will hit the magic number of 270 electoral votes. If she loses any of these states she will have to make up for it by winning a matching number of electoral votes in the southern part of the map.

Here's a way to think of it.  

1. Harris is expected to win 226 votes in reliably blue states.

2. She needs 44 more Electoral Votes to get to 270.

3. The quickest way to do that is to win the three Northern Swing States-Michigan (15), Wisconsin (10) and Pennsylvania (19). That puts her on exactly 270.

4. For every electoral vote she loses in the Northern Swing States, she must make up for them by winning that same number in a Southern Swing State: Georgia (16), North Carolina (16), Arizona (11) and Nevada (6).

Here a chart for what combinations of Southern Swing States would make up for losing one or more of the Northern Swing States.

That is the scorecard you need for election night. As the weeks progress, I'm sure I'll update my expectations. But the math on getting to 270 is pretty simple here. Harris needs to rebuild the Blue Wall of Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania or patch any cracks in it with an equal number of Electoral Votes from Georgia, North Carolina, Arizona and Nevada.

PS: I want to plug a new election forecaster for this cycle. He goes by Theo and I came across him on Twitter. (His Twitter handle is @ctolga_ )  

He has built a neat and visually appealing website for his forecast. His fore cast is considerably more optimistic than the older established forecasts. But I have a hunch that those forecasts are going to trend in his directions as the weeks go by.  Here is the link to his website:

https://theo-forecast.github.io/

Four More Years But For Whoah....Wait a Second. (2024 General Election Forecast, Take Four)

Folks, the tide has turned. Kamala Harris has had an amazing month of good fortune and better politics. For the first few months of this year I assumed that voters would eventually reconcile themselves to the fact that they had to choose between two old declining men and enough of them would choose the one who wasn't evil. 

But Father Time came for Joe Biden a little faster than I expected. Remarkably, he recognized that this was true, or at least the fact that the public believed it was true, so he stepped aside in favor of his vice-president. Then the institutional party rallied behind this decision. Since becoming the presumptive nominee, she has made a very popular choice for running mate, posted incredible fundraising numbers and staged a string of flawless campaign rallies. 

Now America has a choice between an old man, malevolent in being, choleric in temperament and declining in his faculties or a woman in the prime of life, upbeat in bearing and riding a wave of good sentiment that should carry through her convention. When the dust settles around Labor Day, this could be looking like the best presidential election cycle for Democrats since 2008.

But let's not get over our skis just yet. Harris hasn't done an interview, press conference or debate yet. A lot can go wrong and it's inevitable that a she will have a bad press cycle or two between now and November 5th. But for now, she is the favorite. And her opponent seems incapable of adjusting to this reality. 

The electoral college favors the Republican party. A few bad bounces could lead to another 2016 where Trump rides a lucky streak to the White House. He can win Pennsylvania and I'm not lighting any cigars until  that state is called on Election Night (Or the day after. Maybe Thursday. Seriously, folks, margins matter in PA. Let's get this done in a timely manner.)

I. The Roads to 270.

The colored chart at the top of this post is a list of every electoral contest from deepest blue DC to brightest red Wyoming. I don't do toss-ups, because that's boring. But any state or district in a pale color could reasonably won by either party. The darker shades are "safe." But I use that term a little more loosely than more serious outlets. They are safe for now. They are safe in a close election. I'll move the bricks around as polling and prediction markets shift. 

A. The Safe Blue 226.

Just a month ago, team Trump was eyeing Minnesota and Virginia. Trump himself was making noise about New Jersey. (That last one was never going to happen.) But for now, I thin those states are off the board. Unless something horrible happens in the next 87 days, Harris-Walz will win at least 20 contests worth 226 electoral votes.

B. The Swinging 93.

i. Michigan. This state is trending blue and I'd be shocked if Harris doesn't win it. Polymarket gives Harris as 62% chance of winning it. Until that gets over 70%, I'll leave it where it is. (Five Thirty Eight has not yet turned their forecast back on which is embarrassing).

ii. Wisconsin. Also trending blue, but not quite as fast as MI. Polymaket has it 56/44.

iii. Pennsylvania: WI and MI get Harris to 251. From there the clearest path is Pennsylvania, which gets her to exactly 270. The most recent polls have looked good there and I think Harris will probably win it. But let's face it 270 to 268 is a terrifying proposition. Especially for the 270 members of the electoral college in the states that vote for Biden. (And their alternates-thank God the electors have alternates.)

iv. Nevada.  If there is one state to flip because of the switch from Biden to Harris, it is this one. Biden was polling terribly there and Trump was polling weirdly well there all year long. I guess they like casino owners, even lousy ones. But Harris stepping in has led to a swift endorsement by the big culinary union there and it looks like the Reid machine will carry this one over the line for now. If I owned a polling company, I would spend a lot of money on this state the next two months. If Harris doesn't win PA, she probably has to win Nevada.

v. Georgia. After Pennsylvania, this state is most likely to put Harris over the top. If she wins the 251 states, plus NV and GA, she'll be at 273. A slightly less terrifying scenario than 270 to 268.

vi. North Carolina.  If I had to predict the closest margin in this election, I would pick NC. The Dems have only carried it once in the last 11 cycles but the state is nudging its way leftward and the Republicans, God love them, have nominated an absolute nutter to be their candidate for governor. It was the only state that Trump won by a narrow margin in 2020 and I hope this year it will fall the other way.

vii. Arizona.  This is another state that was very close last time and in which the Party of Lincoln has chosen a full-blown lunatic for the senate race. She will lose. But for some reason, this state feels like a reach for Harris. Polymarket still favors Trump there and I'm not ready to bet against that. Picking Kelly for Veep would have helped, of course. But I don't think AZ will be the tipping point state, so it's probably not worth worrying about. And Harris certainly has a chance to win, especially if Trump keeps making his cognitive decline so obvious.

C. The Safe Red 219.

I have written somewhat cautiously so far. I am very encouraged by the current state of the race. But I know there are limits to the popularity of the Democratic party and I'm not about to discount the possibility of attacks on Kamala Harris sticking with a certain kind of "independent voter" who think the President of the United States should be man, just the way more sensible folks believe that James Bond should always be a man. (Or God, if that's your thing.)

Part of my caution stems from the fact that I don't see Harris flipping any big states that Trump won in 2020. Florida could wind up being close. But it makes little senses for Harris to commit the kind of resources it would probably take for her to win there. Texas was fairly close last time, but I don't seeing it moving nearly five points to the left in a second consecutive cycle.  Ohio might be closer than last time and that's good news for Sherrod Brown's senate campaign. But it's not flipping Blue

One persistent prediction I have made is that Florida will again vote to the left of Texas this time. And I think they will both be Red in the end, whether by one point or five.  (The last time TX voted to the left of FL was 1988-when Dukakis-Bentsen lost FL by 22 points but Texas by 12 and 1/2 points. Good job, Lloyd!)

Other than NC, it's hard to see where Harris picks off a state that voted for Trump twice. She might win both of Maine's congressional districts, but that's hardly a trivial effect on the election. If we're talking about a blow out, then Iowa and Alaska could become kind of, sort of close. But if we're worried about that in November, then this will be a good cycle indeed.

II. The Bottom Line.

This election will be decided in seven states worth a total of 93 electoral votes. Kamala Harris needs to win 44 of those 91 votes. Trump needs to win 51 to win outright or 50 to get a 269-269 tie and force it to the House of Representatives*. 

The contours of this are shaped by how the three Blue Wall states vote. 

A. Harris has 3 Paths to winning at least 44 of these votes:

a. The Blue Wall: WI+MI+PA (exactly 44)

b. The Hybrid: Any two Blue Wall States plus NV+ GA or NC (47)

c. The Southern Belles:  NV+AZ+ GA + NC (49)

I do not see the Southern Strategy working. If Harris gets swept in the Rust Belt states, she probably does not win all four southern states. But stranger things have happened.

B. Trump's Needs A Rust Belt Swing State to get to 270:

The good news is that Trump has to win at least one of the Blue Wall states. The bad news is that winning one or more of them gives him several paths to 270.

If Trump wins one of the three Blue swing states, he has the following paths:

If Pennsylvania,  he is up to 238 and he needs either: 

a. North Carolina and Georgia 

b. North Carolina or Georgia plus NV and Arizona.

If Michigan, he is up to 235 and he needs: 

a. North Carolina and Georgia and NV or Arizona.

If Wisconsin, he's up to 229 and needs: 

a. North Carolina and Georgia and Arizona.

If Trump wins any two of the Blue Wall states, he's up to at least 244 and needs to get 26 more. 

a. Georgia plus North Carolina  

b. Georgia OR North Carolina plus Nevada AND Arizona.

If Trump wins any two of the Blue Wall states and one of them is Pennsylvania then he's up to at least 248 and needs to get 22 more. 

a. Georgia and North Carolina

b. Georgia or North Carolina plus Arizona or Nevada.

If Trump wins Pennsylvania and Michigan but not Wisconsin, then he's up to at least 253 and needs to get 17 more. 

a. Georgia or North Carolina plus Arizona or Nevada.

b. Arizona and Nevada.

If Trump wins All  Three of the Rust Belt states, he's up to at least 263 and needs to get 7 more. 

a. Any of the four southern swing states would probably work. House of Representatives. Arizona, North Carolina, Georgia or Arizona would give him a clean win. Nevada would make it a 269 to 269 tie, which means that Trump probably gets elected president by the House of Representatives*. 

Four More Years But For Whoah....Wait a Second. (2024 General Election Forecast, Take Three)

 Kamala Harris has had a very good week. Nearly everything in the news this week has been good for her and today we saw the first meaningful polls conducted entirely after Biden's withdrawal on Sunday. The results were quite good. To put it simply, the race went from favoring Trump and trending his way, to more or less a dead heat.

Not every week will go this smoothly. But for the moment, she has reenergized Democratic voters and independents seem glad to not have to choose between two very old men.

I. Veep Stakes Update.

I still think the VP choice will be one of the five that I wrote about in my last post. But it has been fun to watch them and a couple longshots jockey for position.  I'm adjusting my ratings based on the week that was and a sharper sense of where the Electoral College will likely tip.

The Top Tier:

1. Governor Josh Shapiro. He's had a strong audition. And Pennsylvania is the most important swing state because it has the most electoral votes. He's still not quite my favorite, but he's certainly unobjectionable and the logic of picking the guy most likely to get you to 270 is pretty hard to counter.

2. Governor Roy Cooper.  Same logic as above with the added twist that Harris is said to be on very good terms with him. NC has 3 fewer EC votes than Pennsylvania and that might cost Cooper the nod here. But he's definitely getting a long hard look.

3. Senator Mark Kelly. You know what overcomes the stigma of being short and bald? Being an astronaut. Kelly is probably the best national candidate. He will be a great contrast with JD Vance. I also like the way that he and his wife are going for the job without being unseemly about it. 

The Stretches.

4. Governor Tim Walz. If Minnesota is in play, then the Democrats are probably losing. But Walz will play well in WI and MI too. He's probably had the best television appearances this week, largely driven by a simple motto "Take care of your neighbors and stop being weird." That plays really well and is a nice reprieve from almost a decade dominated by Trumpism.

5. Governor Gretchen Whitmer.  I still think she's a great candidate. But she has said she doesn't want it and I think both she and Harris buy into the notion that they shouldn't put two women on the ticket. Let me push back against that idea for a moment. Can you imagine a voter who says, "I will vote for a woman but only so long as her vice-president is a man." If you find that unlikely, then you probably understand why I don't really buy this argument. 

But the issue is probably more subtle than this. So she has to be considered a long shot. But I do think that's a shame.

The Bad Ideas.

6. Secretary Pete Buttigieg. He's great on television. And it would be fun to watch him debate JD Vance. But...no. He's too young. He needs to get a bigger job before I can take him seriously. In 2032 he will be 50 years old. That seems like a good time to run.

7. Governor J.B. Pritzker.  Well if you really want someone to balance a ticket, I guess Kamala + JB weigh about the same as Trump + Vance. But let's not take that too literally.  Pritzker has been a pretty good governor of Illinois but he's a little smarmy and picking him will bring 14 weeks of Trump making fat jokes and (more importantly) talking about Chicago in the most ridiculous ways ever.

II. The Roads to 270.

As discussed last time, I think Harris is pretty locked in for 226 electoral votes. I think she is favored in Michigan (15) and slightly favored in Wisconsin (10).   That gets us to 251.  The last 19 are the interesting part. There are 2 ways to get there.

1. Win Pennsylvania. That gets Harris up to exactly 270.  If Shapiro is picked, this is probably why.

2. Win North Carolina or Georgia plus one more state. GA and NC both have 16 electoral votes, so winning one gets us to 267 and we need just one more state.  Winning both would get us there. The  other options are Nevada (6), Arizona (11).

III. My Updated Forecast.

So I am optimistic. The race has been joined and I hope things go well. But I understand that the GOP has an Electoral College advantage. The betting markets still favor Trump. 

I'm not ready to say Harris is the favorite. We need to see more polls. We need to know her roommate. But I started by saying it was a good week, and I am going to move Wisconsin from light red to light blue. 

Onward and Upward.

Four More Years But For Whoah....Wait a Second. (2024 General Election Forecast, Take Two)

This is the fourth presidential election cycle that I have forecast on this humble blog. For the first time ever, I am predicting that the Republican candidate is more likely to win than the Democratic candidate. But as of today, we at least know who the Democratic candidate will be and her name is Vice-President Kamala Harris.

My Thanks to All of You.

Joe Biden did something really great and patriotic today. I am a huge admirer of him and I think he's been the best president of my lifetime. I have also vocally supported him as the candidate this time around.  But Father Time is undefeated. After a dreadful debate performance, Biden gave three lengthy interviews and a long press conference. His performance at each was underwhelming. 

It had to be frustrating for him to realize that he's still doing a great job but can no longer project the strength and vigor that voters want from the president. I give him a lot of credit for making this difficult decision. But he's much more a patriot than egotist, so I'm not surprised he got there.

Now It's On To Chicago.

Kamala Harris is going to be the Democratic nominee. No one important will challenge her. The other day I tweeted that the roll call vote will be something like this:  Harris 3,974 Newsom 15, Bernie Sanders 7, Gretchen Whitmer 4, Michelle Obama 3, Dean Phillips 1, Seth Moulton 0.

That's right about where I am still, with one exception. I forgot that some guy named Jason Palmer got on the ballot in American Samoa and beat Joe Biden in that caucus. He earned three delegates and deserves to keep them. Mr. Palmer-you rock.

But sometime between now and the Democratic convention in Chicago, Kamala Harris will have to pick a running mate. She has a handful of attractive options.

When picking a Vice-President, one should consider the following criteria, in order:

1. Are they plausibly qualified to be President of the United States?

2. Will they hurt me by pissing off a specific voting block or bringing scandal to my ticket?

3. Can they help me in a specific swing state?

4. Do we make a good team? Put differently, can they be part of sending a specific and cohesive message to voters?

In the hours since Biden dropped out, most of the running mate talk has focused on four governors. I think there is also one senator worthy of being vetted and considered by VP Harris.  Here are the five most likely running mates, listed in order of my preference.

1. Governor Gretchen Whitmer, Michigan. I'll be direct. I think she's the best choice. She probably takes Michigan off of the map. She is wildly popular in her home state and is good on television. I also think that picking a woman would be bold choice for Harris. It would reflect confidence and really underline that this election is about transitioning to the next generation

2. Senator Mark Kelly, Arizona.  He's an astronaut, which is about the coolest thing a person can be. He doesn't alienate any particular block of voters and he could help in Arizona, a state that Biden won by just 10K votes last time. The only downside here is that it would put his senate seat up for a special election in a midterm. But he has to be considered seriously. He's also a good man with a very sympathetic personal history that ties into the issue of gun violence. 

I don't know if I see a "brand" angle but I think a Harris-Kelly ticket can make this vote about abortion access and gun violence. Those issues are winners for Democrats.

3. Governor Josh Shapiro, Pennsylvania. He's going to be a popular source of speculation because Harris probably needs to win Pennsylvania and she doesn't have the connections there that Joe Biden did. But he's in his first term, which means he's green. Like Harris he is a former attorney-general of a large state. The creates an interesting brand idea but this one might not catch on with some younger voters.  He's also Jewish and the first black woman to run for president might be tempted to stick with a white Christian man. 

4. Governor Roy Cooper, North Carolina.  I don't know a lot about him. But he's a popular governor of  light red state.  But NC is a slight reach for the Democrats this year and his lieutenant governor is a full-blown nut bag and when Cooper is out of the state, the Lieutenant Governor gets to be the "acting governor."  (This particular lunatic is also the Republican nominee for governor this year.) I don't like this pick but Harris is said to be fond of him, so he could end up getting the job.

5.Governor Any Beshear, Kentucky. He is a really good politician and his electoral success in a red state shouldn't be ignored. But he doesn't shore up any particular swing state and I'm not aware of any personal connection between he and Vice-President Harris.  He's worth a look, but well, he's not as strong of an option to my mind.

Other names will be floated but I really think she's going to pick one of these five. Time is short so she can't get too creative. Better to stick with prospects who have been closely examined by voters, at least in their home state.

And Let's Win There.

Okay, so now for the hard part. Winning the general election.  

I expect that Kamala Harris will get a good round of press and that will probably translate into modestly better poll numbers than we have seen over recent weeks. There are a whole lot of people who don't link Trump but claimed they were more worried about Biden because of his age. The fight for those votes in November will probably determine the winner.

But I still think she's the under dog. The map I post below is exactly what I would have posted if Biden were still the expected nominee. 

The Roads to 270.

I'm reasonably confident that Kamala Harris will win at least 226 Electoral College Votes. That leaves her 44 votes shy of 270. The states at play can be put in two broad categories:

The Blue Wall: Pennsylvania (19), Michigan (15) and Wisconsin (10)

The Sun Belt: North Carolina (16), Georgia (16), Arizona (11) and Nevada (6).

1. Sweep the Blue Wall.  

226 + Pennsylvania (19), Michigan (15) and Wisconsin (10) get her to exactly 270.

2.  Win Two Blue Wall and Two Sun Belt.

226 + WI + MI =251  

NC (16) or GA (16) gets Harris to 267. She would then need to win more state to get to 270.

3. Michigan and 29 Sun Belt Votes

4. Wisconsin and 34 Electoral Votes. (This seems very unlikely. If Harris loses MI and PA, she is probably not winning Three of the four Sun Belt states.)

It's not easy to write that I think Donald Trump is more likely than not to win this next presidential election, but right now I think Kamala Harris is on a path to winning 241 Electoral Votes .She has 106 days to get that up to 270. If you live in Wisconsin or Pennsylvania, I hope you like political ads on during TV commercial breaks.

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