Michitahsouridahadcuper Tuesday

In keeping with my half-assed approach to following and forecasting the 2024 presidential primaries, here is a look back at Michigan and several unimportant states, with a view toward tomorrow's "Super Tuesday" action.  

I. Michigan- GOP.

My final call was  "So let's go with Trump 72%, Haley 27%, Others 1."

The final result was Trump 68, Haley 27, Others: 5.

So I nailed Haley's number but underestimated how popular "Uncommitted" is in this state. Uncommitted got a full 3 points and the dropouts combined for 2 percent, including DeSantis who got 1.2%.

Giving myself an A-. 

II. Michigan -Democratic

My final call was "So let's go with: Biden 76% Uncommitted 15% Phillips 7% Williamson 2%."

The final result was: Biden 81, Uncommitted 13, Williamson 3 and Phillips 3.

I short-changed Biden, slightly over estimated Uncommitted, slept on Marianne's enduring popularity on the fringe and comically over-estimated Phillips, who is a loser.

Let's call it a B+. I was close on the important candidates.

III. Missouri, Utah, Michigan (convention) and DC-GOP only.

Since last Tuesday, four other contests gave out delegates to the Republican convention. Trump swept the delegates given on Saturday (126 of them) and then Haley won all 19 delegates from Washington DC by getting 1,274 votes from various trust fund babies and congressional staffers while Trump only managed to get 676 votes from lobbyists and the relatives of January 6th inmates.

Congrats to Nikki! She won't be shut out.

IV. State of the Race and Super Tuesday.

Both races are over. Biden and Trump will be the nominees of their parties and only a major health calamity can avoid a November rematch between these two altacockers.

I think Biden has performed slightly better than expectations. Michigan was the first place where he faced a coordinated opposition and it only managed to win 2 delegates. The 2024 DNC will be a coronation inside the United Center and probably a shit show outside on Madison street.

Trump has also done what he needs to do. He is sailing towards this nomination and is likely to all but clinch it after tomorrow's race. He currently has 244 delegates and will likely win 29 from the ND caucus today. That will put him about 950 delegates away from the 1,215 he needs to be the nominee.

V. My GOP predictions for tomorrow:

1. Vermont: Trump by 4. This is the only race tomorrow where Haley has a chance of winning, mostly because it still has a functioning moderate state GOP whose leaders have endorsed Haley. She is also helped by the fact that any registered voter can vote in the GOP primary.

The delegate math is interesting here because if either candidate gets a majority, they will get all 17 delegates. But Vermont is quirky so it's theoretically possible that the DeSantis/Christi voters could make a 49-45 result, which would split the delegates.

That said, I'm thinking Trump gets over 50% and thus all 17 delegates. But hey, Haley could make the state count 49-1 instead of 50-0 and that would piss off Trump, so I'm rooting for Nikki here.

2. Virginia: Trump by 12.  (Haley 5 delegates)

3. Minnesota: Trump by 27. (Haley 12 delegates)

4. Massachusetts: Trump by 23.  (Haley 6 delegates)

5. Colorado: Trump by 31.  (Haley 2 delegates)

6. Maine: Trump by 40.  

7. North Carolina: Trump by 44. (Haley 6 delegates)

8. Texas: Trump by 47. (Haley 4 delegates)

9. Alabama: Trump by 63.(Haley 2 delegates)

10. Alaska: Trump by 38. (Haley 8 delegates)

11. Tennessee: Trump by 54. (Haley 3 delegates)

12. Oklahoma: Trump by 66.

13. Arkansas: Trump by 70. (Haley 5 delegates).

270 to win has a great breakdown of the delegate allocation math for the Republicans. Just click on a state to check the numbers:  

https://www.270towin.com/2024-republican-nomination/

So I'm saying Trump will go 13 for 13 and win the delegate haul by 812 to 53.

A good night for Haley looks like this: she wins Vermont. She keeps Virginia close and she gets over 75 delegates.

No matter how the voting goes, I expect her to make a Rubio style victory speech around 10PM eastern. On Wednesday we'll start to hear about staffers being let go. She'll suspend the campaign, either on Friday afternoon or during one last Sunday morning TV show. 

VI: My Democratic Predictions for Tomorrow.

Biden leads the current delegate count with 206. There are 2 Uncommitted delegates. Phillips and Williamson have exactly zero delegates.

There are 1,420 delegates at stake tomorrow and it's entirely possible that Biden will win over 1,400 of them.

A. Biden will win by very large margins and sweep the delegates in: California, Maine, Massachusetts, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Texas, Vermont, Utah

B. Uncommitted or some other candidate might win a delegate or two if they have a great night in a congressional district in: Alabama, Arkansas, Colorado, Virginia

C. Phillips should win at least a couple delegates in: Minnesota

D.  Phillips and Williamson could win a delegate or two each in Iowa

A good night for Biden is 1,400 delegates. A good night for Phillips is over 10 delegates. A good night for Williamson is more than 2 delegates.

Like I said, the race is over. But the details will be fun to dissect. And after this, we'll be only eight months away from the general election.

Nevadalina

Today was a pretty great day for American democracy.

First, the Circuit Court for the District of Columbia emphatically ruled that Trump's assertions of Presidential immunity were poppy cock. And just now the House of Representatives voted down the insane attempt to impeach Homeland Security Secretary Mayorkas for.....well they never really said.  

Tonight is also the next game night for American democracy, the 2024 Nevada primary.

As always, we first look back at the previous game. The Democratic primary in South Carolina.

Below are my official picks and the (actual results).

Biden 83%  (96.2%)

Phillips 13%  (1.7%)

Others: 4%   (2.1%)

I hope it does not scandalize you to know that I was under the misimpression that Marianne Williamson had dropped out when I made this prediction.  She had not and still has not, bless her heart.  She is the only "Others" included in the above result, somehow claiming a silver medal over an actual living, breathing member of the House of Representatives.

In hindsight, this makes sense. A vote for Phillips is a vote for Biden's policy in a younger body. But if you want to protested Biden for any reason other than age, Williamson was the only option. I suspect she can credit her second place finish to the small number of SC Democrats who wanted to tell Joe Biden that they did not like his handling of the war in Gaza.

I'm going to give myself a gentleman's C on this forecast. Yes, I missed the mark by 13 percent, but who could possibly have seen a 96 coming?  This isn't Swaziland. 

The more significant number though was turnout. Just four percent of eligible voters turned out. Some of them will want to vote in the Republican primary at the end of the month. But most simply realized that this was not an event worth showing up for. 

So we are on to Nevada. This time I do know exactly who is on the ballot-Biden, Wlliamson, and a  bunch of weirdoes not named Dean Phillips. Voters will also have the option of voting for "None of These." This gives us an ability to measure the protest vote. So without further ado, here are my ofiicial predictions:

Biden 74.9%

Williamson 2.7%

None of These 19.8%

Others: 2.6%.

Onward and upward to Michigan.

elow are my official picks and the (actual results).

New Hampshire-What Will We Learn?

 Iowa: What Did We Learn?

Very little. The result pretty much matched the polls. But a quick moment of self-reflection. Here are my predicted vote percentages for Iowa with the actual result in ( ). 

      Trump 53% (51%)

      Haley 21% (19%

      DeSantis 20% (21%)

      Ramaswamy: 5% (7.7%)

      Hutchinson: 1% (0.2%)

Pretty close, but I did have Haley in second and Ron in second. That didn't work out.  Give myself a B+.

New Hampshire: What to Expect.

We're about 14 minutes away from the results in Dixville Notch and that other stupid town up north. But that won't tell us much.

Since Iowa, The third, fourth and sixth place finishers have all dropped out. (Shout out Ryan Binkley who finished ahead of Asa Hutchinson in Iowa and then stayed on to fight in New Hampshire! Well done, weird nobody.)

DeSantis and Ramaswamy have both endorsed Trump. The polls this week suggest that most of their votes are going to go with Trump. He is a very heavy favorite to win and very well might run up a big margin.

But New Hampshire does have a contrarian streak. They don't like to vote for the winner of the Iowa Caucuses. And Trump had a few hiccups on the trail this week, so maybe he won't quite crush it.  There also could be some Democrats voting in the Republican race to just drag it out a little longer.

Here's my official prediction:

Donald Trump: 54.1%

Nikki Haley       43.9%

Binkley                0.5%

Others:                 1.5%  (Strays for Christie, DeSantis, etc.)

What Does Haley Need?

To even dream about being the nominee, she needs a win. She's not getting that. But if she can get 45% of the vote, than she might be tempted to hang in there a little longer and see if the donor class keeps her afloat just in case DJT strokes out in the next month.

If she loses by more than 15, she probably drops out tomorrow night or Wednesday morning. The humiliation of losing South Carolina to Trump would be too much to bare. (And the donor class won't waste their money on her.

What About the Dems?

There is a Democratic Primary tomorrow too but it won't be sending any delegates to Chicago and Joe Biden isn't on the ballot.

That said, there's like 25 other people in the ballot and no small number of Granite Staters are pissed off that the Democratic party took away their monopoly on being the first in the nation primary. So this number could be interesting.

Biden will win and he should do so with an outright majority. If he doesn't, and Nikki Haley drops out, the media will try to make the Democratic race feel competitive. (It isn't.)

But once again in the breach, here I go:

Joe Biden: 64.3%

Dean Phillips: 16.7%

Marianne Williamson: 8.2%

The other weirdoes and spoiled ballots will be like 10%.

Ooooh, Dixville Notch and Hart's Crotch are going to be announcing in a minute.....