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/