What States are In Play?
The above map from Nate Silver’s Winding Path to Victory.
Here are Nate Silver’s Odds on 9 states.
In Play Discussion
Georgia, Iowa, and even Texas are more “In Play” for Biden than Pennsylvania and Wisconsin are for Trump.
In fact, if we define “In Play” as a 25% or better chance, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin are not even “In Play” for Trump.
You can dispute the percentages and make reasonable claims like “Biden is unlikely to win Georgia” and I would agree. But it is far less likely that Trump wins Wisconsin than Biden wins Iowa or Georgia.
Odds of Winning
Silver has Trump’s odds of winning at 22%. I think that is about right based on the polls.
Moreover, Trump can take none of those states for granted. He will have to spend money defending Iowa and Georgia, even Texas when his campaign is trailing badly in financing.
Spotlight Florida
The big news for Trump supporters was the A+ rated ABC News Washington Post Poll that gave Trump a 4 point lead in Florida.
Four more recent polls took away that gain, albeit by mediocre pollsters.
And although Trump gained (yet still trails in Florida), he lost his lead outright in Ohio. That’s even worse for him.
Spotlight Ohio
There is no realistic way for Trump to win without Ohio, Florida, and Texas.
Yet, the three most recent polls have Ohio tilting to Biden by 1 to 5 percentage points.
Fox News is a highly regarded pollster as is Quinnipiac University.
Biased Pollsters?
It is ironic that Fox News, a clear Trump supporter, has Trump getting kicked in Ohio with the Washington Post giving Trump a lead in Florida.
I have commented on this before. Except for sponsored polls, the pollsters want to be right.
Trump fans attacking the Washington Post over bias now suddenly believe a Washington Post poll.
Two Wildcards
- The Debates
- Trump Taxes
Biden could easily get rattled or confused in the debates. And Trump will try very hard to rattle Biden.
The debates are the best, if not only shot Trump has outside of mail-in vote shenanigans if the race is undecided election evening.
Tax Bombshell
The New York Times dropped an enormous bombshell today regarding Trump taxes.
For discussion, please see my take, Trump Says Taxes are “Fake News”: He Has an Easy Way to Prove It.
Much of the very lengthy report regards tax avoidance, a legal tactic. But several details were criminal in nature, if accurate.
Three Points
- Avoidance is not a concern, legally.
- However, the public may see paying no taxes differently, even if legal.
- The big news is illegal writeoffs and illegal payments to family, not avoidance. Trump could easily wind up in jail.
Undecided votes might easily make a decision based on taxes.
The NYT had so many details that the odds of a Biden landslide win just rose. Even a Biden win in Georgia or Texas would not be much of a surprise following that report.
Related Posts
- Senate Surprises: What to Look Out For in the Election
- An Easy Way to Solve the Mail-In Vote Dilemma
Got Popcorn?
Trump desperately needs momentum.
The debate Tuesday evening may rate not five stars, but rather 5 bowls of popcorn and mud.
Mish
Just saw this “consensus” electoral college map at 270 to win and they say it is a map of 9 organizations* (so far) and not based upon current polling data.
According to their map Biden right now has 273 EC electors and that is without FL, GA, AZ, OH, or NC which are all too close to call. So Trump could get all those and still lose. But we know he will not get all those.
*Full-time Analysts
Sabato’s Crystal Ball
The Cook Political Report
Inside Elections
Statistical Models
The Economist
FiveThirtyEight
Prediction Markets
PredictIt
Media Analysis
Politico
CNN
NPR
They also have another map that is based on current polling: https://www.270towin.com/maps/biden-trump-polling-map
This one has Biden even further ahead at 275 EC votes and shows NC, FL, OH, AZ, GA, as well as NH, AR, IA, and TX as also in play too close to call.
I have a saying….and that is….never underestimate the potential for the Democrats to wrest a defeat right out of the jaws of victory. With this much time still remaining, and the debates as a potential game changer, I don’t feel all that confident that the election is in the bag. Mostly because the Democrats are so tone deaf.
But the other issue is that Trump will probably try just about any populist giveaway trick to pander for votes. Not sure what exactly that might look like, but I’m worried about that sort of thing……seeing as how he is not constrained by ethics or morals or any of that kind of silly stuff.
Interesting post Mish, which as usual I mostly agree with.
But, Biden was not my first choice, remember that this campaign season started more than a year ago now and we all thought JEEZ how are we going to get through more than a year of election year politics with more than 22 democrats having run at one point or another. My main fear back then was there were so many dems running that it would carve up support for the left and make beating the right impossible. Sort of like how Sanders in truth cost Clinton just enough votes to make sure she lost in the electoral college.
But here is what I think a month from the election; Trump has not had ANY competition at all and yet at best he retains only the loyalty of his base of about 40-50 million die hard Trump supporters. All the rest of his voters in 2016 were swing voters and a lot of those he has lost now.
It is often said here and in general that more than 94% of voters at this point have their minds firmly made up, so all ads and debates and such are just aimed at those who have NOT made their minds up. My view is minds CAN be changed, my original favorite out of the whole enormous field of candidates was Beto. But I changed my mind instantly when after a police shooting crisis he attended a progressive meeting about BLM and had stated he was now in favor of reparations for African Americans, something I strenuously oppose for a lot of reasons. It was crossing a red line I will just not cross with him. Ditto my second choice Eric Swalwell, of my home state California. Young, smart, handsome, the future I thought, liberal, educated, a good choice till he swallowed the far left progressive reparations trash hook line and sinker as well. So I did really like Pete Buttigieg, but I did not support his candidacy for president because to think the US electorate is mature enough to overlook his being a gay man is simply asking/pretending too much.
I just did not support another candidate other than to remain opposed to anyone so far left they call themselves progressives. I figured a real front runner would eventually emerge and he did even if I do not really want it to be Biden. I am sorry I just feel he is too old. Otherwise, I have no problem with him. But given Trump’s age that factor is actually neutralized, but it still made me pay close attention to his choice for VP. And I do not like Harris at all. Still, again given who they are running against I have zero choice in the matter, I would vote for a ham sandwich before I would vote for Trump.
There are things that can change people’s minds, I doubt the debates will change any minds unless one or the other candidate just utterly blows it on stage. And that is possible, the base for each will not care about a poor performance in any particular debate, but the few undecided left can decide based upon what they see.
Trump’s real problem is that Biden’s lead is as good as outside the margin of the total number of undecided voters remaining. If you take the 5% or so undecided and add on the 3.5% or so margin of error of polls, and every single one goes to Trump it still gives him a loss to Biden. Not to say that could not result in a second term because it could be like HRC’s win in the popular vote but loss in electoral.
Personally I think it is going to be a straightforward landslide.
But just to show why I am so confident just look at South Carolina. Had you said 12, or 6, or even 2 months ago that SC would vote to oust Lindsey Graham for a young black male political novice I would have bet you the pink slip to my BMW as well as my equity in my home that you would be in care at a mental health facility before the election, why you might as well claim a democrat would oust Moscow Mitch in KY, or that the democrat Jones would win reelection in Alabama.
Yet, Harrison is maintaining his lead in the polls in SC, that minor blip in the polls was not a one off. And in fact he has a huge lead in campaign contributions. That says a lot.
Here is a polling company’s analysis of their poll there that is fresh and breaks down why they think SC will go dem for Harrison. https://jaimeharrison.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/Harrison-Sept-polling-memo-d2-1.pdf
So on election night que sara sara for presidential politics, my take is the only chance Trump has is to rig it, to cheat. Or, to contest it, cheating either pre/post or both sides of the vote.
When it comes to popcorn, mine will be saved for the senate races because in a way the control of the senate is more important than who is in the Oval Office. Even though I really have faith Americans will do the right thing by Trump and put him in the worst federal prison they can find. With the caveat that Sing Sing state prison will do also.
Control of the senate by democrats along with the house means Trump can win in 2020 and still go to prison in 2020. Because without his bootlicking senate majority under the whip and heel of Moscow Mitch Trump is just as toast as if Biden gets a 20 million vote landslide.
I think you get it….the problem is not so much Biden….as it is the Democratic Party’s rush to virtue signal and praise BLM and other over-the-top politically correct social justice crusaders…and to support unlimited immigration, which is nuts.
Trump is a clear and present danger who must be removed to keep us from going full Duterte…..but…
Long term the Dems identity politics, social justice memes, and the abandonment of white working people are also issues with consequences. More than a half dozen people who tried to run for POTUS on the Dem ticket were in favor of reparations….which is a terrible idea.
In my view the Dems created the situation that led to a populist like Trump getting elected in the first place…and they show no sign of waking up to that, or changing anything to make a real course correction.
Dems have the “stated narrative” of giving every minority (whether by gender or race) special rights (as opposed to equal rights under the law). The real objective though, is to get the same corporate bucks as the Republicans do for their election campaigns….and to profit from the same kind of influence peddling.
The hypocrisy is fairly obvious unless you are in one of the chosen special status groups…and more especially if you’re in the OTHER group that gets blamed by all the SJW’s for everything wrong in the world….in other words if you’re an old white guy.
Based on what you wrote I find it really strange you would vote for Joe Biden and Democrats and REWARD what they have done and GET more of what they have done and GET what they PROMISE to do like give amnesty and US citizenship to all 29.5 million ILLEGAL immigrants in USA (MIT-Yale study 2018) which WILL either lead to cuts in Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, federal tax credits, SNAP-EBT, Section-8 housing, state welfare (thereby screwing poor Americans) or even higher debt mountain (screwing all Americans) when those 29.5 million new US citizens start to use these programs and since US citizenship and all programs mentioned above are quite valuable the amnesty by Joe Biden will create an immediate rush of millions of NEW ILLEGAL immigrants to come to USA to get into the Biden amnesty by claiming they have already been in USA months/years (depending on the cut-off date on Biden’s amnesty) and longer term tens of millions new ILLEGAL immigrants will come to USA to wait for the next amnesty and work for low wages (Biden has promised to cripple ICE and many Democrats want to abolish ICE).
All of the above will lower/stagnate wages for American working class people and tens of millions of Americans will have their jobs stolen from them unless they are ready to work for the same wage as ILLEGAL immigrants and this will create a totally dystopian society where tens of millions of Americans are full of rage against Democrats and there will be NOTHING they can do about it since Democrats just got at least 29.5 million new voters and will have house, senate, presidency for the next 100 years even if they go full AOC/Sanders/Socialism.
USA will become a horrible place for regular Americans and you and others who vote for Joe Biden and Democrats will have all of that suffering on your karma.
The Times article on his taxes was very damaging. Not becaus Trump voters will sudenly read it and drop him, but becaue it takes him off message yet again at a time he needs to build momentum and go after Biden so now he’s wasting a week’s news cycle attacking the NY Times as fake news. With 36 days till the election that’s time Trump does not have.
One would think the sum total of his previous attacks on “Fake News” NYT would have driven the point home to his base. But he is not one who would think.
Popcorn? The debates are going to be SAD to watch, if you understand that these two insane, power-lusting clowns are the best this culture could come up with. Instead I look forward to Jorgensen’s interview.
I see Joe Biden a an honest guy.
Oh ye of little faith. As much as I hate every syllable that comes out of the fat orange spy’s mouth I will watch because the potential for him to blow chunks of snorted adderall out of his nose while screaming his hate and lies is just too precious to miss.
And if it is Biden who blows it then at least I will know why.
But there was another debate once upon a time that nobody thought would be worth watching very much, the VP debate between Lloyd Bentsen and Dan Quayle.
Take one minute 44 seconds of your life and see this moment in US political debate history. At this moment many democrats were wishing they had nominated Bentsen. You are probably too young to have seen it or remembered it, please look and tell me what you think of DQ’s face, as well as those in the audience once it was said. I can tell you the room full of democrats I was in erupted and was pandamonium so much that we missed a couple minutes of what was said after.
Good one. Quayle trying to act as if he has as much composure as Bentson is cringe-worthy.
I’ll watch the highlights reel of tonight for any fireworks, but we all know the whole thing is going to be cringe-worthy. Biden is probably nice to his grand-children, but he’s as much of a pod-person as anyone in Washington, where they all want to be in control of hundreds of millions of strangers. Mentally healthy adults are NOT eager to push others around, taking and spending their property.
Not that I disagree with you about Biden, much, but after four years of the Trump shitshow I will take a pod person.
I’m putting my bet on Styxhexenhammer 666 being the closest of the Presidential election predictions. He beat Nate Silver’s predictions hands down as well as all the others. Might actually watch the elections on CNN, Fox, and MSNBC, just to see all the flashing red and blue lights that triggers epileptic seizures and such. Ron Paul or Godzilla for President!
Trump will win in a landslide. All the polls are ridiculous. Third term in 2024!
Nothing is bringing us back we are already there: Our society is collapsing Oh you are just a pessimist !!No I see it happening around me The Unsettling Normalcy of Societal Collapse
Indi Samarajiva lived through the end of the civil war in Sri Lanka that killed an estimated 80,000-100,000 people over 30 years. He cautions that societal collapse can feel quite normal for many people — but that doesn’t mean that it isn’t happening. I Lived Through Collapse. America Is Already There.
I lived through the end of a civil war. Do you know what it was like for me? Quite normal. I went to work, I went out, I dated. This is what Americans don’t understand. They’re waiting to get personally punched in the face while ash falls from the sky. That’s not how it happens.
This is how it happens. Precisely what you’re feeling now. The numbing litany of bad news. The ever rising outrages. People suffering, dying, and protesting all around you, while you think about dinner.
If you’re trying to carry on while people around you die, your society is not collapsing. It’s already fallen down. https://gen.medium.com/i-lived-through-collapse-america-is-already-there-ba1e4b54c5fc
“That he paid no taxes is a big yawn legally, but probably not to the public.” You seriously think most folks haven’t come to expect that? Don’t agree. It’s a yawn to the public as well. Everyone “knows” rich corporations and rich people don’t pay taxes and infact are showered in welfare we all pay for with taxes.
The more votes that go to 3rd party candidates in traditionally red states, the more likely Biden is to flip those states. This happen to Gore in 2000 and Clinton in 2016. Those lost 3rd party votes are the difference sometimes between being President or going in the woods for a walk whenever you want.
When conservative media and Trump’s campaign brags about being ahead of Biden in Texas you know they got problems
You should be mocked. Your anti-Trump bias has severely crippled your credibility. That is not the fault of the unwashed and uninformed, it’s on you buddy.
A serious question: if Trump wins, will you come forward with a sincere mea culpa?
I personally don’t think you have it in you. Sad. You used to be a unique voice that swam against the stream. I accidentally discovered your analysis and commentary. It really was a treasure found on a vast beach of mainstream crap. I hope a Trump victory will make you re-assess. I didn’t say wish because my dad always told me… wish in one hand…
Texas won’t flip blue…I don’t think Georgia or Florida will either, but that’s a WAG, not a poll.
Frankly, Nate Silver needs to show me he’s figured out how to get it right, before I begin to trust his odds-making again.
Not sure about the others. but Texas is all about the gerrymandering. It works, and it’s been upheld in the courts….so I see it working for some time to come.
It’s possible that Trump might be so hated now that people who don’t ordinarily vote will actually show up….if that happens I say Biden gets it in a landslide. In such a scenario, all the states you mentioned could flip.
I’m out at the lake, putting things to bed after a long weekend. Lots of giant Trump banners and such out here on Lake LBJ, turned toward the lake so you have to look at them.
More irony there, but Trump voters wouldn’t get that..
Out at what lake?
LBJ Lake not very near Austin. Not surprised you see Trump flags on the lake given it is the middle of nowhere like much of Texas.
https://www.google.com/maps/place/Lake+Lyndon+B.+Johnson/@30.5693069,-98.4131019,13z/data=!3m1!4b1!4m5!3m4!1s0x865b03c890b85f27:0x66ddc396f46f2257!8m2!3d30.5617707!4d-98.349917
Lake LBJ is less than an hour from my house in West Austin. The Trump signs and banners seem to be popular among a certain group of affluent city people who spend their weekends on the lake, as I often do now. Not just Austin people, but from San Antonio and Dallas, etc.
The banners are also very visible in the countryside out in the Hill Country, usually at the entrances of big ranches….also an affluent group.
In some ways it looks like class warfare. The affluent supporting what they perceive as the party of low taxes. To most people with money, it often comes down to that.
Makes sense, people with money can afford their dacha on the lake, and people with money tend towards older and more conservative demographics because hell, life is good for rich people and they do not want that threatened by some low priority thing like healthcare or affordable food and housing, or a living wage for the majority. They want to CONSERVE the status quo because that is the quo that made them able to afford a summer house on the lake.
But there is another factor at play here. I live in a suburban county less than an hour from Tampa and it is really quite mixed/purplish. Yet you ONLY see huge oversized Trumpanalia because his supporters are LOUD and of questionable sound mental health, after all they advocate breaking the laws in so many ways, and have at best a mob mentality, they seek to inject fear of their weapons and willingness to use them (Rittenhouse’s mother) into the political realm just the same way the Brownshirts did in Germany 90 years ago.
So you see very few signs of support for Biden because that is a great way to get your house vandalized while you are out, or your car vandalized while shopping. The typical Biden voter like me does not need to plaster his car with raving stickers of political fealty at any cost to know that we will be going out to vote to get rid of Trump.
In reality it is houses and cars with Trump signs that get vandalized by lunatic leftists.
Lake LBJ.
Gerrymandering works until the suburbs turn purplish blue. I grew up in Texas and to me every time I visit, the more it looks like California of the late 1980s that is about to flip blue permanently. Also because many of these “new” swing states haven’t banned out of state money, they are going to see a lot of money from wealthy Democratic donors or even Republicans that want Trump out at any cost. Some billionaires are spending half their net worth on this election because they see the opportunity to flip some states and the senate to blue for years to come. Gerrymandering only works to a certain point.
Funny how Citizens United ended all restrictions on corporate legalized bribery in the form of limitless campaign contribution slush funds but actual citizens in a place like Florida can’t have that same “free speech” to support a candidate in a few states. I sent money to defeat Collins in Maine and to Jamie Harrison in SC. Let them try to stop me.