After becoming the underdog during the Kamala Harris âhoneymoon phaseâ of her candidacy, Donald Trump is once again the favorite according to famed statistician Nate Silver, of âFiveThirtyEightâ fame.
As seems to be the case, while all discussion was on who won the presidential debate, the obvious question of âdid it actually change anyoneâs mind?â went unanswered - likely because the same people who thought Harris won (the dominant narrative in the media) knew she didnât convince anyone by repeating discredited talking points and making funny faces.
The day of the debate, Silver gave Trump a 64.4% chance of winning the presidency to Harrisâ 35.3% based on his analysis of the polls. The odds changed slightly the day after the debate in Harrisâ favor - but not by much, with Trump still remaining the favorite:
FiveThirtyEight, which Silver founded and owned until 2013, constantly made headlines the past two election cycles for their predictions. FiveThirty Eight is, ironically given last nightâs debate, now owned by ABC.
For some context; FiveThirtyEight was more optimistic than other pollsters on Trump in 2016, even though he still had Trump as the underdog. While the likes of the Huffington Post and other were giving Hillary Clinton a 98% chance of victory, they gave her a 71.4% chance on election day, to Trumpâs 28.6% chance. Silver was slammed by critics for getting the election wrong after Trumpâs victory, though thatâs not necessarily the case - after all, nobody is shocked when a baseball player with a 0.286 batting average hits the ball.
Meanwhile, FiveThirtyEight gave Biden a larger 89% chance of winning the 2020 election, which, like the 2016 election, was decided by razor thin margins in a handful of states.
Silver departed FiveThirtyEight last year, and in the 2024 election cycle, they have the odds at effectively a coin toss. Whatever one thinks of this sort of polling analysis (as the polls are hardly known to be *that* accurate), the trend is clear; that the same group that Trump below a one-in-three chance of winning an election he won, and a 10% chance of winning an election that was decided by under 200k votes in a handful of swing states, now has him as even money. While not as optimistic as Silverâs analysis seperate from FiveThirtyEight, itâs still bullish for Trump.
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