Nate Silver

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

For now, most of Trump's ~30% winning chances stem from the fact that there are still 2 months to go and the race doesn't have to tighten that much for the Electoral College to be competitive. But if the polls still look like this in Nov. his chances will be lower (~10% or so). — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

It's good to have conversations about "shy" Trump voters and other reasons why the polls might be wrong, but the presence of these conversations is a bearish sign for Trump. — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

RT @DavidAFrench: Yup. Where I live in TN the concept of a “shy Trump voter” is hilarious. Shy Biden voter? Yup. That’s real. All this… — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

RT @dandrezner: @NateSilver538 Do I have a column for you to read. https://t.co/K5UsTS7ir3 — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

RT @briankoppelman: Who knew my entire mood could shift in the time it takes to read or not read the word "slightly" before the word "favor… — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

@conorsen There's also the question of how well-equipped Trump is to take advantage of the catalyst. Like, if some promising Phase 3 results are announced on Oct. 30, probably Trump holds a press conference that soon devolves into a 37-minute rant about Mika Brzezinski. — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

The chaotic news cycles induced by Trump can sometimes be make it hard for his opponent to drive a message. If he was ahead, they could help him to run out the clock. But now *he's* behind and *he's* the one who needs something to change and *he* has to drive a message. — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

But it's also clear that Trump isn't very focused on any of that. Just look at his Twitter feed this week. It's about obscure cable news stories instead. About Nancy Pelosi going to the beauty parlor. About John McCain. About the Drudge Report. About "mini-strokes". — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

Underlying conditions may be getting a bit better for Trump. We did get a great jobs report this AM. COVID cases have been falling. (Though more of a plateau lately, which is a bit concerning.) Some optimism about vaccines. (Along with concern they'll be rushed out.) — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

To put it another way, with the late conventions this year, we're rapidly transitioning from "it's still pretty early" to "we're in the stretch run". And out of that Trump went from...trailing by 8-9 points to 7-8 instead? (And that small bounce might fade anyway.) Not great. — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

Why? If you're behind, you only have so many chances to turn the campaign around, and Trump whiffed on a couple of chances this week. He did not get much help from his convention. Nor does his "LAW AND ORDER" focus seem to working, at least if you trust the polls. — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

Trump still has pretty decent winning chances (~30% in our model) but I don't really buy that his chances are *increasing* and I don't get why there seems to be some sentiment to that effect. In some ways, rather, this was the most reassuring week of the campaign for Biden. — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

RT @juruwolfe: We're past the easy wins of the economic recovery, and the current gains aren't helping all Americans equally, @ameliatd, @N… — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

@JeremyKonyndyk @chrislhayes It is hard, which is why it's only a 2% chance, but TX is also a state that pollsters have had trouble with, tending to lowball Dems in recent elections. If there's a huge turnout that throws polls off, it's possible to imagine weird things happening that make TX more important. — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

@chrislhayes Plausible! Also, TX and AZ will likely gain electoral votes in 2024, making this map slightly more robust. — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

In 2018, Democrats underperformed their polls in parts of the Midwest (though not as badly as in 2016) and in Florida, but overperformed them in Texas and Arizona. If you had a version of that on steroids this year, you could wind up with that map. — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

Texas shows up as the tipping-point state in only ~2% of our simulations, which is not a lot considering how many electoral votes it has. With that said, this map isn't *completely* absurd: https://t.co/Jx1M0llVl1 — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

RT @DaytimeDan: @NateSilver538 Which is why I think there's an equally strong argument for "shy Biden voters" from red areas where being a… — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

RT @galendruke: 🎧 Model Talk pod 🎧 We discuss: If Biden wins the popular vote by 2-3 points, he isn’t favored to win the Electoral College… — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

@RobertCahaly @trafalgar_group @FiveThirtyEight I'm not allowed to place bets even for charity but if I could I'd bet a lot more than that. — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

Do I believe a graphic designer in an upscale college-educated suburb might be inclined to conceal her Trump support? I don't know. Maybe. But those aren't the places where Trump tends to beat his polls. Rather, he wins **places that are already Trump-y** by huge margins. — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

In some ways the obsession with "shy Trump voters" shows how cloistered elites are because there are many places in America where you would face no social stigma whatsoever for showing outward support for Trump (often the opposite, in fact). — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

In this example, the prior shows Trump winning Arizona because if the race were tied nationally, Arizona is (slightly) red-leaning and therefore Trump would be favored there. Note that the prior gets relatively little weight, though (18% and it will fall to 0% by Election Day). — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

The prior (Step 4) based on the economy & incumbency helps Trump in *all* states, conversely, because our model's prior (with recent rapid improvement in economic data) is that the race should be ~tied nationally, rather than Trump being behind 7/8 points, as he is in the polls. — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

In the new polls-to-vote feature on our interactive, you can see where our model thinks the polling averages are too bearish or bullish on Biden based on demographics and past voting. For instance, Biden's polling a bit better than the model expects in AZ. https://t.co/TdCOi1WkWL https://t.co/UAnvxUc5g3 — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

RT @micahcohen: We added some awesome detail to the state pages of our presidential forecast -- a step-by-step look at how the forecast goe… — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

RT @micahcohen: We added some awesome detail to the state pages of our presidential forecast -- a step-by-step look at how the forecast goe… — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

@NormOrnstein I don't think the Rasmussen Reports folks would say they've been happy about all the attention, positive and negative, they've gotten from 538 over the years. We can including them in our averages but also sharply criticize when it's appropriate (as it often has been with Ras). — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

p.s. This only applies to 538, not RCP. If you *are* going to arbitrarily pick-and-choose which polls to include, then there's no good argument for including Ras & Trafalgar while excluding many other higher-rated pollsters. 538 has actual rules, though: https://t.co/37N8bDqsnB — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

Rasmussen and Trafalgar are not highly-rated pollsters. I would not bet on them being right this year. But I think our *averages* are likely stronger for including a *dose* of them because it reflects a fuller consensus; that's what this thread was about. https://t.co/mjuuNDgLLl — PolitiTweet.org