For the first time since 538 published our presidential election forecast for Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump, Trump has taken the lead (if a very small one) over Harris. As of 3 p.m. Eastern on Oct. 18, our model gives Trump a 52-in-100 chance of winning the majority of Electoral College votes. The model gives Harris a 48-in-100 chance.
Calling Silver a right winger is more than a bit silly. He’s not as far left as some but damn, to call hin right wing, that’s just some kind of ridiculous.
And no, he’s not affiliated with 538 but he is explaining how polling aggregation, which 538 and others do, works.
Again, even if he isn’t an outright right winger, that’s fine. I’m willing to back off on that. But polls do not matter, and in fact the only thing they seem to do is reduce turnout. I really don’t care about Nate’s thoughts, and never have since 2016. I think a lot of people stopped trusting polls and definitely stopped trusting him back then.
All they do is predict the future.
Here’s 538 going over the 2020 predictions (in a historically difficult polling year):
Even in a year when the polls were mediocre to poor, our forecasts largely identified the right outcomes. They correctly identified the winners of the presidency (Joe Biden), the U.S. Senate (Democrats, after the Georgia runoffs) and the U.S. House (Democrats, although by a narrower-than-expected margin). They were also largely accurate in identifying the winners in individual states and races, identifying the outcome correctly in 48 of 50 presidential states (we also missed the 2nd Congressional District in Maine), 32 of 35 Senate races1 and 417 of 435 House races.
They sure didn’t get 2016 right, which is what I referenced and what caused distrust. Just because they got 2020 right doesn’t mean they’ll get 2024 correct. It’s meaningless and only serves to make people feel like they don’t have to turn out. They definitely don’t just “predict the future”.
Also, I’m not sure if quoting the very pollsters that got 2016 wrong will make people trust them now. It’s certainly not working for me.
