Data-Driven Election Forecasts From RavenPack - and Others; The Impact of "Anger" on Winning Chances

Joaquin Monfort | September 15, 2020

In this update, our monitor’s assessment of Trump and Biden’s winning chances, forecasts from other major monitors, and news about “Anger” and how it impacts on different candidates’ projections.

Key takeaways

  • Trump still lagging
  • Review of top 7 election monitors
  • Focus: Nevada, Arizona, New Hampshire, and other battlegrounds
  • The impact of news about “Anger”

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Despite talk of a convention boost and his typically visceral approach still proving unsettling to the opposition, Trump lags behind - according to our election model.

Now 7 weeks before election day, the monitor is saying that if the election was held tomorrow, Biden would probably win by 323 electoral college votes to 215.

biden win

If that seems a fantastically large margin, it is not - most other major monitors are also forecasting a blue wave, as shown in the table below.

election monitors

RavenPack is showing the fourth largest lead for Biden and 6 out of the 7 major monitors are forecasting Biden with a majority of over 270, the minimum required for an outright victory.

INDIVIDUAL STATE ANALYSIS

The Trump campaign’s recent pivot towards Nevada and Arizona does not appear to have helped much, according to our monitor. In fact, the opposite seems to be the case. Both of those states rank in the top 3 for weekly changes in winning chances. But ironically, all with swings in favor of Joe Biden.

election state analysis

Nevada is the state showing the greatest weekly change in projections with a 1.4% rise in Joe Biden’s winning chances to 86.5%.

nevada weekly change

The state featured prominently in the news recently after Trump held a rally of over 2000 supporters in the town of Henderson, near Las Vegas, which broke state rules prohibiting gatherings of more than 50 persons.

It was the first major rally since Trump’s June Tulsa rally, in Oklahoma, which was later heavily criticized for causing a spike in local COVID-19 cases.

NEWS ABOUT OTHER STATES

The state with the largest daily change, at the time of writing, is New Hampshire with a 2.1% swing in favor of Donald Trump, though it is not enough to put him back in the lead.

new hampshire favors trump

North Carolina recently flipped Democrat and the monitor is showing Biden is consolidating his lead there, with both a daily 0.5% increase in projections for Biden winning and a 0.1% rise in polls.

north carolina flips democrat

Finally, polls in Texas are neck and neck showing both candidates on 46.75% although the monitor’s projections still has Trump romping home with a 95% probability chance of winning - it is Texas, after all.

trump probability win in texas

ANALYSIS: VOTER ANGER NEGATIVE FOR TRUMP

New interactive charts on our monitor mean it is now possible to conduct quick and easy analyses of key election gauges. An accompanying drawing tool enables highlighting of key areas of interest.

One relationship that has emerged is between levels of news about “Anger” and the different candidates.

The suggestion from the circled levels on the chart below is that levels of news about “Anger” are negatively correlated to Donald Trump’s chances of winning. That is - when Anger rises, Trump’s chances of winning generally fall (after a short lag).

anger rises trump falls

When compared with Biden’s chances of winning, on the other hand, the opposite - not surprisingly - seems to be true and mentions of Anger are more closely correlated with his chances of winning, as highlighted by the boxes in the chart below.

anger rises biden wins

The charts may even suggest a causal relationship where rising Anger - which may be indicative of growing resentment and anger amongst minorities who are not Trump voters - actually causes a fall in support for the President which benefits Biden.

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