"It will take a lot to go wrong for Biden to lose"

@Ducky Well, check Allan Lichtmann's track record. He hasn't gone from smug to snivelling yet, not even in 2000, when we all know the SCOTUS stole the election for the Republicans.

@Aidankenny23 And what if he turns out wrong?

@Ducky He won't :) I'm confident :) He even predicted Trump's victory in 2016 against EVERYONE else's predictions.

@Aidankenny23 [i]But what if he does?[/i] What will you think then?

@Ducky He won't I'm 100% confident :)

@Aidankenny23 Doesn’t seem very logical to me, but I’m glad you’re so confident with it. Hope for your sake, he doesn’t turn out wrong then. Please spare me another reiteration saying he won’t be. I get it.

@Ducky @dakotaviper OK well, here are the 13 keys, plus analysis from fivethirtyeight

R[b]emember the rules: in order for the incumbent party to lose, 6 or more keys must be false, whereas if 5 or fewer are false, they win re-election. [/b]

1. [b]After the midterms, the incumbent party holds more seats in the House than it did after the previous midterms: FALSE [/b]- the Democrats lost the House, and even had they held the same number of seats, they would have had to gain enough to beat their 2018 margins for this key to be true.

2. [b]There is no serious contest for the incumbent party nomination: TRUE[/b]. Nothing we've seen in the Democratic primary comes close to toppling this key.

3. [b]The incumbent party candidate is the sitting president: LIKELY TRUE[/b]. This only turns false if Biden doesn’t run while staying POTUS, which is incredibly unlikely (but why he should not take Ezra Klein's advice!).

4. [b]There is no significant third party or independent campaign: SWITCHING THIS FROM LEAN FALSE TO LEAN TRUE.[/b] When I published this in November, it looked like No Labels was getting traction and RFK Jr. was polling quite well. Now, No Labels is a dud with Manchin and Hogan declining to run, and RFK Jr. still polling well but not on any swing state ballots except maybe Arizona and Georgia yet. Even assuming he gets onto those ballots, his support could fizzle out before this key is called FALSE, but given that he's not on them yet and No Labels isn't going to be doing much, I'm flipping this key's leaning to LEAN TRUE.

5. [b]The economy is not in recession during the election campaign: LIKELY TRUE[/b]. Almost want to call this one solid true at this point, but want to be careful in case there's a surprise.

6. [b]Real per capita growth equals or exceeds mean growth during the previous two terms: TRUE[/b]. Even if there were no further growth, Biden already has this one locked down. In order for this key to turn false, the recession key would also have to turn false, and the recession key would need to be COVID-level deep.

7. [b]The incumbent administration effects major changes in national policy: TRUE[/b]. The IRA, infrastructure, gun safety, stimulus checks, reversal of the Trump admin’s executive orders lead this to be true. Lichtman called this key himself.

8. [b]There is no sustained social unrest during the term: LIKELY TRUE[/b]. Same as before: I would say this one’s as locked as key 7 but there’s potential for the pro-Palestinian protests to turn violent or more disruptive than they are now or for there to be serious street violence after the Trump trials. But so far, none of that has materialized (and FWIW, this key has only been called false in 2020 and 1968, so the bar is HIGH to flip it.)

9. [b]The incumbent administration is untainted by major scandal: TRUE[/b]. The Hunter allegations blew up with the Russia connections indictment recently, and the House is nowhere close to impeaching Biden.

10. [b]The incumbent administration suffers no major failure in foreign or military affairs: 50/50.[/b] I don't think the war in Ukraine or the Middle East are by themselves enough to turn this false, but Ukraine losing ground or things getting worse could well turn this FALSE.

11. [b]The incumbent administration achieves a major success in foreign or military affairs: CHANGING THIS FROM 50/50 to LEAN FALSE.[/b] Ukraine is not successfully pushing back against Russia, which was the obvious way to make this one true. If a hostage deal is reached with Hamas and all the hostages come home, I would think this might count as true, but to me that feels like a heavy lift.

12. [b]The incumbent party candidate is charismatic or a national hero: FALSE[/b]. Biden is not broadly appealing or charismatic.

13. [b]The challenging party candidate is NOT charismatic or a national hero: TRUE. [/b]Trump is “charismatic” in the sense that he excites people, but only appeals to a narrow base unlike Obama, Reagan, JFK, or FDR, all of whom turned this key. Lichtman has already called this key true.

Right now we have two solid false keys (1 and 12), one lean false (11), and one tossup (10). If all four of those broke against Biden, he would be down 4 keys and would have a two key cushion against a predicted loss according to this model - and that's a big if.

In order for Biden to lose in this model, you would probably need the foreign policy successes and failure keys not to go his way AND the 3rd party key, which gets you to 5 false keys, PLUS Biden not running again. It's really tough to see how this model predicts a Trump win.

Worth noting that NONE of this is conditional upon Trump getting convicted (although I don't dispute that would help Biden as the keys aren't absolutely everything, and they do rely on history).

And before you say "[i]well, Biden's too old and that makes this different[/i]", keep in mind that the case has been made that "[i]this year is different and the model is wrong[/i]" many, many times. Most obviously 2016, when it predicted a Trump win, but also in 2008 when Obama was the first black candidate, and in 2012 to some degree when Lichtman predicted Obama's re-election in late 2010.

To me, the idea that Biden's age alone can defeat a robust historical pattern like this seems like a really tough case to make. It would be easier to make that case if he were running against Haley or DeSantis, but maybe this model has gotten lucky in the past with his prediction record, and it will get lucky because he's running against... Trump.

Prediction. 9 TRUE, 2 FALSE, 1 PROBABLY FALSE, 1 50/50. Biden is re-elected.

@Aidankenny23 You’re a bit on the zealous side, aren’t you?

@Aidankenny23 That never happened. There was a liberal investigative reporter that analyzed 2000, and his conclusion was that, "any way you cut it, Bush was going to win."

@IronHamster Here is a pertinent part of the interview with Lichtmann.

[quote][quote]“[2000] was a stolen election. Based on the actual votes, Al Gore should have won going away, except for the discarding of ballots cast by Black voters who were 95% for Gore. I proved this in my report to the United States Commission on Civil Rights. One out of every nine to 10 ballots cast by a Black voter was thrown out, as opposed to one out of 50 cast by a white voter.

“Most of those were not so-called hanging chads. They were over-votes because Black people were told punch in Gore and then write in Gore, just to be sure, and those ballots were all discarded. Political scientists have since looked at the election and proved I was right. Al Gore, based on the intent of the voters, should have won by tens of thousands of votes.”[/quote][/quote]

And while we're at it, who was this "liberal investigative reporter"?

@Aidankenny23 I don't maintain my records like that, and you can't trust Google to either because they are avowed leftists, but, even if everything was totally hung up, per Constitution, the President would have been chosen by the House which was Republican controlled, leaving the son of a CIA chief as President, and Gore as President of the Senate would have cast the deciding vote making him vice president.

@Aidankenny23 ...and, that whole racist tripe is 100% discrediting. I'd never take anything seriously by Lichtmann, and if I taught a poli-sci course and a student referenced him I would fail him.

@HoraceGreenley You'd better hope it is 😂 But you are going to be SEVERELY pissed off on November 6th!

@IronHamster [quote]I taught a poli-sci course and a student referenced him I would fail him.[/quote]

I think that says more about your academic record than anything😂

@Aidankenny23 It says students would learn more in my classes and years later attribute their success to my guidance.

@IronHamster Well deflected, sir. Fact remains, Trump is done for in November.

@Aidankenny23 Only because the criminals in the CIA will rig it, just like they've done since at least 1960, with the exception of the rigged election of 2016 when they didn't realize how much they had to rig it. Facts being, Trump will win three elections in a row.

@IronHamster so you believe that 2016 was rigged? omg get help

@IronHamster exactly right, only the sleeping people don’t realise this

@Aidankenny23 Look carefully. Democrats projected after the 2016 election. Get it?