More Data That Supports A Harris Win

The Daily Escape:

Wrongologist readers know that Wrongo thinks the presidential election isn’t quite as close or scary for Democrats as the polls would have you believe. They show Harris with a narrow lead, with some showing the battleground states as tied. Well, most polls aren’t truly reliable these days. And the pollsters, who make arbitrary weightings after the questions are asked, seem to travel in packs. They’re terrified of underestimating Trump support (as they have in the past). So maybe this time they have a thumb on the scales just like they did in 2022.

Wrongo has been saying that it’s possible to make a vibes-and-momentum argument that Harris has sprinted ahead of Trump who seems to be shrinking right before the public’s eyes whenever he speaks. By any normal standard, Trump has lost it mentally and emotionally. His speeches at rallies consist of rambling, often apocalyptic, hate-filled rhetoric and lies.

In order to get attention he’s saying crazier and crazier things, but it’s hard to see that any of that is winning over more voters. His efforts seem to be to directed at keeping his most fervent supporters energized while extracting as many dollars as he can from their wallets.

Harris on the other hand has effectively undermined the image of Trump as some sort of inevitable strongman. Instead has cast him as a failed rich-kid with no plan beyond turning Americans against each other.

There are some interesting survey data points that are encouraging for Harris: A new survey suggests that pollsters may be underestimating Harris’s support with young people. The large Harvard IOP youth poll suggests there is now a serious youth surge towards Harris.

She is up 61%-30% with likely 18-29 year-old voters. In 2020 Biden won 18-29 year-olds by just 24 points.

The Harvard IOP youth poll is a very large sample poll of a narrow slice of the electorate, and thus far, more reliable than 70-person sub-samples of groups in national polls. We’re also seeing surges in young people registering to vote.

And this Harris margin hasn’t been getting captured in most polling so far.

Compare the Harvard poll to this week’s Quinnipiac poll, that had Trump up a point. Quinnipiac’s 18-34 year old vote was Harris 48, Trump 45. But if Harvard’s poll is closer to correct, that number probably should be more like Harris +25 to +27. Adjusting for the youth surge in the Harvard poll to the Quinnipiac poll would put Harris up by a lot, not behind.

Another point is that many young people register as unaffiliated, not as Democrats. So analysts may not be seeing a youth surge towards Harris.

Howard University just completed a large sample poll of black voters in the battleground states. It showed that likely Black American voters in battleground states show strong support for Harris over Trump. Harris leads Trump, 82% to 12% among this population. The same voters report having supported President Biden over Trump 81% to 9% in the 2020 election. Support for Harris was even higher among voters who say they are “almost certain” to vote 85% to 10%.

The Howard poll has a ±3.1 margin of error, and 96% of the sample indicate they are likely to vote in the 2024 presidential election.

Finally, some readers wanted Wrongo to keep them updated on Thomas Miller’s model that forecasts the Electoral College vote based on investor closing prices in the PredictIt market for the Party that will win the 2024 presidential election. For September 26, the closing prices indicated that Harris wins the Electoral College 312- 226.

Remember that political polls are snapshots of the recent past and have limited predictive power.

Prediction markets, OTOH, are forward-looking. Investors anticipate what will happen on election day and place their bets accordingly. Just as the stock market is a leading indicator of what is expected to happen with the economy, a political prediction market is a leading indicator of what will happen with an election.

Time for a Saturday Soother. Just forget about the election for a few moments while you watch and listen to Luigi Boccherini’s (1743-1805) “String Quintet in E major” (1st Movement) performed in 2015 at the Chester Music Festival and played by the Ensemble Diva: