The Election According to the NY Times

Racial Depolarization was Mostly Hype

The final round of NY Times swing state polls are out.

Previous Times polls showed racial depolarization. Trump was winning over nonwhite men, especially younger ones, but some secular white voters were coming home to the Democratic party. The most recent round suggests that these changes were more flirtation than dalliance. Nonwhite men took longer to decide, but late deciders broke heavily towards Harris. Similarly, some white secular white voters mulled non-Trump options but ultimately voted for him. The Time’s narrative cuts heavily against yesterday’s Selzer poll, which showed Harris up by three points in Iowa. The Times surveyed roughly 8600 voters and Selzer surveyed 800, so the Times’ collective findings are about three times less likely to be an outlier than Selzer’s. Selzer’s result is probably noise.

If we run the model using only the Times polls (and fiat non battleground states to the likely winner), Harris wins the election 58.3% of the time. The model printout is at the bottom.

The Times’ polls seem slightly biased towards Harris. Nate Cone admitted that Democrats were 16% more likely to answer surveyors than Republicans. The Times’ Nevada sample indicated that Republicans had cast 2% more early votes than Democrats, but we know from Jon Ralston’s good work that Democrats have cast roughly 44,000 fewer ballots, a 4% difference. Similarly, Georgia’s early voting patterns appear to favor Trump.

For every data-conforming narrative suggesting Harris is a modest favorite, there is a counternarrative suggesting Trump is a modest favorite. It may be time to throw my hands up, say it’s 50-50, and vamp on the Georgia vote totals when they pour in between 8 and 10 pm Tuesday. It looks like even Detroit might report before 2 am Wednesday!

HARRIS WON 583566 out of 1 Million times

she got exactly 270 EVs 5048 times

the blue wall holds 460546 times

Blue Wall Cracks 539454 times, of which Harris salvages 123020 wins

Harris wins a southern state (GA/AZ/NC): 712470 times

Harris wins blue wall only: 5048; blue wall plus nevada: 44346

Harris wins PA and wins with fewer than 289 ev 96228

State wins w/ losses w/ wins w/o losses w/o

AZ 268420 7471 315146 408963

GA 403313 155793 180253 260641

FL 0 0 583566 416434

MI 557930 65124 25636 351310

MN 583566 416434 0 0

NV 550830 121954 32736 294480

NC 490194 126516 93372 289918

PA 488725 11046 94841 405388

TX 0 0 583566 416434

WI 537781 79003 45785 337431

NE-2 583566 416434 0 0