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Nov 01, 2024
Welcome to the second quadrennial (that means every four years) Narwhal Capital Election Live Blog. As I've always said, if you don't vote and you don't blog, you can't complain about elections. And I love complaining.
We’ll try to timestamp updates as we publish, so if you read from the top you’re reading our most recent commentary. A few notes to kick this off:
Lastly, unless otherwise noted all posts are from me (Andrew Hall). I’m the President of Narwhal Capital and not as small as the AI-Generated graphic above implies. If you have something you’d like to see addressed on the blog please email me – [email protected]. Mention the blog in the subject line.
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Wednesday, November 6 - 2:05 a.m.
Fox is the first to do the inevitable - calling the election as a whole for Trump. They reference out-performance with black voters, Latino voters and young voters. All of these are things we've mentioned.
Worth noting - this blog has drawn attention to all of this.
Barring something unforeseen this is an earlier-than-some-expected sign-off for the Live Blog. Thanks for staying with us. As I close, a few things I'm thankful for:
As I close a few off-the-wall predictions:
In closing, please listen to our Morning Market Briefing. It's live every market day at 8:30 and available in podcast form on Apple or Spotify. Tomorrow will be a podcast recap. Thanks to Jonathan Hicks who produces that call and oversees our content from a compliance perspective. Go see Natalie Rogers (who runs our office in every since of that phrase) in her operatic performance Friday. Be kind to each other.
Oh, and please remember: We called this at 11:47. MSNBC still hasn't called PA.
Be well.
Wednesday, November 6 - 1:03 a.m.
Fox has called PA for Trump. Which should pretty much do it.
Wednesday, November 6 - 1:03 a.m.
I think Kamala Harris should have sent Tim Walz out instead of her campaign chair.
Look, guys. I'm a football guy. Not just shaped like a football but also a lot like a football game. My hands shake like I'm looking for a flag to throw. I'm loud like a coach and sometimes as goofy as a fan. But we're in a real old-fashioned ball game. It's fourth-and-one and if we can just pick up one inch without anyone noticing we used a down to do it and then do that...I dunno...85 more times...we can pick up that first down by gaining one whole yard. And we've got time! The game is almost over but we can run some plays and pick-sixes in the next seven seconds. What I'm saying is, we got this!
Wednesday, November 6 - 12:55 a.m.
Based on called races, Republicans have clinched a Senate Majority and both PA and WI look headed to Trump.
MSNBC starting to hand out consolation trophies. I expect those states to be called sooner than later.
MSNBC is counting all the votes and following all the facts. The fact of the matter is: Dems are only 0-for-2 in swing states. They lost two states they were projected to lose. And two states are close to being called and the Harris Co-Chair just told people at the party to go home.
Trump is a dumb-dumb and him thinking he was going to win in 2020 was so dumb - and in hindsight a narrative he hung to for 4+ years. There's a real difference between, "We got this" speeches when you don't and "Go home" speeches by a staffer.
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Wednesday, November 6 - 12:45 a.m.
CNN reports that Trump is bussing folks over to his rally so he can speak. Almost simultaneously, MSNBC notes that Kamala Harris is not expected to speak tonight. Co-Chair of her campaign Cedric Richmond notes that there are still votes to be counted and states to be called. He says you won't hear from her tonight. She will be back tomorrow.
That's probably the end of the Kamala Harris campaign for Presidency.
Wednesday, November 6 - 12:40 a.m.
CNN has called Georgia to Trump - a mere 190 minutes after me.
He's now 2/2 on Battlegrounds. This is the first flip and I would argue a low-effort flip as measured by trips to the state by Trump vs. Harris.
As an aside, I almost got t-boned while driving to church on Sunday morning. The driver was in a Prius (literally) and driving the wrong direction in a two-lane, one-way road. I swerved to avoid her and she cut across to park at the local Cobb County Democrats field office - which is hosted at a place called the "Root Canal Place" about 600 yards from my house. She was SO mad at me after running a red light that she might have seen if she'd been driving the correct direction. And not for nothin', that somehow seems pertinent to how today is going for Democrats. A lot of urgency. A little fast and loose with the choices. Not the desired outcome. Some frustration.
Meanwhile some people are just trying to take their wife and kids to Sunday School.
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Wednesday, November 6 - 12:30 a.m.
CNN reports that Trump leads GA by 118,000 ballots. There are 100,000 ballots outstanding. So...maybe we could call this state? I did it four hours ago.
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Wednesday, November 6 - 12:15 a.m.
MSNBC is railing against bonds pricing up (yields down). This is ALL Trump's fault given that he might be the next president (he is, according to me). I'm waiting on a comment from Tom while the same MSNBC panel makes a joke about how "some people think the shirt cost more than it did a few years ago" while adding, "They don't realize it's cheaper than two years ago." What shirt are these people buying? Alabama Football shirts? What's cheaper than two years ago?
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Tuesday, November 5 - 11:47 p.m.
BREAKING: Donald J. Trump has won the 2024 Presidential Election. Narwhal Capital Management has made the call. Screenshot and time stamp included below.
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Tuesday, November 5 - 11:45 p.m.
Georgia and North Carolina are done - which really just Narrow's Kamala Harris's path. Wisconsin seems likely for Trump but is close and PA is the crown jewel as expected.
Trump needs to get 45% of the outstanding vote to hold on there. I don't know the timing - but his odd are better if it's day-of voting. Here's how the most difficult remaining counties look for him:
I would truly classify this state as a toss-up. Unlike Georgia (should be called) and North Carolina (called), which never seemed that way.
I'd expect this to be contested. If that's the case, Trump's camp should root for Wisconsin and a bit more margin there. WI + AZ + NC + GA = Trump victory. Notably, not much is being made of WI - which is looking stronger for Trump than PA in my estimation.
Meanwhile MSNBC just moved Minnesota from "too soon to call" to "too close to call." I don't know what that means, but I don't think that's an upgrade as it relates to Harris. [Hand in the air - I could be wrong.]
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Tuesday, November 5 - 11:21 p.m.
MSNBC Reporter just described the mood at Kamala Harris's Election Night party as "nauseously optimistic." Like a woman during childbirth, I guess. I'm trying to think of when else one would be nauseously optimistic.
Meanwhile the Wall Street Journal has called North Carolina for Trump.
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Tuesday, November 5 - 10:52 p.m.
Per Fox, Harris is running 8 points ahead of Trump with voters under the age of 30. Biden led that by 25. Scroll way down and think about the post on new media. If Trump wins this demo could be more important of a swing than male vs. female.
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Tuesday, November 5 - 10:40 p.m.
NBC is projecting three of five congressional districts to Trump. Nebraska was expected to split 4/1 and they may reverse to a 4/1 final ultimately - but for now it's just 3/2. But that matters. Why? If Trump gets NC and GA and PA the conventional logic was that this would get him to 270. Well if he's 3/5 in Nebraska (vs 4/1) he's at 269 for a tie.
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Tuesday, November 5 - 10:20 p.m.
Milwaukee is recounting 30,000 votes due to a tallying malfunction. Heard it reported on multiple networks and not citing it - but if WI is close and Trump has a shot we may not know an outcome till tomorrow.
Meanwhile PA is drawing the focus. Harris is 2.5% behind Biden's pace in some place called Lackoahanwakada County and that's supposed to mean something.
Meanwhile the Dekalb Co. post I made about 45 minutes ago is gone and has been edited from saying "about 28,521 votes from election day" are left to saying "about 90,000 votes from election day" remain to be counted. I mean they just changed the number from something small and very specific to an even 90,000 without changing the time stamp. See the marked-up screenshot below for what was posted at 9:24 initially.
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Tuesday, November 5 - 10:15 p.m.
The New York Times now projects Trump to win the popular vote by a smidge. If I was a betting man, I would bet on that to happen. Oh wait. I did. On October 23rd.
I'm not banking on that, but I wouldn't hate my $150 bet on Trump winning the Electoral College by 65-104 hitting.
Tuesday, November 5 - 10:05 p.m.
Outside of my calling of Georgia for Trump, the first major swing state call has been made by a major organization. Decision Desk HQ has called North Carolina for Trump. They've been early on these but I don't disagree with any calls - yet.
Tuesday, November 5 - 9:58 p.m.
Reminder, almost two hours ago I projected Florida to go to Trump by 13.9%. It's at 13.4% with 5% remaining.
Nate Silver's fine. Nate Gold is better.
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Tuesday, November 5 - 9:46 p.m.
Below is an edit of the AJC's reporting on DeKalb. At a flat percentage this is another county where Harris is bleeding several multiples of 2020's total state-wide margin.
Tuesday, November 5 - 9:30 p.m.
I mentioned the AJC a moment ago but I find the sequencing of these posts incredibly disingenuous and lacking in context. Post 1 says, "Fulton early vote is done." Post 2 (a few minutes later) says, "Lots left out there in Fulton and other blue areas."
No mention of context like this - 87% of votes cast in Fulton in 2020 were early or by mail.
Trump has Georgia. Official call from me.
Tuesday, November 5 - 9:20 p.m.
Per the AJC, Fulton County's early vote is all in. Harris dominated, but her margin there was slightly lower than Biden's margin in the county overall in 2020. More importantly, total early vote in Fulton came in about 143k lighter than in 2020.
At this year's rate, that means early vote under-performance of 102,202 - about nine times Biden's statewide margin in 2020.
Gonna come down to day-of voting in Georgia. In Florida, Trump held on and expanded his lead. Will that translate?
Tuesday, November 5 - 9:05 p.m.
If you think Kamala Harris will win, this is a good time to think about betting on that. Outside of good news for Trump in Florida there's really no good/bad news anywhere else.
Kalshi has her odds down to 32%. Polymarket has her at 28.9%. PredictIt has her at 37%.
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Tuesday, November 5 - 8:43 p.m.
Here's my daughter's EC Map.
My Daughter's Prediction
Tuesday, November 5 - 8:10 p.m.
Baldwin County GA very much in the spotlight as a potential read on Trump in GA. I regret to say I didn't think of that one before right now. I'm not perfect.
I highly recommend watching coverage here.
This is what AI says bewilderment looks like (see below)
Tuesday, November 5 - 8:04 p.m.
Marjorie Taylor Greene is projected to keep her congressional seat. So you know...
Come for the AI-generated images; Stay for the "Gosh. I forgot about her. Really?"
Tuesday, November 5 - 8:00 p.m.
A slew of data should start coming in but my read is that my guess for Florida may have been high on turnout (now seeming closer to 10.7 million) and Trump may move through the 12.2% margin mentioned and closer to something like 13.91%. The question is does that become a theme? Does low turnout, paired with decent-to-strong Day-Of performance from Trump become a trend?
Duval County Florida seems likely to go to Trump in the 3% range. Does that put something in the 5-6% range in play for him in Georgia? If so, how does that translate to North Carolina and are polls more broadly (outside of the Southeast) discounting him by something in the 3% range? If - and that's a whole lot of ifs - those things prove true it may be a fairly early night and a big win for Trump.
If not, who knows.
For what it's worth, I'd love to spin a data-driven counter-point in favor of Harris, but at this juncture I just don't see any data anywhere that is that strong. Part of that is because all we know about is Florida (which Trump was always going to win). Part of that is because he's winning there - by my estimation - by more than expected.
Again, from where I'm sitting it seems he may net more total votes in Florida than he did in 2020 despite a lower turnout. If true, there are no positive conclusions for Democrats to draw other than, "Well we didn't need that state anyway."
Quite obviously I'm not working for either campaign or in the media, so going to try to just call it like I see it. From what I see on X and elsewhere: Democrats seem quite quiet and insistent that this may take some time, Republicans seem a bit overly confident and the media is already starting to cover (notably CNN's Dana Bash talking about how short Harris's election cycle was - I mean...duh!).
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Tuesday, November 5 - 2:00 p.m.
Predictions on the state of Florida (which by all accounts is not all that contentious).
What this means? Nothing really. Trump won in 2020 and it didn't really help him. But at least for one state the theory of cannibalization seems to be fading.
I'm probably most intrigued by overall turnout. This would put Florida very close to the totals achieved in 2020.
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Tuesday, November 5 - 12:18 p.m.
The always-insightful Wu-Tang Financial has weighed in
Worth thinking about...
Tuesday, November 5 - 11:00 a.m.
Too soon to draw meaningful conclusions from this but with polls open in Florida for a few hours, Republicans lead submitted day-of votes 394k to 211k (note: source updates on an ongoing basis, so numbers will change Election Day voting is columns AA and AB). Republican ballots (including early votes) lead by 1 million at this juncture. It's margin of about 21.5% at this point towards Trump by that measure - though it should be noted there are 181k unaffiliated day-of votes and there could be party cross-over (both ways). This would, in theory, compute to a Trump advantage by around 11.14% in Florida. As a reminder, his team should be rooting for something north of 10% (well above the polling averages).
If these numbers hold it doesn't say a ton about Trump in isolation but it suggests a day-of Harris surge is not happening - at least in Florida. Of note, Duval and Pinellas (two counties I referenced yesterday) both look strong for Trump but Duval is largely in-line with expectations for Georgia (which would not suggest out-performance by Trump).
There are reports of 2-to-1 Republican turnout to Democrat turnout in Maricopa County Arizona.
Some Pennsylvania polling locations have had some issues with machines.
Who knows what's happening in North Carolina? I don't.
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Tuesday, November 5 - 7:05 a.m.
Happy Election Day. Last night at about 12:30 Nate Silver moved Kamala Harris to be the projected favorite and I've got some thoughts on that. Might save them for the Morning Market Briefing (links above).
In any event, something tells me Republicans might need a little dose of "nobody believes in us" to drive the day-of votes. We'll see if it works.
Meanwhile weather may potentially be a headline today as a decent system is moving through fly-over country. Make sure to follow Ryan Hall Y'All (no relation) for the best weather coverage on the planet. He'll go live if it gets crazy.
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Monday, November 4 - 10:05 p.m.
What comes next for the losing part?
For this, I solicited feedback from a friend in Boston (a much bluer territory than Georgia). Here's his take on where Democrats might head post-Kamala Harris (in the event of a Harris loss):
In an election that is so tight that no one I know who doesn’t have a secret rooting interest is confident on how it turns electorally either way, we get to the conversation about where do both parties go if they lose an eminently winnable election?
I think the more interesting conversation is where does the GOP go since their candidate for the last 12 years isn’t really a prototypical conservative. If that surprises or bothers you, crack open a history book and put down your iPhone. Do they drop MAGA and go back to Romney/Bush policies or find a new MAGA standard-bearer who is less toxic than the Don?
But the under-discussed topic is what if Kamala loses. Where do the Dems go? Who do they blame?
I know already they will blame the process, putting up a guy in Biden who wasn’t equipped to finish the race even though they all knew it (that’s arguable since I don’t know how out in the open Biden’s slippage was) and then handing off to Kamala who wasn’t battle tested. So, first thing, they’ll blame Biden’s handlers and the Kamala hand-off.
I think we’ll also see some handwringing over the electoral college if she wins the popular and loses the electoral. The reality is the electoral college is a disgraceful slavery relic and should be turfed. The problem is it’s only sore losers who raise it.
I’d also hope that they realize that their policies aren’t capturing the electorate. People are upset about things: the border, how they’re doing financially, some social culture war issues. Some of it is agitation created by divisive forces. Some of it is legit. The Democrats make it easy to think they don’t care and have no good ideas.
And now, my thoughts on Republicans after a Trump loss:
I tend to agree with my dear friend's assertion that Trump is not a true conservative and I think Republicans should rest easy tonight (the night before the election) knowing that one of the least conservative candidates in recent party history is surely - surely - almost done running for President.
It should encourage Republicans that their next candidate should be better at what Trump is worst at. And what's he's worst at, exactly? Being likeable. As my mom (a former Kindergarten teacher) says, "He does stuff you learn not to do in elementary school. He calls people names. He says mean things. He talks about himself too much."
The problem Republicans will face is a combination of history and circumstance. Historically, how do you compete with an opposing party that has won the White House in four of the last five presidential races with an incumbent eligible to run again? Not an ideal scenario. But the Republican party candidate has been more competitive this go-around than I would have expected and that's probably because he's not actually all that conservative and he's some kind of whacky political force.
So do you go back to your roots and risk shrinking the tent? Or do you find a more likeable, less chumpy Trump-y candidate? I'm not totally sure who either of those choices would be four years from now (though J.D. Vance certainly seems like he wants to be the latter). What's going to be fascinating in this scenario is watching the next candidate distance herself/himself from Trump while also trying to appeal to the fringe parts of his base.
In any event, the rationale for why Trump lost will be much more simple than the rationale from Democrats if Harris loses. If Trump loses, it's because he's a bad candidate who was disliked, said awful things and couldn't handle a loss in 2020. It's pretty simple. Fixing that and trying to move forward with a broad coalition might be a bigger challenge, however.
Monday, November 4 - 3:10 p.m.
As promised this morning on our daily call, here's what I think is worth watching in the early part of returns on Tuesday.
Florida: We've got several things to keep an eye on with the state at large. Thankfully, Florida is usually pretty quick with counting and should offer some answers to these questions:
Two counties to look at:
What's the number to look at? Polling suggests Trump is leading in the 6-8 point range. The early vote data becomes encouraging for Republicans pushing to a 10 point spread. Twelve is decisive and not out of the question if day-of patterns hold (which would be best case for Republicans and a nightmare for Democrats).
Why?
Georgia
I wrote about the importance of the Peach State on Saturday, but if Trump's lead in Florida moves solidly into the double-digits it will be a strong read-through for Trump as it relates to the Georgia vote.
Much has been made about Georgia's impressive in-person early voting performance in 2024 but if one includes mailed ballots accepted + early voting the total votes really haven't changed in this cycle. What's the difference? Received mail-in ballots are down about a million and in-person early voting is up about a million. Where else have we seen mail-in ballots plummet? Oh that's right, Florida...specifically to the disadvantage Democrats - or so it seems.
If Florida posts strong Trump numbers it quickly foils the narrative of Republican cannibalization. Georgia could put a nail in that coffin if that story plays out there too.
If you're in Harris's camp, you're looking for strong performances on Election day from DeKalb, Gwinnett, Fulton, Cobb, Richmond, Muscogee, Clayton, Bibb, Rockdale, Clarke, Douglas, Dougherty and Henry counties. Those 13 counties cast 2.377 million votes in 2020. So they're a large portion of the electorate - but I did not sort this solely by size, so let's get some context:
Those counties are down from their early/mail-in totals from 2020 by 117,307 ballots. If the electorate remains unchanged and votes are evenly distributed across early/mail/day-of voting on a pro rata basis, this is a loss of 76,245 votes for Harris. That's almost 7x Biden's margin of victory four years ago.
So, what could have happened? Maybe Republicans turned out earlier in these areas and are cannibalizing election day votes. But wait...that doesn't explain a decline in voting, does it? If that's the case, Democrats' current deficit is larger than the 76,245 implied above and 13 counties who only accounted for 16.1% of their ballots cast on 2020's Election Day really have work to do.
So why did I pick those 13 counties? I didn't sort for voting history or party lines. I sorted by largest total early voter deficits relative to 2020. What counties are out-performing on early voting? Coweta, Cherokee, Houston (pronounced How-ston), Newton, Jackson, Hall (shout out), Pickens, Walton, Chatham, Bartow, Spalding, Dawson and Columbia. These counties do not have the scale of the previous 13.
These counties are up in early/mail voting by 82,227. Harris and Democrats should be watching Cherokee County. The county had 80% participation in the 2020 election with just shy of 145,000 votes. It was heavily red in 2020 (at just shy of 69% to Trump). If you're Harris you want to see 1. Vote share fall for Trump (obviously) and total turnout as close to 145,000 as possible. If 145k becomes 155k total voters and Trump moves closer to 70% - that's a spread big enough to get Trump the win statewide if everyone else votes exactly the same.
North Carolina
North Carolina will be the best read on how independents are breaking on Tuesday night. More mail/earlyballots have been returned by non-party-registered voters than either major party. In theory, Republicans have a lead of about 41k in the Tar Heel State. But over 1.5mm of the 4.45mm votes cast so far offer no read-through.
I really don't know what to expect there.
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Sunday, November 3 - 2:45 p.m.
A Clear Trump Victory was Inevitable Against a Candidate Who Previously Got No Votes
What we might say after a decisive Trump victory.
This was inevitable, and it’s inexcusable that the media AND the so-called polling experts missed the most well-telegraphed victory in recent history.
Political experts spent the last month spinning themselves into circles to make this election a “toss-up” in a meager attempt to actively deny the fact that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing repeatedly while expecting a different result. What did the pollsters and prognosticators get right? Well, they stuck to their models. They were incredibly disciplined to their process and yet again their same broken process rendered a ridiculously inaccurate prediction of the election. Garbage in; garbage out.
So what went wrong for expert modelers? Well, according to them: nothing. According to normal people with a brain: Everything. They will claim discipline to the process. I will claim the process is broken. If you continue to cook the same meal with bad ingredients, you'll continue to have a yucky dinner.
For the third-consecutive cycle, the most well-covered event in the world somehow managed to discount the most well-known and scrutinized person on the planet. Polls said Trump had a lead narrow lead in some swing states and somehow that was STILL discounting him.
OK, so the polls were wrong, but what happened?
Well, as it turns out the pandemic and wall-to-wall coverage of the pandemic and its management by Trump was not good for Trump in 2020. Who knew? And as it turns out, the ceiling of vote share (which he hit in 2020) was not a normal ceiling.
What else happened? Well he won the popular vote (or at least threatened to do so). Floridians showed up and showed up in bigger numbers due to migration of red voters. Texas showed up and showed up in big numbers thanks to red migration. New York and California stayed home as the states became increasingly blue.
Trump ran circles around Harris with new media. As it turns out, 3 hours with Joe Rogan is more meaningful to voters than a brief appearance on Call Her Daddy, a podcast focused on things I can’t type about at work. Comedian Tony Hinchcliffe might have actually helped Trump - as the host of the most popular comedy show in the world probably brought young voters out and young voters were one of several groups that skewed towards Trump relative to recent history. Add black men and latinos to that group. And it turns out that the “silent vote” was not quiet Harris-supporting suburban moms who were scared to tell their husband as her advertisements implied.
Early voter turnout from Republicans was not merely red eating red. Rather, Republicans finally recognized the value of locking votes in early. And the red meat only got redder due to the enthusiasm gap between parties.
As it turns out, the least popular Vice President in recorded history was not all that popular on a shortened campaign cycle with no primary – especially after four years in office covering for a clearly limited President. Turns out, inflation matters and she couldn’t distance herself from an administration that had her second-in-command. Americans don’t think the world is safer with more wars and they don’t love American funding and involvement in international conflict. Amazingly, most Americans don’t think a $25,000 first-time home buyer credit will make homes cheaper. An awful lot of Americans had a hard time reconciling “my opponent is Hitler” and “his followers are garbage” with “unite the country” and “a new way forward.”
The message from Democrats fell flat. Coconut trees, being raised in a middle class home, being unburdened by what has been and the duality of democracy…these things don’t resonate with most Americans. Know what does?
“Make America Great Again,” and apparently jokes about Arnold Palmer.
On that note, of course Trump won and won big.
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Sunday, November 3 - 8:15 a.m.
Quick Snapshot of Projections
The Economist model is projecting a 270-268 Electoral College win for Kamala Harris. I feel like that's kind of a recipe for disaster and a whole lot of childish behavior from you-know-who. But I continue to think the winner clears 300 Electoral College votes.
What are others counting on at this point?
Nate Silver now has Trump at a 51.5% chance of winning the election. That's Trump's lowest reading since October 19th. He has Trump winning Nevada, Pennsylvania, Georgia, North Carolina and Arizona. Harris takes Wisconsin and Michigan. With the exception of Arizona (Trump by 2.1) all these races are within 2% per his model. His model runs thousands of simulations based on polling data and pollster ratings and the most likely outcome (though only 6% of all simulations) is a Trump victory with 312 Electoral Votes.
FiveThirtyEight (Silver's old site) has Trump with a 53% chance of winning and also sees the 312 outcome as the most likely scenario.
Real Clear Polling says Trump will get 287 Electoral College Votes if there are no toss-ups and polling averages hold on a state-by-state basis.
Polymarket bettors are currently giving Trump a 54.9% chance of winning. He was as high as 67% last week.
Kalshi's market had Trump with a 55% chance yesterday but he's now behind Harris 51 to 49.
It seems unlikely that additional good polling will come out between now and Tuesday - so any real substantive move in the numbers above is probably just noise. So unlike 2016 and 2020, Trump is heading into election day favored to win the election - albeit not by much.
I'm interested to see how the gambling markets - especially Kalshi - react and overreact on Tuesday night to early returns. The political gambling market was less sophisticated in 2020 but there were some wild swings away from Biden to Trump on the odds at around 10:00 p.m. last time - meaning some people got pumped about Trump dumped some money on him and looked like chumps (say that ten times fast).
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Sunday, November 3 - 7:20 a.m.
A Clear Harris Victory was Inevitable Against the Most Unlikeable Person in the World
What we might say after a decisive Harris victory.
Say what you want about Donald Trump, but this point is abundantly clear: He’s the most hated person in the world. Ask half of America. Ask international leaders. According to President-Elect Kamala Harris and her surrogates, foreign leaders despise him for his instability. Presumably those leaders’ constituents feel the same way. He’s been mocked ridiculed and derided by his opposition (duh), the media (oh) and even those in his own party (oh wow!), and ultimately he’s the oldest man in American history to lose sequential Presidential elections.
That is no small feat. Politicians are old. They’re divisive. They’re unlikeable. But Trump is the oldest to divide the country and lose the world’s most important likeability contest. AND HE DID IT TWICE.
What should be surprising about this? In a word: nothing.
But what is surprising about this? A lot.
The so-called unbiased experts have told us this would be a toss-up. “Who could say what will happen?” said those who are paid to say what will happen.
As it turns out, it’s not a political advantage to get shot. People wanting to take you out is not a good thing! There have been multiple attempts on Trump’s life. If he takes on fire again they’re going to call it a “booster” as opposed to a “shot.” It’s awful and these actions are obviously indefensible, but they’re also not a sign of popularity. I can’t believe I’m having to write this, but as the most recent loser of a Presidential election, it’s not a GOOD thing to get shot at while running for the Oval Office...again. Go figure.
As it turns out, speaking non-stop when you have been characterized by those who cover you as “dishonest” is not a good thing. Apparently, being convicted of 34 felons is not actually the boon some might think. Apparently, wetting your pants on stage at a debate and then saying you were bullied by nerdy news anchors is not a sign of strength.
So what happened? Well, Harris won Georgia, just as Biden did in 2020. Harris won Arizona, just as Biden did in 2020. Harris won Nevada, just as Biden did in 2020. Harris won Michigan, just as Biden did in 2020. Harris won Wisconsin, just as Biden did in 2020. Harris won Pennsylvania, just as Biden did in 2020. That’s six of seven swing states in a “toss-up” election.
How did she do it? What happened? What’s the common denominator? Hmmm…I wonder if she was running against the same guy. And is that same guy still wrestling negative net approval ratings (despite being out of office)? And is that guy the single-most covered person in the media? Oh, wait a second…yes, yes and yes!
But how did her state-by-state margins expand? Well it turns out the Democrats were the only party with a voting issue that actually stirred its base – abortion rights. Or, as they like to dress it up “Reproductive Freedom.” Even Republicans aren’t opposed to Reproduction. And everyone loves Freedom. And only one party was able to take capitalize on grievances tied to a Supreme Court ruling enabled by the villain in this story. Trump couldn’t even win on policy – which was the icing on the cake of his own unpopularity.
It didn’t actually matter who the Democrats put on the ballot. Trump just stinks. She won six states by basically doing nothing. My daughter would have won those states too and she’s nine. My son is six and could have won all of those except Michigan (because he likes Cybertrucks not F150s).
Oh and North Carolina, that went to her too. Why? Because it’s been close, it’s stayed close, she closed in the polls and the polls didn’t account for migration from the Northeast to the Tarheel state.
How on earth are we surprised that she beat the most unliked person in a generation and why did we think it would be close?
Come back later today for the narrative of a big Trump victory.
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Sunday, November 3 - 1:05 a.m.
Kamala Goes on SNL
The Harris campaign was all over the place today but her team found time to read my critiques of her lack of presence on YouTube. She just showed up on Saturday Night Life.
Saturday, November 2 - 12:00 p.m.
The Most Important State
I would argue those wanting to know the direction of this election - as it relates to the swing states - should be watching Georgia on Tuesday. Pennsylvania will get the talk as it's essential to Kamala Harris's path to victory (I can't really figure one out for her without it), but the Peach State is narratively more important.
Harris's campaign has leaned heavily into three themes in its waning moments:
The third item is inarguably her flimsiest argument to voters given her current role as Vice President and given the persistence of inflation (which has come down but still lingers) and some weakening in the job market.
But the first two should get pretty highly vetted by Georgia's electorate. We're going to see if point one and two are effective in Georgia and I think we can surmise some sentiment from that across the national landscape.
Before looking at the messaging itself and what you should be looking for in Georgia, here's a quick refresher on Georgia.
Recent History
Historically, Georgia has been red and now it seems more of a purple state. I'd argue the state is likely headed either back to another run of Republican dominance or to a more solidly blue state. I do not think the back and forth is sustainable.
The argument for the state (broadly, not speaking just for this election) going red would focus on the heavy presence of major corporations in the state and the 2022 gubernatorial election in which Brian Kemp (Republican) defeated Stacey Abrams. Kemp defeated Abrams narrowly in 2018 after the two campaigns spent more than $100 million on the race. In 2020, Biden defeated Trump in the presidential race in Georgia giving way to the theory that the state might be turning blue. Two years later Kemp kept his spot at the Governor's Mansion in a race that saw Abrams alone spending over $100 million. Kemp won by more than 7.5%.
I'd argue that in order for the state to be in the blue camp Harris would need to win here this year and both senate seats would need to stay blue (though neither is up for grabs this year).
So will Harris win?
What the Polls Say
According to RCP, Trump leads by an average of 2.6% in Georgia polls and there is not a single poll on the landing page that shows anything better than a tie for Harris. Nate Silver has Trump with a 63.9% chance of winning. Polymarket gamblers are giving Trump a 71% chance of winning.
Obviously, losing Georgia would be a bummer for Harris given that she's seemingly visiting the state every third day. But the real problem with losing Georgia is that it may imply her closing messaging was not effective.
Trump Unfit
No state in the union was more impacted by Trump's election denialism than Georgia. Sure, there have been lawsuits and courtroom drama out of a soap opera. But the biggest damage - to his own party - was done in the immediate aftermath of the 2020 election.
After he insisted elections could not be trusted, the Republicans immediately lost two senate races in January of 2021 after Trump's rhetoric dissuaded voters. Case in point: Senatorial candidate David Perdue got a quarter million fewer votes in his January run-off than he did two months prior.
Peach State Republicans were furious with that outcome. If you can't convince Georgia Republicans that Trump's whining about elections is a real problem...I'm not sure who you can convince. He screwed his party in the state of Georgia.
Reproductive Freedom
The Harris campaign has hammered home messaging about the dangers of a national abortion ban while specifically citing some cases in Georgia. There are actually a lot of women in Georgia.
So we'll get some semblance of a read-through on the effectiveness with women and I think the read-through could be quite pronounced. The AJC's presidential polling over-sampled females at 55% in the state of Georgia relative to historical female voting participation (which is always higher than male participation but not historically at a 55/45 split). Further, some early voting data suggests that the early female vote is already at 55.6%. If that trend holds and it breaks as Harris would expect it to - we'll know a bit more about her chances nationally.
It may take some time to know the demographic breakdown of each state (and Georgia is no different), but a Harris win in Georgia means the two points above were in fact effective in a state impacted by both issues. That doesn't necessarily mean she'll win every other swing state. But a loss in Georgia certainly is a negative read-through on the messaging.
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Saturday, November 2 - 12:00 p.m.
What Really Matters
Here are some college football picks for today.
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Still got it
Saturday, November 2 - 11:48 a.m.
Early Voting
Much is being made of early voting turnout. Thematically, across the core swing states (Georgia, North Carolina, Arizona, Nevada, Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin), relative Republican turnout looks good. What does that actually mean? It means compared to at this point four years ago Republicans are keeping things tighter than they did four years ago.
What does it not mean? It does not mean Republicans are necessarily winning those states (even at this juncture). In fact, in many states it just means the deficit is not as significant for Republicans. It also does not mean anything - really - as it relates to where this thing is done.
A few resources that we feel are doing a good job of interpretation - which at this point really just means "reporting what can be known."
I'm going to write about Georgia later today or tomorrow so I'll come back to that one.
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Saturday, November 2 - 8:40 a.m.
We All Want a Fair, Free, Fake, Fraudulent Election
Though you probably don’t need a refresher, former President Trump took great issue (understatement) with the results of 2020 – even before the election took place four years ago. Until recently, Trump was the biggest cry baby in the long storied history of losers and I fully expected that he’d stay in that spot.
That was until University of Texas fans threw water bottles onto the field in protest of a Defensive Pass Interference call (against the hometown Longhorns) with three minutes remaining in the third quarter as the University of Georgia soundly, methodically, consistently and relentless administered a butt-whipping. Georgia did everything possible to be unintrusive guests. The Bulldogs threw interceptions. They missed tackles. They dropped so many balls that head coach Kirby Smart called it "almost comical." And yet, there my beautiful Dawg were, leading 23-8 with a margin that might as well have been a billion points with a few minutes left in the third quarter. And finally…finally!... the Longhorn faithful – fans of the top-ranked and richest program in college football –woke up. They woke up so vewwy vewyy gwumpy. So they threw trash on the field because, “Officials so mean to me!” Thanks to Texas, Trump got off the hook as the dumbest looking loser of my lifetime.
So now here is my Top 10 List of Losers, Losses and Losing:
The list above is obviously satirical (except for the LeBron James part), but I felt I should lighten the mood before fanning the flames of mistrust - because that's happening.
Undoubtedly, if Trump fails to win in 2024 we can expect more of the same (though in reality we are likely to see some degree of denialism from the other side in defeat as well). So what would Trump (or Harris) point to?
Well, unfortunately, there has already been enough chaos to create confusion and enough confusion to bring up the other word...cheating.
Here are some things that have already happened.
Virginia Voter Registration Nullifications
The registrations of some 1,500 Virginia would-be voters were cancelled due to cross-agency (whatever that means) suspicion that the aforementioned voters are not U.S. citizens. In theory, this is a revamped “purging” process of a law that was signed into order in 2006 by former Virginia governor (now senator) Tim Kaine. Though most – and it should be all – agree that non-citizens should not vote in U.S. elections, there were concerns about the effectiveness of the new screening and there were certainly some issues.
In true government efficiency, this has turned something that impacted real people in a real way into an ugly political dispute that ultimately has already led to at least two courts rulings (including the Supreme Court). All of that falls under an umbrella of “doesn’t matter to the outcome of the election” given the scale of impacted would-be/should-be voters and the size of Virginia’s electorate and the premise of the Electoral College.
To be sure, it’s a pain in the rear to have to re-prove your citizenship. Given the governmental inefficiency that caused this problem it's easy to assume the government wouldn't easily get you back to eligibility. Ultimately, we’re talking about 1,600 people here (so 0.03587% of the total ballot total for VA in 2020) in a state that Joe Biden won by 451,138 votes in 2020.
A federal judge issued an order vacating governor Glenn Youngkin’s new application of the old mandate. Then the Supreme Court ruled 6-3 to issue a stay on the mandate. So the old thing being done in a new way was cancelled and reinstated.
As you’ll see thematically here, it’s hard to make predictions about this election. But I’m quite confident in saying this: 1,600 votes in Virginia will not be retroactively significant to the Electoral College.
Non-Citizens Voting
Does this ever happen? Well, yeah.
A Chinese citizen voted in Michigan and according to CNN, "Illegal voting by non-citizens is extremely rare, and when it does happen, it is usually caught quickly."
So that's good news, right? But per the same report, "Investigators in Michigan are still looking at whether this was an isolated incident, an accident or possibly part of an attempt by China to interfere in the 2024 election."
That is a little less confidence-inspiring.
And finally, again from CNN, "It appears that the student’s vote can’t be nullified after the fact and will be counted."
This would never happen in Texas. There would be so many water bottles thrown at that voting precinct.
Hot Boxes in Washington and Oregon
Official Ballot Drop Boxes were set ablaze in Washington and Oregon destroying an estimated hundreds of ballots last Monday. Per CNN’s reporting about 475 ballots were burned in Vancouver. Not cool (literally and figuratively).
Issues with Dominion Voting Machines
The Michigan Bureau of Elections reported and the Secretary of State gave comments on an issue with Dominion voting machines. Honestly, this story is a little bit boring but apparently the “nation-wide issue” is something that other states tend to handle just fine but the Wolverine State is still trying to figure out. Just throwing this out there, but maybe Michigan could hire Connor Stalions to scout out how other states vote.
The Bucks Stop Here Early
Voters were turned away too soon in Bucks County, Pennsylvania on the final day of early mail voting last Tuesday. The Trump campaign (jointly with senatorial candidate Dave McCormick) sued to get those early voters* more time and the court agreed to give them until close-of-business Friday.
*Interestingly, you can’t really vote early in-person in PA on a voting machine. You have to go, grab a ballot, fill it out and turn it in. But Georgia makes it very hard to vote.
To be clear, the Republican National Committee won the case and voting was extended in Bucks County - a fact that some Washington Post panelists were too slow to admit, leading to conservative Hugh Hewitt quitting live on air.
Weak Passwords in Colorado
Colorado’s secretary of state Jena Griswold had to admit last week that the passwords to voting equipment had in fact been published on the state’s website. I don’t know how not to make a joke about that but it’s tough to figure out which direction to go. Let’s just do this: I bet Secretary Griswold’s reaction to the snafu was not dissimilar to this infamous Griswold reaction (don’t watch with children).
In Summary
Don’t be surprised to hear these topics referenced again – especially if results are unknown for some time or contested. Do I think elections results are totally 100% accurate and fair? Yes and no. I don’t think we’ve ever had the wrong candidate win the Presidency. Undeniably, however, there will be instances of funny business every time. A dead person will vote in 2024. Someone will vote on behalf of someone else. Someone who shouldn’t get a ballot will get a ballot. And when it’s all said and done hundreds of millions of legitimate votes will render this class of exceptions statistically and functionally obsolete.
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Friday, November 1 - 4:50 p.m.
The Final Pitch
This is a very random thought, but why wouldn't either candidate (or both) come out this weekend and say they intend to cut income tax rates by 5% for all Americans?
The obvious objection to this would that a. It can't really be done because b. It would pummel the budgetary deficit. But think about these two facts:
So clearly the American people aren't actually making electoral decisions based on balancing the federal budget and/or clearly politicians aren't being held accountable for failing in this task. So why not throw it out there?
It's one thing to conflate tariffs to a national sales tax (as Harris brings nuance to Trump's talking points) or to talk about the corporate tax rate (which Trump does repeatedly without bringing much value to the average American voter). It's another to say, "I've got good news and bad news. The good news is: I'm cutting your tax rate by 5%! The bad news is: It might rain this weekend."
You're telling me that wouldn't snag a few voters? That's how AI me would win the election.
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This is not actually me.
Friday, November 1 - 2:35 p.m.
New Media's Role
Ben and I recently had a debate about the impact of comedian Tony Hinchcliffe’s comments at Trump’s rally. For those who don’t know, Hinchcliffe called Puerto Rico a floating pile of trash in the middle of the ocean during a Trump rally.
If I were to put Ben’s argument in my own words I would say:
My argument, in summation:
This was a debate that happened before any fallout from the Biden “garbage” remarks and well before Trump showed up in a garbage truck. [Quick timeout while we're talking comedy: if you can’t admit Trump in a trash truck is objectively funny, you definitely hate Tony Hinchcliffe and his comment definitely didn't make you less likely to vote for Trump because you never were going to.] But I think my viewpoint (as someone who is way cooler than Ben) is influenced by my view of Hinchcliffe and “new” media in general.
It's shocking to me that Trump has run circles around Harris with podcasts and other alternative mediums. Stylistically, it's unlike Trump to 1. sit still and 2. share the stage with someone else. Podcasts require both. Further, it kind of bucks the trend organizationally. Obama crushed social media. Democrats are much more media-trained. Harris is much younger.
Regardless of outcome, Trump won in this domain.
Why do I say that? Think of the scale of these things.
Jumping Off a (Hinch)Cliffe
I am not in any way, shape or form endorsing Kill Tony. In fact, I'd encourage you NOT to watch it. It’s a live YouTube broadcast in which aspiring comedians hop on stage for one minute and then get grilled by Tony Hinchcliffe himself and a panel of guest comics. It’s inappropriate. There’s cursing. There’s non-P.C. content out the wazoo. And, frankly, a lot of it is really, really bad (objectively) comedy. But over the past three months an average of 4.13 MILLION people have watched the podcast on YouTube every week. That does not include people who stream the content – which by design is a podcast (audio medium not requiring visuals) on iTunes, Spotify, whatever. In the real world, hundreds of people attend the show every week (unless it's at tens-of-thousands at Madison Square Garden, where it sold out twice this summer) and hundreds of people wait out side hoping to have their name drawn for a one-minute shot at fame.
Those viewership numbers are no joke (pun intended). Want a comparison? This week’s episode surpassed 1.6 million views in the first 24 hours. Kamala Harris’s closing argument from the Ellipse amassed fewer viewers than that across her YouTube channel AND the MSNBC live feed on YouTube in its first day., and those were the two largest YouTube broadcasts of her closing argument. Kill Tony killed her closing argument in ratings. For additional context, she was delivering her FINAL BIG SPEECH before Election Day and she is a candidate to be President of the United States of America. And Kill Tony had more online viewers. Hinchcliffe does this show every single week and his guests this week were a Dr. Phil impersonator and Harland Williams, who famously played “Additional Giraffe” in the 2008 animated film Madagascar and the role of “Ketchup” in the 2016 film Sausage Party. A weak Kill Tony weekly show beat her closing argument.
It was dumb politically to have Hinchcliffe on stage. There is NO question about that. The comment itself was insane and understandably criticized. In fact, I'm surprised that Puerto Rico jab was the only thing he said that sparked outrage. But the strategy of having someone like that involved in some way kind of makes sense. Hinchcliffe being on stage was probably consequential to some portion of his four million weekly viewers and I don't think any of them were outraged by what he said.
Scale
Who knows how any of this translates to votes, but Trump’s sit down with Joe Rogan garnered 41 million views onY YouTube and who knows how many on podcast platforms. J.D. Vance's half-day (seriously, it's almost 3.5 hours long) conversation with Rogan has almost 9 million views in 24 hours.
If I search, "Kamala Harris" on YouTube and sort the results by total viewership here are the most viewed videos:
People are clearly engaging with Trump/Vance content.
Does it Last?
We’ll discuss if this stuff matters in a moment, but the real question is simple if I’m a candidate: Does this drive voters FOR ME to the polls? In order to do that, the interest has to last and percolate.
Let’s take Harris’s most “viral” YouTube video as a baseline. Her debate performance is her YouTube (and arguably campaign) peak. Here is a comparison of Google Search Results for "Harris Trump Debate" and "Trump Rogan."
Undoubtedly, Kamala Harris won the debate in spectacular fashion. Objectively, Trump “survived” Rogan, which is a win if you’re trying to just reach a tens of millions without alienating others.
One could argue, that staying relevant for longer is more achieved by going on Rogan than by winning a debate – at least as it relates to search interest. And I’d imagine undecided voters are more likely to consume independent media than a major network debate.
Does it Matter?
Hell if I know. But it seems like it should. I’m not a big Rogan guy by any stretch but I know enough to know his appearance probably didn't hurt him. What that means, I don’t really know. But it means something – and I think both sides would agree on that. I've been texted the Rogan/Vance interview by three different clients in the past 24 hours. People are into it.
Harris might nitpick the importance of Rogan and she might be right (of note: she was invited to sit down with him but wanted Joe to come to her for 60 minutes…he said no, but re-extended the invite to a longer form interview in his podcast studio). But clearly she thinks this stuff - podcasts in general - matters. How else would you explain:
I want you to think about what you know and what you’ve heard about Joe Rogan. It may not be all positive. It's probably not. Then I want you to think about “All The Smoke” or any of the many other podcasts she's hopped on. I want you to then explain to me why her going on “All the Smoke” was a good call but someone going on Rogan was a bad idea. If you have that explanation, please email me.
It could very well be that NONE of this matters. But even if it's meaningless, Trump did this meaningless thing better. And if he loses again and runs for President again in 2028, I hope he uses the line "Make Meaningless Things Great Again."
Missed Opportunity
If Trump loses the election, it will be easy to point to various podcasts (Theo Von, Rogan, Bussin’ With The Boys, etc.) and think, “Wow, what a waste of time.”
If Harris loses the election, it will be easy to say, “Geez, she really picked the wrong ones.”
But there is common ground in the two potentially-flawed approaches to podcasts. Neither major party candidate accepted invitations to be on The Morning Market Briefing hosted by Narwhal Capital Management.
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Friday, November 1 - 10:40 a.m.
10 Things I Think I Know
As we get closer to Election Day(s) and launch this “live” blog (this page will stay live and be updated actively through the final election result – but more actively on Tuesday), here are 10 things I suspect are true:
1. Trump’s ceiling should not necessarily be equated to 2020 results. I think this has been a miscalculation by Democrats (though I would have made the same assumption myself). Somehow, this guy has a higher net-favorability rating today (though it’s still negative) than he did in 2020 – by a wide margin. He can win a higher percentage of the popular vote than he did in 2020. And that could be trouble for Democrats. And that’s not dependent on a big move in turnout. Turnout could be the same and if Trump is more likeable (per surveys) he should get more votes. In some states that might flip outcomes.
2. The polls are going to be wrong. Trump was massively undercounted for most of the 2016 cycle. He was discounted again in 2020. The polls will be wrong again in 2024. I don’t know if they’ll be wrong in the same direction, which seems to be the assumption of Republicans. Logically speaking, it actually seems like they should be wrong in the opposite direction.
3. If polls discount Trump again, he wins. If polls are wrong in the same direction and to the same magnitude as 2020 (let alone 2016), Trump wins in a landslide – including a possible outright run at the popular vote and a sweep of swing states. He's going to get 312+ Electoral College votes. Getting Trump support wrong in the same way seems like an egregious mistake to make in round three of the Trumpstakes (not to be confused with Trump Steaks).
4. If polls overcounted Trump support, we know the outcome. If polls are wrong in the opposite direction, we’re probably looking at an Electoral map that is incredibly similar to that of 2020 and a comfy Harris wins. I think Harris will rack up something in the area of 308 Electoral College votes in that scenario. Biden got 306.
5. An identical outcome kind of seems weird. As mentioned a moment ago, it logically makes sense that pollsters would overcorrect to a point of overstating Trump support. It also makes sense that the incumbent Vice President could beat the loser of the last election in exactly the same way. But it seems strange that we'd get the same result for some reason.
6. Major voting shifts have surely taken place. The following changes will have some degree of impact in 2024:
These are just things that come to mind outside of, "It's the economy, stupid."
7. Everyone thinks this is a toss-up. Yet I’m fairly convinced that the winning party will get 300+ electoral votes. It seems weird to say, but I bet after the fact (and for my best guess now) the winner will have won 55-45 (rough estimation of a 300 vs. 238 Electoral Map) and some will say, “there was no way of knowing.” You would never call a 10 point spread in a football game a “toss up.” When scaled to NBA scores, a team favored by 15-20 would not be in “toss-up mode” entering a contest. The Electoral college is weird and polling is bad, but we also kind of know how the Electoral College works. I’d argue I know more about the Electoral College than regular college. It’s not that hard to understand. Back to sports, if you said a football team was a field goal attempt each quarter better than their opponent, would you call it a toss-up? Because ultimately there are "toss-up" states with 3% projected margins that will define the out come of this election. In the football analogy, that's presumably a spread of about 12 points. Is that a toss-up? I mean sure that team could miss all of their kicks. But is that the assumption? If someone has a lead and momentum in all states do we act like they don’t? If we’re supposed to trust the polls why would we discount them?
8. Time has been on the Democrats' side. I think time is on the Democrats side in the sense that the enthusiasm/vibes/joy push could not be sustained for a full Harris cycle AND people are understandably so tired of Trump. On Harris, her favorability was quite negative as Vice President. She briefly turned positive after being anointed as the party's candidate but fell pretty quickly thereafter. Some might find more exposure to her as a positive, but the data doesn't suggest that. On Trump, you just can't escape the guy. He's everywhere. I don't know if that is a good thing for Republicans. I tend to think both campaigns could have benefitted by chilling out a bit over the past few weeks. I don't know that we needed to see Trump riding in a garbage truck. But we certainly did.
9. Republicans turned out aggressively during the various early voting periods. But I don't know what that means and neither does anyone else. There are essentially five potential outcomes from that:
We don’t really know how to interpret early vote yet. Nevada has the good predictable data and interpretive analysis available, but it still does not account for the risk of option three above and tells us nothing about the day-of. In other words, party alignment could stay highly correlative and we still couldn’t glean much out of Nevada – even if we knew the outcome of that race statistically due to a strong early vote for Trump. Of the five scenarios above: Option 1 and 4 are great for Republicans. Options 2, 3 and 5 lean status quo. If this were an even race by design, you’d give Trump the edge because there's really no way to paint an unexpectedly strong early vote for Republicans as something that is good for Harris. But the status quo likely means a loss for him. So based on the early vote: There’s a 60% chance that the Dems do just as well if the scenarios above are equally weighted. There’s a 40% chance Republicans improve with equal weighting. If you’re a Democrat that might seem OK. But relative to expectation, that’s a plus to Republicans.
10. This isn’t a “beat expectations” game. It’s a win or storm the Capitol game...wait, no. It's WIN OR GO HOME! From an analytical standpoint, I think people struggle with probabilities from the likes of Nate Silver (who currently has Trump at a 55.4% chance of winning) because at the end of the day we want an answer. Nate will definitely be wrong because there is NO CHANCE that Trump becomes 55.4% President. He will be President. Or he won't. We can dissect how Harris or Trump performed in any state relative to history and expectation, but ultimately all that matters is the outcome.
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President
Andrew’s career with Narwhal began as an intern during the summers of 2008 and 2009. He was hired in a full-time capacity in 2011. Andrew oversees the strategic direction of the firm and enjoys a role split between portfolio management, client engagement and operations. He previously served on the Advisory Board for the Mercer University Student Managed Investment Fund and completed the Charles Schwab Executive Leadership Program as a member of the 2019 class. Andrew and his wife Amanda live nearby in Marietta with their two kids.
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