With no particular pleasure, I predicted Donald Trump’s win, in the week before the election, in print, in the pages of the News Letter (and on their website, here). Then, when everyone got giddy about Harris’ chances after the Selzer Poll that turned out to be a spectacular miss, I doubled down on my predictions on Slugger O’Toole (available here) based on this Twitter thread I posted.
I’ve reproduced the text of both articles below. The polls were clear and the polls were right, but people only see what they want to see in them, which raises wider challenges to the way we think our beliefs about the world are based on hard scientific evidence. But anyway…
Gerry Lynch: The two reasons why Donald Trump will win the US presidential election
Published 1st Nov 2024, 00:01 GMT
Donald Trump is running neck and neck with Kamala Harris in the polls, so if this is an underestimation of his support – as has happened in the past with polls – it looks like Trump will win the popular vote, and win the Electoral College
In his two previous presidential campaigns, the polls significantly understated Trump’s actual result.
This year, for the first time, the polls do not put Trump well behind in the final days, but instead show him running neck and neck with Kamala Harris.
If the past tendency of polls underestimating his support continues, we would expect Trump to win the popular vote for the first time ever, and to win the Electoral College comfortably. I think it is that simple.