FiveThirtyEight Forecast: Biden Has 71% Chance To Win

Nate Silver writes for FiveThirtyEight:

Joe Biden currently has a robust lead in polls. If the election were held today, he might even win in a landslide, carrying not only traditional swing states such as Florida and Pennsylvania but potentially adding new states such as Georgia and Texas to the Democratic coalition. But the election is not being held today. While the polls have been stable so far this year, it’s still only August. The debates and the conventions have yet to occur. Biden only named his running mate yesterday.

That, in a nutshell, is why the FiveThirtyEight presidential election forecast, which we launched today, still has Trump with a 29 percent chance of winning the Electoral College, despite his current deficit in the polls. This is considerably higher than some other forecasts, which put Trump’s chances at around 10 percent. Biden’s chances are 71 percent in the FiveThirtyEight forecast, conversely.

Charts and graphs are here.

Coincidentally, these are the exact same odds as in our final forecast in 2016!!!

(Clinton 71%, Trump 29%)

As was also the case in 2016, our model gives Trump a MUCH higher chance than other statistical models.

— Nate Silver (@NateSilver538) August 12, 2020