Category: Projection

Beware the Ides of March: Candidate Targets

There will be a new narrative in each race after tonight’s primaries. If Trump takes all of the winner-take-all states, it’s more likely than not John Kasich and Marco Rubio will drop out. Establishment types will likely view that a Hobson’s choice, and rumors of a third-party candidate may grow. Below is the Donald Trump worst-case scenario, in which his poll numbers represent ceiling. This is not our projection, but rather a baseline to measure Trump’s performance against tonight (and we left the “force Cruz win in IL” flag on):

Trump still wins the day, even if his poll numbers are a ceiling, but Kasich wins Ohio and Cruz pulls out a surprise in Illinois.

The biggest surprises above are Ted Cruz’ strength in Illinois and Missouri. Western Illinois’s not all that different from Eastern Iowa (nor, for that matter, is Northern Missouri), so Cruz doing well in those regions won’t be too big of a surprise. Chicagoland has a lot of hard-over ex-union voters, and south of Springfield, IL it’s basically Kentucky (ditto Jeff City). Our “status quo” projection, on which our current overall projection (Trump wins on first ballot, but by a nose) is based looks like this:

GOP Rule of Thumb: Measure against Trump. If he gets fewer than 150 delegates (winning only Florida and North Carolina^[1]As of this writing, he already won the Northern Mariana Islands’ nine delegates. There’s zero data there, but we wonder how much the Islands’ strange history and current legal framework for immigration affected the thoughts of the (likely) couple of dozen voters.), he had a rough night, and the likelihood of a contested convention grows; between 150 and 300, the status quo is preserved; over 300 he had an outstanding night, and he likely wins outright sometime in May.

On the Democratic side, it’s increasingly likely Bernie Sanders will upset Hillary Clinton in some key states, but due to the proportional manner in which delegates are allocated, her delegate lead will still grow. Below is the math if her poll numbers represent her ceiling:

Close States + Hillary ceiling = tough night for the frontrunner?

It’s much more likely that Illinois and Missouri will look more like Ohio, with the winner taking a smaller delegate lead than the above chart suggests. Still, it shouldn’t be a huge surprise if Bernie takes 3 of 5 states. If the numbers above hold, Sanders is on track to finish just 250 delegates shy of Clinton, but she would still com out on top with superdelegates.

Democrat rule of thumb: Measure against Clinton delegates. States won means very little to the math ^[2]Though admittedly a lot for narrative, which affects future states.. If Clinton wins fewer than 340 delegates, she’s in real trouble, and Bernie may well overtake her in delegate counts by June; if she gets between 340-365 delegates, the Michigan momentum swing is real; if she nets between 365-385, the status quo is maintained; anything above 385 is a pretty good night for her. If Clinton gets more than 400 delegates, the tightening over the past week is mostly erased and she’s back on track to win without resorting to superdelegates.

Footnotes [ + ]

1.	↑	As of this writing, he already won the Northern Mariana Islands’ nine delegates. There’s zero data there, but we wonder how much the Islands’ strange history and current legal framework for immigration affected the thoughts of the (likely) couple of dozen voters.
2.	↑	Though admittedly a lot for narrative, which affects future states.

Two Polls Show Tight Ohio Race

We’ve already adjusted our model to account for a “Clinton ceiling,” and it’s looking like it may be the right projection. New polls from Quinnipiac and Public Policy Polling show Sanders closing the gap in Ohio, Illinois, and Missouri. Our model baked in a Missouri upset (we have him winning there by nearly 10 points on the assumptions late breakers go for him). The potential softening in Ohio, where PPP has Clinton 46-41 is a significant shift from our model’s 55-45 split (as, under our rule, this would translate to a 9-point Sanders win). PPP’s 48-45 split in Illinois is not too far from the 51.5-48.5 we’re projecting.

The GOP numbers are equally interesting in Ohio, showing a tied race there. If Kasich fails to win there, it’s hard to see a credible pathNew @ppppolls and @QuinnipiacPoll numbers show tight Dem race in OH, MO, IL with potential #Sanders upset. #Kasich #Trump tight. for him and Rubio to stay in (and for the GOP to block Trump).

A not-unreasonable path to “victory” for #NeverTrump

Donald Trump has a good chance to effectively wrap things up on March 15. Polls show him with a 20-point lead in Florida (where early voting opened as Marco Rubio was tanking), putting him on track to take all of its 99 delegates in the winner-take-all primary. If Rubio fails to win Florida, it’s difficult to see him staying in the race. Here’s how our model sees that race playing out:

Trump sweeps Super Tuesday part 2, Rubio drops out, Trump wraps it up in May.

Change four variables, though, and the race takes on a different flavor:

Rubio drops out after Florida. His supporters go 75% to Kasich, 20% to Cruz, and 5% to Trump (yes, that’s a total guess).
Kasich wins Ohio. This isn’t a huge stretch; he leads Trump in current polling averages, and the 6-7% Rubio numbers may heed his strategic-voting advice.
Trump’s poll numbers are his ceiling. Until our last update, our model split the “undecided” votes (i.e. the difference between 100 and the sum of the candidates’ support) proportionally. We’ve added a number of different scenarios. The one that tracks most closely to reality is that Trump’s polls are his ceiling; the biggest difference in his favor, according to the excellent fivethirtyeight.com poll average, was the 3.3% miss in Massachusetts. On average, he comes in below his polls 1-2%.
Cruz wins Illinois. He trails Trump by 6 points in the late fivethirtyeight.com average, but when we apply the “Trump ceiling” rule, he comes within a single point.

Assume four things, Trump needs a second ballot.

Based on that, Trump misses. the target by about 20 votes. Still not an ideal outcome for the #NeverTrump camp, but it doesn’t require too many logical leaps.

Stretching a bit further into supposition, Rubio’s dropout could broaden the gap:

Kasich or Cruz win Pennsylvania. Rubio dropping out would put the three remaining candidates within a point or two of each other (possibly favoring Kasich, as Rubio still polls strongly here). Kasich may end up off the ballot, though.
Kasich or Cruz win Maryland. There, they really would all get a third under our polling split.

Trump falls over 100 short if he loses OH, PA, IL, MD, and CA.

This setup would already have Cruz winning Wisconsin and Kasich winning California, based on Rubio’s support pushing them over the edge. That’s about as close to a NeverTrump dream scenario that the numbers currently bear out. It would have the weird effect of an all-out fight in California (!), but perhaps March 15 will shed a bit more light on Rubio’s future, and on Trump’s ceiling.

Does Clinton have a ceiling?

The story of the week on the Democratic side this week was Bernie Sanders’ impressive win in Michigan, where polls had him trailing 20%. It’s probably right to question the demographic models pollsters are using for the upper-Midwest states (including Ohio and Illinois that vote March 15 – and where Clinton holds 20-point leads).

This blog isn’t going to do that. Our model is set up to assume that the candidates’ polling averages are their “floor”. In Michigan, for example, polls showed Clinton at around 58% support and Sanders at 38%. Our model split the remaining votes proportionally (i.e. Clinton got 58% of undecideds).

In the event, Clinton’s strength was oversold by around 10%, and Sanders, in effect, won all of those plus all of the undecideds. Since polls are the only data that show likely support, changing that as a baseline for the model would put us too far into guess territory. Instead, we’ve built into the model a couple of variables to re-align how undecided votes are split.

National polls have Clinton leading Sanders 51.8% to 37.6%. So what happens if all of the undecideds vote for Sanders (i.e. if he is polling 48.2%)?

If Sanders wins all of the undecideds, Clinton would need super delegates to clinch the nomination.

Well, the race closer, and ends with a different result from our baseline projection. Clinton would end up 150 delegates short of the 2,382 delegates the Democrats need to win on the first ballot without superdelegates. Most outlets show her with around 460 superdelegates pledged, so she would likely still win the nomination, but with Sanders saying he’s in until the convention, the backroom politicking would continue until the actual nomination.

Clinton's lead grows (slightly) through April even if Sanders gets all the undecideds. — Clinton’s lead grows (slightly) through April even if Sanders gets all the undecideds.

How likely is this outcome? The polls suggest Clinton is holding/gaining nationally and in most states where there is polling. Obviously, that’s not how things played out in Michigan. The key states to watch for assessing both whether the polls are overplaying Clinton’s strength and whether late deciders are breaking to Sanders are Florida, Illinois, and North Carolina, and Ohio (there just isn’t good polling in Missouri). Until then, the current polls are the best information we have.

Clinton has trended slightly up in national polls over the past four weeks.

Trump, Clinton still on track to win on first ballot

Big nights for both Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders. The former grew his delegate lead (though not by quite as much as our model projected, mostly because there wasn’t any polling in Idaho somewhat because Cruz/Kasich had a stronger-than-expected night). Sanders, though, still lost ground overall to Hillary Clinton.

Clinton still leads by over 200 pledged delegates, and our model still shows her getting a majority of delegates without dipping into her (substantial) super delegate reserve – but only just. The big caveat here is that Sanders will almost certainly get a national bounce from Michigan, and the result there may suggest that polls in other states are under representing his strength:

Sanders had a big night, but Clinton (possibly) still on track for win without superdelegates.

On the GOP side, the thing to watch is if Rubio drops out. He’s widely thought of as the “establishment” candidate, but, as we’ve reported before, he’s not necessarily loved by GOP insiders. We’re speculating here, but Rubio’s best hope may be to do what he can to help Kasich survive in the hopes he could win points with insiders for a potential Kasich ticket emerging from a brokered convention. It’s a risky strategy: for Kasich to win at the convention, he would need to wheel and deal considerably, possibly abrogating whatever primary deal he strikes with Rubio. Oh, and Trump is still on target to win:

If Rubio dropped out today, Trump would likely win Florida, and Kasich would pick up Pennsylvania and Ohio - but Trump would still win on the first ballot. — If Rubio dropped out today, Trump would likely win Florida, and Kasich would pick up Pennsylvania and Ohio – but Trump would still win on the first ballot.

There are 234 winner-take-all delegates on March 15 in Florida, Ohio, and Illinois. Polls show Trump winning all of them. If he does, we project him winning in early May. Kasich appears to have a better shot at winning his home state than Rubio does in his. If Kasich pulls it off, the #NeverTrump movement’s only hope – and slim one at that – is to get Rubio to drop out and full-throatedly endorse Kasich.

Sanders’ Big Night

Hillary Clinton led by about 20 points going into Michigan’s primary. Even if she squeaks out a win, it’s impossible to deny that Bernie Sanders had a huge night there. With 74% of districts reporting, Sanders is up around 4%. From a delegate math perspective, though, Sanders said it himself “the delegates are going to get split up because of proportional representation.”

Based on the 20-point lead, we projected Sanders would leave with a 30-delegate lead. If the current numbers hold, Sanders will probably walk away with a 6-delegate lead. Regardless of what happens, Clinton will widen her gap overall, as she will probably get around 30 more delegates than Sanders in Mississippi. So, in the short term, Sanders win is big and unexpected, but doesn’t matter much.

In the long term, well, Clinton is still has a 200-delegate lead, and the March 15 states look pretty favorable to her. But if Sanders’ result in Michigan is an indicator that the national numbers are tighter than the current 13-point spread, Bernie could start chipping away, possibly preventing Clinton from getting a majority without having to use Superdelegates.

Michigan: Will Rubio Break 15%?

Donald Trump will almost certainly win Michigan; he has a 16-point lead in the latest polls. Ted Cruz and John Kasich both come in around 20%. A story to watch for tonight will be whether Rubio, who is polling around 11%, breaks the 15% delegate threshold. Doing so will give him around 9 delegates in Michigan, of which four will come from Trump and 3 from Cruz. Not a huge swing, to be sure, and fourth-place is already going to be hard enough, but a delegate goose egg will be a tough thing.

Dem Race: Clinton Still On Track To Win Without Super Delegates

There’s a lot of talk from Bernie Sanders supporters about the super delegate race, and it’s pretty clear that Clinton currently holds a commanding lead with 460 of the 712 on the board. They argue, though, that those delegates will start flipping to Sanders when he builds a pledged delegate lead. Based on our projections, however, Clinton is likely to earn the 2,382 delegates she needs to win without using any of her pledged delegates.

Based on our count, Clinton holds a 699 to 458 lead in pledged delegates. Based on current polling, that lead should expand considerably on March 15:

Upcoming states highly favorable for Clinton.

Of the above, only Missouri lacks state-specific data and is therefore based on Clinton’s nationwide 51%-37.6% lead. If those numbers hold, Clinton will hold a 1244-776 lead following those votes.

Is that impossible to make up? Well, mathematically, no. But the path to get there is highly improbable. To make up a 480-delegate deficit, Sanders would have to win every single delegate in Pennsylvania AND New York, for example.

Does that mean Hillary has it locked up? Well, no. After March 15, we see Sanders basically keeping pace with her. Our projection sees her building her lead a bit on April 22, but mostly that’s just big-delegate states that are relying on the national poll. Unless things change, she won’t actually wrap it up until the last day of voting on June 7:

Clinton's lead is set to grow March 15 and never substantially narrow. — Clinton’s lead is set to grow March 15 and never substantially narrow.

Sanders is now on record saying he won’t drop out before the convention. That probably makes sense. There’s not much that Clinton can offer him now that will make him back down, and it probably helps her general-election campaign to have the come-together moment happen at the convention. That will probably happen: it’s hard to see Sanders losing the political revolution fight and then letting Trump take the White House.

Projections Update: Post Super Tuesday numbers, what if Rubio drops out?

We’ve updated our spreadsheet that the latest numbers on the delegate projections, based on polling aggregates from fivethirtyeight.com and Real Clear Politics. These are run on a state-by-state basis, with each state’s delegate allocation rules factored into the math. The poll numbers are up-to-date through March 6, and we’ve added options for Rubio dropping out, as well as forcing new winners in the big winner-take-all states to see what that does to the numbers.

How might our numbers still be off? Well, first off, if the polls are. Some big states, like Florida, haven’t had new poll numbers for nearly two weeks. National polls don’t yet seem to reflect Super Tuesday (and certainly Super Saturday) voting.

They’re also probably off a few delegates per state, as we use state-wide polling numbers for each congressional district, which favors the state winner by allocating a handful more delegates to them than real life.

A third way it’s probably off is that it apportions undecided voters proportionally among those that make the threshold. This has no effect on the Democratic side, but does favor Trump on the GOP side for two reasons: it probably undercuts finishers who are polling near the delegate threshold, and the latest results show that late deciders are voting against Trump by large margins.

With those caveats, it’s useful for running scenarios to see what might happen March 15 and beyond.

Run the projections yourself here:

Delegate Math

Should Rubio Drop Out?

The press narrative is basically right: Ted Cruz had a great night Saturday, somewhat at Donald Trump’s expense but much more at Marco Rubio’s. However, neither Maine nor Kentucky had good polling there, so all you can say is that they didn’t reflect the national polling average – which isn’t saying much at this point. Here’s how they did:

	Trump		Cruz		Rubio		Kasich
	Projected	Result	Projected	Result	Projected	Result	Projected	Result
Kansas	19	9	8	24	7	6	5	1
Kentucky	22	17	10	15	9	7	4	7
Louisiana*	22	18	12	17	0	0	0	0
Maine	12	9	5	12	5	0	0	2

Note that Louisiana didn’t post its rounding rules for congressional districts, so you have to wait on the state GOP to assign the remaining 11 delegates. The same rounding problems are why our projection doesn’t add up to the actual.

All in all, though, Trump comes out about 15 delegates below projection, Rubio 8 below, and Cruz 33 above. That’s a pretty big deal for Cruz, if for no other reason than it gives him some momentum ahead of March 15 and now makes him look like the main anti-Trump.

Trump still on pace to win, but Cruz strength may shift poll numbers. — Delegate projections March 6

It’s still a long road, and there’s probably no way that Rubio drops out before Florida (though there, remarkably, hasn’t been a poll there since February 24), but his strong second to Trump in delegate count (coupled with Rubio’s bad press night) could change the narrative. If Rubio wins Florida and Kasich wins Ohio, it’s hard to see either dropping out to clear the path for Cruz, but if they did, here’s what the math might look like:

Admittedly, this is an anti-Trump fantasy and not really based on current polls.