Helmut Norpoth

Stony Brook University

helmut.norpoth@stonybrook.edu

PS: Political Science & Politics 49

(October 2016)

forthcoming

However unpredictable the ascent of Donald Trump onto the stage of presidential politics may have been, one forecast model has been highly confident for months that he would win the election on November 8, 2016. The Primary Model predicted on March 7, 2016 that Trump would defeat Hillary Clinton with 87 percent certainty.

[i] http://www.huffingtonpost.com/helmut-norpoth/trump-nearcertain-to-defe_b_9403762.html?1457390306 J

The forecast of a near-certain Trump victory at a moment when he was trailing both Clinton and Bernie Sanders in every poll, some by double-digits, was greeted with a heavy mix of shock, cheers, amazement, and derision, much of it on social media but also regular media outlets. Many offered bets against the forecast, gleeful that it would turn out wrong. There is nothing to add to or subtract from the March forecast here. It was unconditional, final, and not subject to updating. Just in case Hillary Clinton would not be the Democratic nominee, the Primary Model gave the nod to Trump over Bernie Sanders with 99-percent certainty; forecasts for Republican nominees other than Trump were also issued.[ii] What are the ingredients of this forecast model?

As the name indicates, the Primary Model relies on presidential primaries as a predictor of the vote in the general election; it also makes use of a swing of the electoral pendulum that is useful for forecasting (http://primarymodel.com/). For the record, the Primary Model, with slight modifications, has correctly predicted the winner of the popular vote in all five presidential elections since it was introduced in 1996 (Norpoth 1996, 2001, 2004, 2008, Norpoth and Bednarczuk 2012).[iii] In recent elections the forecast has been issued as early as January of the election year. Also note that for all elections from 1912 to 2012 the Primary Model picks the winner, albeit retroactively, every time except in 1960.

Turning to the primary predictor of the model, it never ceases to amaze its author how many students of elections are surprised to learn that presidential primaries predict anything beyond perhaps who wins the nomination. Yet the outcomes of these primaries prove to be uncanny leading indicators of wins the general election for president in November. It also comes as a surprise that presidential primaries have been around as far back as the days before World War I. They were introduced into the presidential nomination process in 1912. William Howard Taft was President. A Republican, he had succeeded Theodore Roosevelt with the best wishes of his friend. But now Roosevelt was itching to return to the White House. He seized on the new invention and challenged Taft for the Republican nomination in the primaries. The sitting President lost badly in those contests, yet managed to secure the nomination at the GOP national convention nonetheless. Meanwhile a former professor of politics won the primary battle in the Democratic Party. Woodrow Wilson then went on to secure the presidential nomination at the Democratic national convention. And in November of 1912 Wilson was elected President while Taft lost. Hence the candidate who won his party’s primary vote, Woodrow Wilson, went on to defeat the candidate who lost his party’s primary vote, William Howard Taft, in the general election (Table 1).

Table 1. The Vote for Presidential Candidates and their Strongest Rivals in Primaries (1912, 1964, 1980, and 2012).