June 2020 – Election Graphs

Ups and Downs

Since the last update on June 2nd, there have been new state polls in Kansas, Arizona (x4), Florida (x4), Michigan (x6), North Carolina (x4), Pennsylvania (x2), Wisconsin (x3), Texas (x2), Ohio, California, Iowa (x3), Oklahoma, Tennessee, Kentucky, Georgia, Missouri, Arkansas, New Mexico, and Mississippi.

Now, there has been lots of reporting in the last couple of weeks about national polls moving strongly away from Trump and toward Biden.

The view here looking at state polls is a bit more complicated. Some states moved toward Trump while some moved toward Biden. And combining that into an Electoral College view, Trump strengthened a bit at the start, then Biden made up all of that ground and then some by the end. Overall Biden is a bit stronger now than at our last update.

Anyway, let's start with the summary table of changes, then get into the graphs:

Model	Metric	2 Jun	18 Jun	𝚫
Categories	Trump Best Expected Biden Best	Trump +2 Biden +130 Biden +288	Trump +42 Biden +130 Biden +288	Trump +40 FLAT FLAT
Categories	Tipping Point	Biden +4.3	Biden +4.8%	Biden +0.5%
Probabilities	Trump 2σ Median Biden 2σ	Biden +22 Biden +122 Biden +234	Biden +32 Biden +132 Biden +242	Biden +10 Biden +10 Biden +8
Probabilities	Trump Win Tie Biden Win	0.5% 0.1% 99.4%	0.3% 0.1% 99.6%	-0.2% FLAT +0.2%

The most obvious change here is the improvement of Trump's best case in the categorization view by 40 EV.

For the categorization view, a state is considered to be "in play" if the margin is less than 5%. This change was driven by Biden's lead in the Pennsylvania poll average dropping below 5%.

You'll also notice that the "Expected Case" in the categorization view moved 30 EV toward Trump, then reverted to what it was before. This is due to the average in North Carolina moving from just barely Biden, to just barely Trump, and back again within the scope of a few days.

Those are the states that actually shifted categories since the last update. But let's look at the other close states that have new polling this time around too:

Trump is still leading Texas, but it has been moving toward Biden recently. A blue Texas would change the game completely. Biden isn't quite there. But it is close enough it should make the Trump camp nervous.

Biden has had a small lead in the Florida average all along, but it has been trending further in his direction lately. Another really strong poll and Florida might even move over the 5% threshold so we wouldn't even classify it as a close state. (Although it is just as likely that the TIPP poll showing Biden with a greater than 10% lead is an outlier and the average will soon revert to a small Biden lead.)

Ohio is surprisingly sparsely polled, but the average flipped from Biden to Trump in May and the one new poll in the last month didn't move the average at all.

Georgia is barely on the Trump side of the line, and trending toward Biden.

In Arizona Biden has moved from our "strong lead" to our "weak lead" category since May. He still leads, but Trump has been closing the gap.

Iowa is still a Trump state, but the average has been tightening there too.

If you count these up, you'll see five of the eight close states with new polls have been moving toward Biden, and three have been moving toward Trump.

When you mash all this together into our probabilistic model, you get this:

In the last couple of weeks, things moved toward Trump for a little bit, then started moving back toward Biden, and his median position is now 10 EV better than it was when we did our last update.

The switch from things improving for Trump to improving for Biden does seem to be just a few days after the death of George Floyd, just when the aftermath of that event was dominating the news.

In terms of the median case of our simulations, the last time Biden was doing better than he is today was on December 5th.

In terms of probability of winning though, Biden was better off much more recently, on May 19th.

The tipping point is also moving back toward Biden again:

Biden is back where he was in May, but you have to go back all the way to October to find a time he was doing better.

All of this looks very strong for Biden. But remember how fast the tipping point can shift. In 2016 on at least a couple of occasions, it moved 5% or 6% within just a few weeks. And so far in 2020, we have seen rapid swings of nearly 3%. The bigger the movement, the bigger the news event that has to happen to drive the change. But given the last few years, who can doubt the potential for big news events that can change a campaign overnight?

Over the last few days, there have been tons of commentators talking about Biden's national polling being much stronger than Clinton was during the 2016 campaign. Some are saying he is doing better than she EVER did on that metric. That is probably true. But we don't elect people by popular vote.

How does this look in our views?

<139 Days Out>	2016	2020
Expected Case	Clinton by 144	Biden by 130
Tipping Point	Clinton by 6.1%	Biden by 4.8%

So yeah. Biden might well be doing better in terms of national popular vote polling than Clinton was at this stage. But Clinton was doing better when you factor in the state polls and the Electoral College.

Let's be very clear here. Biden is in a very strong position right now in terms of the Electoral College as well as the popular vote. Very strong.

But so was Clinton at the same point in the campaign. People were talking about landslides.

Then there was a bit of a roller coaster. Clinton was a lot weaker by the time we got to mid-September. Then she recovered and was strong again by mid-October. But then she collapsed again in the last few weeks. On election day, she was still favored, but it was clear Trump had a path to win and a Trump victory was very possible.

(That's looking at the Election Graphs analysis of course. Famously, lots of other sites didn't show things to be quite that close at the end. Election Graphs was one of only a handful that did.)

That kind of roller coaster may not happen this year. Biden may stay strong through the rest of the race. We shall see. But nobody should be getting overconfident at this stage.

OK, so to round it out, here is the spectrum of the "weak" states that are actively in play, plus the "strong" states that might be brought into play with some big improvements by one side or the other:

And of course the current map:

And that is where we are.

138.7 days until polls start to close.

For more information:

This post is an update based on the data on the Election Graphs Electoral College 2020 page. Election Graphs tracks a poll-based estimate of the Electoral College. The charts, graphs, and maps in the post above are all as of the time of this post. Click through on any image for current interactive versions of the chart, along with additional details.

Follow @ElectionGraphs on Twitter or Election Graphs on Facebook to see announcements of updates. For those interested in individual poll updates, follow @ElecCollPolls on Twitter for all the polls as I add them. If you find the information in these posts informative or useful, please consider visiting the donation page.

Biden Clinches

Some other places that count delegates had him there a day or two earlier, but by our count, the Virgin Islands put Biden over the top with Biden getting all 7 delegates there in today's update to the Election Graphs delegate race charts.

Sorry New York, New Jersey, Georgia, Connecticut, Kentucky, Louisiana, Puerto Rico, West Virginia, Delaware, and Guam… your 780 delegates don't make any difference this year.

This seems like a good time to look at how the graph of "% of remaining delegates needed to win" ended up, and compare it to some of the previous cycles. So here goes:

The little loop in the graph there is from when New York gave all their delegates to Biden, but then there was a court battle and the delegates went back to TBD pending the New York primaries which now won't be until June 23rd.

Biden clinched with almost exactly 80% of the delegates determined.

Of the five contested races in both parties since 2008 when I started tracking these, three took longer than this (in terms of % of delegates, not calendar date) and two took less.

Looking at the charts, first the three that took longer to clinch:

Obama in 2008:

Trump in 2016:

Clinton in 2016:

Then the two that clinched faster:

Romney in 2012:

McCain in 2008:

And of course, lacking any competitive challengers, Obama in 2012 and Trump in 2020 both clinched at the 50% mark.

Our count of the totals on the day Biden clinched are as follows:

This will of course continue to change as those last 780 delegates get determined. And there may even still be some shifts in the 3199 already allocated as delegate selection plans wrap up before the convention.

As a simple example of this, when the initial count was over back in February, the delegate count in Iowa was:

Buttigieg 14
Sanders 12
Warren 8
Biden 6
Klobuchar 1

But when candidates dropped out and were no longer vying for delegates in the later parts of the delegate selection process, statewide delegates from the candidates who dropped out were reassigned to Biden. As of today, Iowa looks like this:

Biden 14
Sanders 12
Buttigieg 9
Warren 5
Klobuchar 1

So after all this, Biden wins Iowa after all.

And of course, since they can't make a difference to the outcome, the superdelegates will get to vote on the first ballot too. So any full delegate count coming from the convention (virtual or otherwise) will be a bit different than what we have here, which just counted pledged delegates.

As more updates come in, we'll add them as updates to the end of this post.

We declared things "almost done" on March 11th, and "over" on March 18th, but now we are really "done done" absent something catastrophic that causes Biden to leave the race prematurely.

So there we are.

71.0 days until the Democratic National Convention.

78.0 days until the Republican National Convention.

Update 2020-06-08 04:16 UTC: Results from Guam today: Biden 5, Sanders 2. Also an update from PA: One delegate moves from Sanders to Biden. New totals: Biden 1997, Sanders 1063, Others 146.

Update 2020-06-09 04:16 UTC: Update from Arkansas: Bloomberg loses two delegates to Biden. New totals: Biden 1999, Sanders 1063, Others 144.

Update 2020-06-10 04:01 UTC: Today we have the results from Georgia and West Virginia. It looks like Biden will get all 133 delegates. New totals: Biden 2132, Sanders 1063, Others 144.

Update 2020-06-11 15:51 UTC: Not a delegate update, but a quick correction. Above I said, "And of course, since they can't make a difference to the outcome, the superdelegates will get to vote on the first ballot too.". This is slightly premature. For the superdelegates to vote on the first ballot, Biden has to have enough pledged delegates to have a majority of ALL delegates, which would be 2378 pledged delegates out of 4753 total delegates (rather than 1991 pledged delegates out of 3979 pledged delegates). So he is still 246 delegates short of that threshold, although he will probably get there before the end. For more details on this, see this FHQ post.

Update 2020-06-24 07:08 UTC: Today we have initial results from Kentucky and New York. Biden 250, Sanders 57. There are 21 delegates TBD in Kentucky which may end up officially uncommitted. New totals: Biden 2382, Sanders 1120, Others 144.

Update 2020-06-25 05:28 UTC: Today we have updates from Kentucky and New York. Biden gains 4 delegates, Sanders loses 3. New totals: Biden 2386, Sanders 1117, Others 144.

Update 2020-06-26 16:21 UTC: Today we have another update from Kentucky. Biden gains 8 more delegates, Sanders gains 2. Looks like 10 delegates will be officially uncommitted. New totals: Biden 2394, Sanders 1119, Others 144.

Update 2020-06-27 16:45 UTC: Today we have an update from New York. Biden loses one delegate to Sanders. New Totals: Biden 2393, Sanders 1120, Others 144, TBD 322.

Update 2020-06-29 03:46 UTC: Today an update from Kentucky. Biden gains one more delegate. New Totals: Biden 2394, Sanders 1120, Others 144, TBD 321.

Update 2020-07-01 02:35 UTC: An update from Kentucky today. Biden gains 9 delegates, Sanders loses 2. New totals: Biden 2403, Sanders 1118, Others 144, TBD 314.

Update 2020-07-07 05:45 UTC: An update from New York. Biden pulls one delegate from Sanders. New totals: Biden 2404, Sanders 1117, Others 144, TBD 314.

Update 2020-07-08 06:41 UTC: Initial results from New Jersey and Delaware have Biden getting all 147 delegates from the two states. New totals: Biden 2551, Sanders 1117, Others 144, TBD 167.

Update 2020-07-12 15:33 UTC: Initial results are in from Louisiana, and it looks like Biden will be getting all 54 delegates. New totals: Biden 2605, Sanders 1117, Others 144, TBD 113.

Update 2020-07-13 04:52 UTC: Initial results are in from Puerto Rico: Biden 44, Sanders 4, Bloomberg 3. New totals: Biden 2649, Sanders 1121, Others 147, TBD 62. Only Connecticut left. And 2 uncommitted delegates from Kentucky.

Update 2020-07-17 18:20 UTC: Logged an update from Rhode Island where a delegate moved from Sanders to Biden, and an update from Puerto Rico where a delegate moved from Biden to Sanders. No net change: Biden 2649, Sanders 1121, Others 147, TBD 62. Only Connecticut left. And 2 uncommitted delegates from Kentucky.

Update 2020-07-22 23:10 UTC: One delegate in Puerto Rico moves from Bloomberg to Biden. New totals: Biden 2650, Sanders 1121, Others 146, TBD 62.

Update 2020-08-03 04:17: Logged updates today from New Jersey and Puerto Rico. Net change, Biden lost 11 delegates, 3 went to Sanders, and 8 went to… Bloomberg. New totals: Biden 2639, Sanders 1124, Others 154, TBD 62. Only Connecticut left. And 2 uncommitted delegates from Kentucky.

Update 2020-08-06 23:30: Update from Puerto Rico today. 8 delegates move from Bloomberg to Biden. New totals: Biden 2647, Sanders, 1124, Others 146, TBD 62. Only Connecticut left. And 2 uncommitted delegates from Kentucky.

Update 2020-08-08 20:20: Today's delegate estimate update is from New Jersey. Two delegates shift from Biden to Sanders. New totals: Biden 2645, Sanders 1126, Others 146, TBD 62. Only Connecticut left. And 2 uncommitted delegates from Kentucky.

Update 2020-08-12 04:23: Results from Connecticut today. It looks like Biden will get all 60 delegates. Also an update from New York, where Sanders gives up 11 delegates to Biden. New totals: Biden 2716, Sanders, 1115, Others 146. Only the 2 uncommitted delegates from Kentucky are still unknown.

Update 2020-08-19 04:07: Tonight was the official roll call vote at the Democratic National Convention. The final results, as per @2020Delegates, including superdelegate votes since they couldn’t make a difference: Biden 3558, Sanders 1151, Abstain 5, Did Not Vote 35. And that is that for the Democratic nomination.

For more information:

This post is an update based on the data on the Election Graphs 2020 Delegate Race page. Election Graphs tracks estimates of the convention delegate totals for both parties. The charts, graphs, and maps in the post above are all as of the time of this post. Click through on any image for the current interactive versions of that chart, along with additional details.

Follow @ElectionGraphs on Twitter or Election Graphs on Facebook to see announcements of new blog posts. For those interested in more granular updates of delegate updates or general election polling, follow @ElecCollPolls on Twitter. If you find the information in these posts informative or useful, please consider visiting the donation page.

Small Improvements for Trump

Since the last update on May 9th, there have been new polls in California [x2], Ohio, Texas, Wisconsin [x3], Nebraska (CD2), Georgia [x3], New Jersey, North Carolina [x4], Florida [x4], Colorado, Arizona [x3], Virginia, Tennessee, Kentucky, Michigan [x4], Pennsylvania [x2], Washington [2], Minnesota, Maryland, Utah, New York, South Carolina, Indiana, and Missouri.

Despite all of this polling, things actually moved very little.

We'll start with the changes since last time on all of the metrics, then look at the graphs.

Model	Metric	9 May	2 Jun	𝚫
Categories	Trump Best Expected Biden Best	TIED Biden +166 Biden +286	Trump +2 Biden +130 Biden +288	Trump +2 Trump +36 Biden +2
Categories	Tipping Point	Biden +4.2	Biden +4.3%	Biden +0.1%
Probabilities	Trump 2σ Median Biden 2σ	Biden +36 Biden +130 Biden +240	Biden +22 Biden +122 Biden +234	Trump +14 Trump +8 Trump +6
Probabilities	Trump Win Tie Biden Win	0.2% 0.0% 99.8%	0.5% 0.1% 99.4%	+0.3% +0.1% -0.4%

The biggest change is in the "Expected Case" where Trump reduces his losing margin against Biden from 166 EV to 130 EV.

This is due to Ohio.

The polling average in Ohio moved from just barely Biden, to just barely Trump. Since the categorization model's Expected Case only cares who is in the lead, not by how much, this moves Ohio's 18 EV from one side to the other, for a net change in margin of 36 EV.

The probabilistic view, however, recognizes that both of these situations represent a close state that is very much in play. In addition, other close states move around a bit without actually changing category, but in ways that move the probabilistic results.

The net result is still Biden weakening a bit, just not quite as much as in the categorization view:

Aside from Ohio, Trump had nice movements in his direction in two close states:

This was countered a little bit by improvements for Biden in a couple of states:

But that wasn't enough to improve Biden's overall situation. On balance, although it has been small, the movement in the last few weeks has been toward Trump.

If the election was held today, Biden retains an overwhelming advantage.

But as usual, we point out that the race is dynamic. It would only take a 4.3% shift in the polls to make Trump the favorite, and that kind of change can happen in a matter of weeks. We have a long way to go.

Right now these are the battlegrounds:

And this is the map:

154.7 days until polls start to close on election night.