Hey guys, I put together this map for my prediction of how the upcoming american election will go, based on currently elected state officials.

http://www.270towin.com/maps/qx44X

Light red = Republican leaning
Dark red = Strongly republican
Dark Blue = Strongly Democrat
Light blue = Democrat leaning

These are the elected state officials I used to determine party leaning:

Governor
Lieutenant Governor
State Upper house
State Lower house
National Senators
National House delegation

The process I used to determine the political leanings of states while easy to execute, is actually really hard to explain. So, I'll just give an example.

Pennsylvania:

Governor: Democrat; Lieutenant Governor: Democrat = 1 democrat pennsylvania point

National Senators: 1 Democrat, 1 republican = draw (no points for either party)

National House delegation: 13 Republicans, 5 Democrats = 2/3rds majority for republicans, so 1 republican pennsylvania point

State Upper House (Senate): Republican, 31; Democrat, 19 = Draw, since neither party has a 2/3rds majority

State Lower House (House of representatives): Republican, 119; Democrat, 84 = Draw, since neither party has a 2/3rds majority
_________________________________________________

Democrat points: 1
Republican Points: 1

Since it is a tie, we now go back to the state legislature, to find that Republicans have clear majority support, so the state is classified as republican-leaning.

You can apply this process to any state to fact-check me if you'd like, or point out any flaws in the process. Here are the rules to determine if a state is leaning or solid:

5 possible points

• If only one party has 1 point, the state leans towards that party
  
  
• If there is a draw with each party having 1 point or 2 points, the state leans towards the party with the highest proportion of seats in the state legislature
  
  
• If only one party has 2 or more points, the state is solid towards that party
  
  
• If the points are split 3/1 or 4/1, the state is solid towards the party with 3 or 4 respectively
  
  
• If the points are split 2/3, the state leans towards the party with 3
  

In your predictions, the republicans have a very high advantage, which is obviously false. You can't compare statewide and congressional elections, where the turnout is very low, and helps the republicans, to the presidential election, where the turnout is higher.

Even with the actual state seats, governors and congress, the democrats have more states that voted for them in the last 6 elections, then the republicans.





Anyway, it's impossible to make accurate predictions before we have the nominees.

Hillary for example is very impopular even in the democrat camp, she could make them lose a few democrat leanning states if the republican candidate is a moderate. Trump on the other side is very impopular nationwide, and could do even more damage to the republican side. Many red leanning states can be gathered by the democrats if he's the nominee.

I don't feel that that's a big issue; After all, turnout for the 2012 election was barely over 50%, compared to the 2014 congressional elections, were turnout was around 40%.

I didn't factor in what party states had voted for in the past as I feel that this isn't relevant. Obama has been in office for 8 years, and his legacy is certainly the main focus point of the 2016 campaign, which has definitely switched the political affiliations of some people who previously voted for or against him.

Edited 3/11/2016 22:50:59

@TeamGuns, I think a lot of people are really overestimating how unpopular Trump is.

If he gets the Nomination and the other Nominees start backing him, he could get a good deal of Republican support. Also, if he suddenly switches to a more moderate point after the nomination, he could gain even stronger support among Independents.

@Darth Darth Jinks

I disagree he'll become much more popular, even with establishment backing. Every debate with democrats will be about his past for his nomination and every attack ad will be done with mysogin/xenophobic quotes.

Plus, if he goes moderate, he'll be betraying his core supporters.

Governor: Democrat; Lieutenant Governor: Democrat = 1 democrat pennsylvania point

National Senators: 1 Democrat, 1 republican = draw (no points for either party)

National House delegation: 13 Republicans, 5 Democrats = 2/3rds majority for republicans, so 1 republican pennsylvania point

State Upper House (Senate): Republican, 31; Democrat, 19 = Draw, since neither party has a 2/3rds majority

State Lower House (House of representatives): Republican, 119; Democrat, 84 = Draw, since neither party has a 2/3rds majority
_________________________________________________

Democrat points: 1
Republican Points: 1

Since it is a tie, we now go back to the state legislature, to find that Republicans have clear majority support, so the state is classified as republican-leaning.

I'm sorry but this methodology is entirely random and highly inaccurate. While I praise your attempt to objectively and fairly determine the 2016 General Election outcome, your method relies on several bad assumptions.

1) You assume that each branch of government is equally weighted. For example, having a Democratic Governor should be weighted more than having a Democratic Lower House Legislature.

2) Each branch of a state government is not necessarily elected at the same time and each state doesn't have their elections at the same time. This means that your analysis of the Republican and Democratic parts of each state aren't necessarily a reflection of what the voters want right at this moment because new events and scandals and political issues haven't been accounted for in the voting.

3) Why did you use the state legislature to decide a tie instead of the Governorship?

4) You didn't account for dramatic differences in voter turnout from election years to off-years. For example, in 2014 the voter turnout was around 36.1%, which is almost 20% lower than the turnout for the US presidential election in 2012.

5) Really? Illinois going to the Republicans? Dude that's not going to happen.

1. This could possibly be right, although I'd disagree that the governor is more important since the Executive branch takes orders from the legislative branch.

2. Understood, but there isn't exactly more up-to-date information available.

3. See #1

4. If you have an idea for how to account for it, be sure to let me know. Personally it's not a big problem, since the composition of congress has been a pretty reliable predicter for first-term presidents before, such as in 1992, 2000, and 2008; In all three cases, the party that the president was from also had majorities in both houses of congress. And then, when you account for the fact that turnout for presidential elections and congressional ones are basically synced... (http://newshour-tc.pbs.org/newshour/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/Turnout-1940-2014.jpg)

5. Perhaps it's just a bit of optimism since I come from Illinois, but I really believe that there's a chance that they could vote republican sometime :P With republican governors and liutenant governors plus about even representation in congress between democrats and republicans, I truly believe that Illinois may vote republican this election.

Edited 3/12/2016 04:51:25

I think a lot of people are really overestimating how unpopular Trump is.

Trump is the most hated presidential candidate in US history, hillary is second most hated, in fact bernie is the only candidate that have more people that like him than that hate him

Edited 3/12/2016 07:01:11

Half the country seceded because Lincoln got elected. Fail to see how Trump is the most hated in history.

@Major General Smedley Butler

In terms of % of americans hating a candidate, trump is more hated then lincoln... But I doubt the country would start a civil war over him.

The percentage of Americans hating Lincoln was most defintely higher and more intense.

^+1

K, let's do a bit of math now.

The United States Census of 1860 was the eighth Census conducted in the United States starting June 1, 1860 and lasting five months. It determined the population of the United States to be 31,443,321

Population of the confederation: 9,103,332.


Let's imagine now, that prior to lincoln's election, 70% of the population of the area that would become the confederation disliked lincoln. That's already a huge number, but let's choose it.

70% of 9,103,332 = 6372332.4

Let's now say that 30 percent of the Union population disliked him.

30% of (31,443,321-9,103,332) = 6701996.7

We'd have then 13074329.1 Lincoln dislikers, which makes it 41.6% of the United States population.


A gallup poll put trump's unfavorability rating ammoung americans at 60%. Even if you put my calculations at a margin of error of 10 percent, and if you use the margin of error of that poll of 5 percent, the percentages wouldn't cross each other...

Edited 3/12/2016 04:48:40

Key word : intensity.

What are trump haters gonna do? Move to Canada? *roflmaololretards*

Nah, Lincoln haters declared legitimate war.

^ Good point, but they didn't declare the war. They just gave the finger, left the country, built their own, armed themselves for a war and cheered when it came on their faces.

The confederates sieges a US fort, starting the war.

Hmmm, pretty much.

Well, I don't think people will actually want a war because trump got elected, but I'm sure the US will have lot of refugees fleeing the country.

70% of 9,103,332 = 6372332.4

Let's now say that 30 percent of the Union population disliked him.

Are you sure it's really going to be that much higher of a proportion? Hardly anyone actually would be affected by not owning slaves, since only a small proportion owned slaves.

The democrats would dislike/hate him of course.(Lincoln)

Also, I know a few guys who are going to start a militia if he's elected.(Trump)

Edited 3/12/2016 06:14:45

@Жұқтыру

Yea, it was a large estimation. I'd say it was a lot less too... There was a war just because the elites decided so.