The stage has been set for the most intense, brutal, and crazy election since 1860. The 2020 presidential campaign will be an event unlike anything this country has seen in its almost 250 years of existence. If Trump’s impeachment and acquittal, the first Republican to have been acquitted of impeachment charges, and Joe Biden’s epic South Carolina and Super Tuesday comeback weren’t unprecedented enough, then how about a global pandemic that has killed 430,000 people from almost every country? And just in case that’s not enough unprecedentedness, how about a few race riots in major U.S. cities and a national civil rights protest the scale of which we haven’t seen since the 60’s. Both candidates are over 70 years old, are gaffe-prone and often don’t act their age, and are surrounded by an aura of personality. America is divided into three populations, those that hate everything to do with Trumpism and its upending of political norms and social progress, those that celebrate Trump and will never not defend him as an effective President that has brought a straying America back to its great traditions, and those in the middle who haven’t yet drank red or blue Kool-Aid and remain to be convinced.
We’ve always known that this election would be a roller coaster ride with twists, turns, climbs, and drops. But the events of the last couple of weeks has shifted the presidential race so that it clearly favors Joe Biden.
Indeed, back in February, before coronavirus began spreading (or so we think), after Trump was acquitted, his approval ratings began ticking up. Last year, Congress took the first steps toward a Chinese trade deal, and ISIS leader Baghdadi became Baghdeadi. Bernie Sanders, who was seen as hardly electable, swept the popular vote of the three early primary/caucus states. Many like me thought Trump was on a roll that would lead to his re-election. Then 2020 happened.
Coronavirus has claimed a mind-boggling 117,000 U.S. lives. That’s about 64 Hurricane Katrinas, or 39 nine-elevens. The level of death and heartbreak caused by coronavirus is unrivaled by any event in modern American history. About 1 out of every 2,800 Americans have succumbed to the virus. And health officials say that the official death toll is likely a low count. This is after Donald Trump said in April that only 60,000 people would die to the virus, and reports and testimonies came out telling us that Trump blew off early warnings about the deadly potential of the virus in February. Top officials were trying to get him to invest in testing and implement European travel bans and some social distancing measures, to no avail. In fairness, he did implement all of those measures, but only after it was clear community spread of the virus was happening all over the country. COVID-19 can be in someone’s body for a week or more before they test positive. It was too late to really mitigate the virus. Public opinion polling shows 54% of Americans don’t approve of Trump’s handling of the coronavirus, and that number is on an upward trend.
In this article, we are going to once again break out the 13 Keys to the White House. Developed by American University professor Allan Litchman in advance of the 1984 election, they are a collection of 13 true/false statements. If 6 or more of the statements are false, the incumbent party is supposed to lose the popular vote. If 5 or less are false, the incumbent party is supposed to win the popular vote. None of the 13 keys are based off of polling data or events during the campaign, the keys are mostly about the performance of the incumbent president. This system has supposedly worked in every election since 1860 (due to the subjectivity of some of the keys, the jury is still out on if it predicted correctly the 1932 election).
This is just my interpretation of Litchman’s system and how it applies to 2020. I’m not plaigarising his work, as he hasn’t made an official 2020 prediction yet. If you want more info about how the 13 keys have worked throughout history, get his book, Predicting The Next President.
Key 1: After the midterm elections, the incumbent party holds more seats in the U.S. House of Representatives than it did after the previous midterm elections.
Our first false statement. After 8 years of controlling the House, the GOP lost control in 2018.
Key 2: Only one candidate gets more than a third of the delegate’s votes at the incumbent party’s convention.
True. The path to the nomination was paved for Trump a long time ago.
Key 3: The incumbent-party candidate is the sitting president.
Also true.
Key 4: No third party candidate will receive more than 5% of the popular vote.
This is very likely to be true. In 2016, when both the Libertarian and the Green parties had relatively well-known candidates, they both failed to get 5%. This time around, after Congressman Justin Amash withdrew his nomination for the Libertarian Party, the slate of third-party candidates is made up of unknowns with limited credentials and fundraising ability. Therefore, it’s very likely the percentage of the vote that is casted for neither Democrats or Republicans will decrease, and key 4 will remain stubbornly true.
Key 5: The economy is not in recession during the election campaign.
False. According to many experts, we’ve been in a recession since February. In some states, a quarter of the population applied for unemployment benefits as lockdowns shuttered non-essential businesses, and people became afraid to venture too far from home. The virus has caused more economic hardship in America than almost any other single event since The Great Depression. A virus-induced recession has never really been seen before in America, so some might argue that this one doesn’t really count when it comes to this key. However, as I talked about earlier, Americans also seem to be blaming Trump for letting the virus get as bad as it did.
Key 6: Real annual per-capita economic growth during the term equals or exceeds mean growth during the previous two terms.
False. This key was on track to be true, before the virus hit. The average growth rate for 2017-2019 was 2.53%, while the average growth rate for 2009-2016 was 1.59%. But 2020 GDP growth is projected to not be a growth at all, as the figure is expected to be under -3%. If that’s true, the 2017-2020 GDP growth will be at best 1.15%, lower than during Obama’s two terms.
Key 7: The incumbent administration effects a major change in national policy.
Under Litchman’s guidelines, the 2017 overhaul of the tax code passed by congressional Republicans and signed by Trump makes this key true. Both Trump supporters and detractors agree that he has implemented major changes, especially in foreign policy and immigration. The popularity of the policy change is irrelevant to this one key, but may affect other keys, like the economic keys or the upcoming social unrest key. That’s the genius of this system. The blind spots of any one key are usually covered for by the others, so that nothing isn’t accounted for.
Key 8: There is no social unrest during the term.
I think it’s safe to say that this key is false. Three Mondays ago, George Floyd, an African-American man who had been arrested and handcuffed after attempting to purchase with counterfeit money, was killed when Derek Chauvin, a white police officer, kneeled on his neck for over nine minutes, with a straight, emotionless face. The four officers present claim that Floyd was resisting arrest, but some eyewitness accounts contest this. Americans across the nation were shocked and horrified by this unfathomably heinous injustice, and began protesting. We are witnessing the largest civil rights protest in America in over 50 years. It seems as if demonstrations are in every town, as if all of America is crying out as one against injustice and racism in every form. I bet that a lot of people, particularly white and young suburbanites, are becoming more liberal as they are exposed more to the systematic discrimination against poor, majority-minority neighborhoods in America.
Some Trump supporters argue the riots and looting associated with Floyd’s murder could help Trump as people are exposed to the left’s destructive tendency and intent. Maybe part of that was true the first week after Floyd’s death, when widespread looting and damage occurred in major cities. However, since then, authorities seemed to have restored order in most cities, and the protests have been almost exclusively peaceful, with the exception of maybe the Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone in Seattle. Many quiet, small, majority-white towns and cities are seeing their first big protest in years. A good number of the protestors out now are political moderates, that hold the non-radical position of wanting to remove the barriers that put poor people of color at an unfair disadvantage. Joe Biden has vocally distanced himself from the most radical protestors, saying that he doesn’t support defunding or abolishing the police.
Key 9: The incumbent administration is untainted by major scandal.
I’m going to say that this is also false. Trump’s acquittal remains very controversial. Trump also has several other scandals to his name, not the least of which being sexual assault allegations against him after the release of the Access Hollywood tape in 2016. As we saw in the 2000 election, Senate acquittal doesn’t clear your name. Back then, Litchman turned Ley 9 against the incumbent Democrats due to Bill Clinton’s impeachment and acquittal regarding inappropriate behavior with Monica Lewinsky.
Key 10: The incumbent administration suffers no major failure in foreign or military affairs.
As in most cases, this key is true. Since Americans don’t pay that much attention to foreign policy, only a major debacle can turn this key against Trump. I don’t think anything Trump has done so far matches previous American failures such as the Bay of Pigs Invasion, The Vietnam War, or the Iranian Hostage Crisis.
Key 11: The incumbent administration achieves a major success in foreign or military affairs.
In March 2019, ISIS lost all of its territory in Syria, stamping out all of the group’s territory in the Middle East. Later that year, the terrorist group’s leader, Baghdadi, was killed by American forces. Radical Islamic terrorism has been on the decline during Trump’s term, so this key turns true.
Allan Litchman said in September 2016 (when he made the prediction that Trump would win the popular vote) that two things could swing the election to Clinton: the collapse of Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson, or the snuffing out of ISIS in the Middle East by Obama. Gary Johnson exhibited his severely limited knowledge of foreign affairs, leading to his decline in the polls beneath 5%, the third-party key turned true, meaning that the keys now projected Hillary Clinton would win the popular vote, which of course she did. But Litchman himself said ISIS’ defeat also could’ve triggered this, and he also turned this key in favor of the Democrats in 2011 when Bin Laden was killed. So there’s little doubt in my mind that this counts as a major military triumph for Trump.
Key 12: The incumbent-party candidate is charismatic or a national hero.
This is the sixth false key, the one that’ll do Trump in. The keys set the bar high for charisma. The only post-war candidates to have gotten this key were JFK and Reagan. In order to have this key be true, you must not only be charismatic among your political base (like Trump), but also charismatic to people all over the political spectrum (unlike Trump).
Key 13: The challenging-party candidate is not charismatic or a national hero.
A potential saving grace for Trump, this key is true. Joe Biden has been tainted by a growing number of gaffes (“poor kids are just as smart as white kids”), cavalier statements (“if you have a problem figuring out whether to vote for Trump or me, you ain’t black.”), and embarrassing mix-ups, like mixing up his wife and daughter during a rally. A lot of people don’t find him particularly inspiring when he talks, and there are definite signs of mental decline.
So there are exactly six false keys, just enough to supposedly sink Donald Trump. While I did have some positive things to say about Trump, most of those things were related to events that occurred before 2020, back when this race was still a Toss-Up.
If the virus hadn’t shown up, then Keys 5 and 6, short and long term economy, would both be true. There’d be 9 true keys and only 4 false. There also probably wouldn’t have been the magnified reaction to George Floyd’s murder, which means no real leftward shift among people. I think that would be the case because now that a lot of people are out of work or are working from home, and coronavirus has kept people inside, this gives people more free time, more time to look at what’s happening in the world around them, more time to become outraged when a heinous act of evil is done to someone that they don’t know personally. These last few months have been emotionally taxing for a lot of people, and Floyd’s murder finally broke s0me of them. Because Floyd was murdered when he was, during the coronavirus lockdown, people are now more aware of the underlying race issues in this country, making people more sympathetic to Joe Biden, who will no doubt incorporate civil rights as a big part of his campaign.
The polls back up my findings. The RCP polling average has Biden leading Trump by a whopping 8 percentage points (and counting), 50%-42%. (Clinton was up by 3.3% on Trump in polls on Election Day, before winning the popular vote by 2.1%) Biden is routinely reaching 50% in the new polls coming out, a number that evaded Hillary Clinton in 2016 polls. That was key to her defeat, as many undecideds voted for Trump in the end. The polls are just getting better for Biden. That’s the thing about polls: While they may not be the best at predicting raw margins, they’re getting better and better at picking up on trends in one direction or the other. If the left’s behavior during these racially charged times are really bothering Americans, we’d be seeing Biden’s margins decrease, not increase.
The big difference between 2016 and 2020 for Trump is this: In 2016, when Democrats controlled the presidency, people where more likely to blame Trump’s opponents if they felt uneasy about the state of the country. Now, I’m pretty sure everyone who isn’t living under a rock is uneasy about the state of the country, but Trump has been the incumbent President now for over 3 years. People will credit him for the current condition of the world, instead of his opponents. Not everyone lives in a partisan bubble.
In 2016, just the polls were against Trump. They didn’t reflect the conditions and leadership in the country that, at the time, created prime conditions and sentiment for a Republican victory. Now, as this article describes, the current state of the country -AND- the polls are against Trump, and the polls are against Trump much more severely than they were by this time four years ago.
Ratings Changes
This conclusion I’ve reached that Biden is the favorite to win has caused me to make three Electoral College ratings changes.
| State(Electoral Votes) | Old Rating | New Rating |
| Colorado(9) | Lean Biden | Likely Biden |
| Nevada(6) | Lean Biden | Likely Biden |
| Ohio(18) | Likely Trump | Lean Trump |
I chose to move the states I did because they were already on the fence of Lean vs. Likely.
Ohio is a state with a lot of white suburban voters. Unlike in many other states, Ohio suburbs hardly trended left, probably because Ohio suburbs are less affluent and more working-class. However, as we see what’s going on with the protests sweeping the nation, Trump can no longer rely on these suburban voters to stick with him. Still, it will be tough for Biden to flip the Trump+8 state.
One of the demographics that are suffering the most from unemployment at this time are Hispanics. The coronavirus shut down Las Vegas casinos as they were deemed non-essential, hurting Nevada’s economy. Nevada is not only a very diverse state with a large Hispanic population, it is also a very metropolitan state, as almost no one lives outside the cities in the uninhabitable desert.
Colorado has all kinds of voters that are either already trending left, or may turn to Biden given the times. College-educated suburbanites, working-class voters who may be out of their work, Hispanic voters, you name it.
Can Trump Upset Again?
It’s important to note that the 13 keys only predict the popular vote, and not what really matters, the electoral college. Biden needs to win the popular vote by about 4 points to ensure an Electoral College victory. Right now polls show him up 8 points, 50%-42%, leaving 8% undecided. Rememeber, 46% of American voters in 2016 voted for Trump, and several more were never-Trump conservatives that voted for third party candidates. Never-Trump conservatives are a dying breed; some have become Democrats, but most have found the President to be acceptable. It’s probable that many of the undecided voters are or had been leaning towards Trump.
In May, many economic forecasters predicted the United States would lose another 8 million jobs. Instead, we added more than 2 million. IF the economy can continue to bounce back more swiftly than people think, unemployment rates tank, and a second wave of the virus doesn’t happen or holds off until mid-November or later, this will be big for Trump’s re-election odds, as key 5 will become true again, so he will have the 8 true keys he supposedly needs to win the popular vote.
Another big event for Trump and Biden will be the debates. They will be a test for the two men, as they must respond intelligently to questions regarding complex political issues, instead of just rambling about how good of a president they have been/will be like in rallies. For Trump, the key will be defending all of the actions he’s taken as President and explaining how they’ve made America secure and thriving. For Biden, the key will be clearly defining what government policies and laws he’d change to better America. It’s no secret that neither Trump or Biden aren’t the best at articulating their ideas and stating their morals, so if one of them can step up to the challenge and give intelligent answers, the other candidate will look foolish, turning many voters away. If Trump is to make a comeback, it will probably start at the debates.
Another potential saving grace for Donald Trump is that he seems to be much more aggressive and risk-taking in holding campaign events during the COVID-19 pandemic. On June 20th, he will hold a rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma without social distancing. He plans to follow this up with rallies in the swing states of North Carolina, Florida, and Arizona. Joe Biden, on the other hand, may opt to hold less campaign events with less people, as he looks out for the safety of himself and others. This well-intentioned move may cost him media coverage, crucial swing voter interactions, and a general feeling of presence.
If some of these things happen, undecided voters may be rubbed the wrong way with Biden, and the already conservative-leaning undecided vote will have their bad feelings about Trump drowned out by good feelings. Polls are showing that, unlike in 2018, the enthusiasm advantage is on the Republican’s side. It will be hard for him to win the popular vote, given the high percentage of Americans that are in vehement opposition to him, but, as we saw in 2016, he may not need to.
One of the biggest factors at play here is Biden’s running mate. This is Biden’s chance to find someone that can compliment his style, add new, younger blood to the Democratic ticket, and forever connect someone to his name to make voting for him more appealing. If Biden goes for a more progressive running mate, like Elizabeth Warren, this may provide his base some badly needed enthusiasm, while at the same time turning off some moderate voters who don’t like Warren’s antics or policies. If Biden goes with a more mainstream Democratic woman, maybe Tammy Duckworth, he can throw a bone to moderate voters, while leaving the liberal base unimpressed. The level of appeal to the black community a running mate would have is another huge factor. Biden must choose someone with great political talent, or risk dropping the ball.
Of course, there may be some things that will happen between now and Election Day that there will be no way someone like me could see coming in advance. If the next 5 months are even half as crazy as the last 5 months have been, this election could be right back at Toss-Up on November 3rd.
Thank you for reading my article. If you want more Toss-Up Central, visit the homepage: https://tossupcentral.com/. New articles will be posted at least every other Sunday at 6 P.M. EST.
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