Tuesday, July 22, 2008

Presidential Forecast - 7/22 - McCain gains for first time

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Update 7/22: Latest projection: Obama leads 303-235, down 2 EVs from our previous forecast. For the first time since we've been tracking the forecast since early June, McCain has improved his position, led by gains in two projections each in Ohio and New Hampshire.

Please also check out our Senate Forecast and House Forecast.

Map showing consensus of sources. This table will show a state Blue or Red if a majority of the sources show it Leaning or Solid for that candidate. NH moves from Obama to Tossup.

<p><strong>><a href='http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/interactives/campaign08/electoral-college/'>Electoral College Prediction Map</a></strong> - Predict the winner of the general election. Use the map to experiment with winning combinations of states. Save your prediction and send it to friends.</p>

Unanimous solid states, not shown in the table below:
Solid Obama: CA, CT, DC, HI, IL, MA, MD, NY, RI, VT - 150 EVs.
Solid McCain: AL, ID, KS, KY, NE, OK, TN, UT, WY - 58 EVs.

The sources are sorted by each projection's estimate of Obama's Electoral Votes (Algorithm at bottom). The states are sorted by the number of electoral votes.

DCW Presidential Forecast
State
EVsElect. Proj.Open LeftEV
.com
FHQRCPRM538
.com
CNNNBC....
Date

7/227/227/227/207/227/227/226/277/9
Obama-Strong (O)

200210207175153210210153168
Obama-Lean (OL)

8463354710263637842
Tossup (T)

831081151671203838113139
McCain-Lean (ML)

1017098586462676953
McCain-Strong (M)

7087839199165160125136
Obama Total

284273242222255273273231210
McCain Total

171157181149163227227194189
Obama Est.

329328312308307292288286282

Texas
34MLMLMLMLMLMMMM
Florida
27TTMLTTMLMLTT
Pennsylvania
21OLOLTTOLOLOLOLT
Ohio
20OLTTTTTTTT
Michigan
17OLOLOLTOLOLOLTT
Georgia
15MLMLMLMLMLMMMLML
New Jersey
15OOOOLOLOOOLOL
N. Carolina
15TTTTTMLMLMLML
Virginia
13TTTTTTTTT
Indiana
11MLTTTTMMLMLML
Missouri
11TTTTTMLMLTT
Washington
11OOOOOLOOOLO
Arizona
10MLMLMMMMMMM
Minnesota
10OOOOOLOOOLOL
Wisconsin
10OLOOOLOLOOOLOL
Colorado
9TOLTTTOLOLTT
Louisiana
9MMMMMMMMLM
S. Carolina
8MLMLMLTMMMMM
Iowa
7OLOLOOLOLOLOLTT
Oregon
7OOOLOLOLOOOLOL
Arkansas
6MLMMMMMMMLM
Mississippi
6MLMMLMLMLMMMM
Nevada
5TTTTTTTTT
New Mexico
5OLOLOLOLTOLOLMLT
W. Virginia
5MLMMLMMMMMLM
Maine
4OOOOOLOOOLO
NH
4OLOLTTTOLOLTT
Alaska
3MMLMLMLMLMMMML
Delaware
3OOOLOLOOOOO
Montana
3TTOLTMLMLMLMLML
N. Dakota
3MLTTTMLMLMMML
S. Dakota
3MLMTMMMLMMML


Elect. Proj.Open LeftEV
.com
FHQRCPRM538
.com
CNNNBC....


















































Notes:
538 - FiveThirtyEight - Safe and Likely mapped to Strong (O or M), Lean to Lean (OL or ML), Tossup to Tossup (T)
CNN - Safe mapped to Strong, Leaning to Lean, Tossup to Tossup
Elect. Proj. - Election Projection - Solid and Strong mapped to Strong, Moderate to Lean, Weak to Tossup
EV.com - Electoral-Vote.com - Strong mapped to Strong, Weak to Lean, Barely and Tossup to Tossup
FHQ -
FrontLoading HQ - Solid mapped to Strong, Lean to Lean, Tossup (Dem and Rep) to Tossup
NBC - Base mapped to strong,
Lean to Lean, Tossup to Tossup
OpenLeft - Solid mapped to Strong, Lean to Lean, Tossup to Tossup
RM - Rasmussen - Safe and Likely mapped to Strong, Lean to Lean, Tossup to Tossup
RCP - RealClearPolitics - Solid mapped to Strong, Lean to Lean, Tossup to Tossup

Here are the states that span 3 categories.
  • Alaska: Now only 1 at Tossup, 4 at McCain-Strong. Rasmussen's own poll shows McCain only up by 4, yet they still have AK as Likely-Republican, which we convert to McCain-Strong.
  • Indiana: 4 at Tossup, Rasmussen at McCain-Strong.
  • Iowa: One at Obama-Strong, NBC and CNN still calling it a Tossup.
  • Michigan: 1 Obama-Strong, 3 Tossups.
  • Montana : EV.com at Obama-Lean, 5 at McCain-Lean. EV.com will exactly follow the latest poll if no other poll has been published within the week.
  • New Hampshire: 4 at Tossup, 2 at Obama-Strong.
  • New Mexico: Six projections have it as Obama-Lean, CNN has it at McCain-Lean. Two recent polls show Obama up by 3 and 8 points.
  • North Dakota - Two at McCain Strong, 2 at tossup.
  • South Carolina: 1 Tossup, 5 McCain-Strong
  • South Dakota: 1 Tossup, 5 McCain-Strong
We're purposely ignoring Maine and Nebraska CD splits for now to keep things simple. We'll add them in later if we need to.

The overall projection is just a straight average of each projections' estimate of Electoral Votes (EVs) for each candidate. For each projection other than FiveThirtyEight, we give Obama 100% of the EVs in a state that is solid for him, 80% of the EVs for a leaner, 50% of the EVs for a Tossup, 20% of the EVs for state that is McCain-Lean, and 0% of the Solid McCain states. Exact opposite for McCain. For FiveThirtyEight, we use their overall estimate of Obama's EVs, not the state-by-state categories.