US: 2024 presidential election – early Biden basecase

• This note lays out:
  • Current election data pointing toward a Trump victory.
  • Current election data pointing toward a Biden victory.
  • The reasons for our early basecase of a Biden win.

Data pointing to a Trump win:

Polling:

• National polling:
  • Trump leads Biden by 1-3 percentage points nationwide:
    • RealClearPolitics: Trump +1.1 points (44.9 - 43.8)
    • 270 to Win: Trump +1.4 points (45.4 - 44.0)
    • DDHQ/The Hill: Trump +2.7 points (44.4 - 41.7)
  • Swing state polling:
    • Trump leads Biden by wide margins in 4 out of 6 swing states, and by narrow margins in the remaining 2 states, according to two polling aggregators (RealClearPolitics; DDHQ/The Hill):
      • Arizona: Trump +4.5; +4.6
      • Nevada: Trump +7.0; +5.6
      • Georgia: Trump +7.2; +8.3
      • Michigan: Trump +4.8; +2.6
      • Wisconsin: Trump +0.6; +1.7
      • Pennsylvania: Biden +0.6; Trump +2.8

Betting markets:

• Trump leads Biden 51.7% to 31.4% according to aggregates.

Rejection of Biden:

• Biden is unpopular in general:
  • 39.7% of voters approve of Biden while 55.9% disapprove – a net 16.2 point negative rating, which bodes quite poorly, as…
  • …“since modern polling began, the first-term presidents who were unable to reach 50% approval at any point within a year of their next Election Day have not won a new term” (Source)
• Biden’s age is a problem in particular:
  • Trump is not much younger (77) than Biden (81)...
  • But voters are far more concerned about Biden’s age (76%) than Trump’s (48%) – even according to polling conducted before recent headlines.

Immigration

• The emergence of immigration as a primary concern for voters is problematic for Biden, because:
  • Biden underperforms Trump: “Voters in [swing] states say they trust Trump over Biden on immigration 52% to 30%” (Source)
  • Biden underperforms history: “[Biden] has just an 18 [percent] approval rating on the issue, the lowest for any president since ABC News and the Washington Post began asking the question in January 2004” (Source)
  • Biden underperforms previous Biden:
    • Republicans’ advantage on the issue has risen from +9 points in 2021 to +35 points in 2024…
    • and by +7 percentage points just since December (Source)

Electoral College (EC) bias:

• In recent election cycles, the translation of candidates’ overall popular vote share to Electoral College delegates won has benefitted Republicans, as Democratic votes are concentrated in urban areas (and are thus ‘wasted’ at a higher rate than are Republican votes), and as swing states prove slightly ‘redder’ than the national environment:
  • In 2016, Wisconsin proved 2.9 points ‘redder’ than the national popular vote, and was the state that guaranteed Trump an EC majority.
  • In 2020, Wisconsin proved 3.9 points ‘redder’ than the national popular vote, a high hurdle that Biden nonetheless overcame to clinch an EC majority.
• “University of Texas political scientists found that in a 50-50 popular vote election, the Republican had a 65 percent chance of winning in recent elections,” an advantage due to EC bias. (Source)

Data pointing to a Biden win:

Traditional electoral models:

• 2 of 3 leading models favor Biden over Trump:
  • Moody’s currently projects a narrow Biden win “if the economy continues to perform well […] and voter turnout and third-party vote share remain close to their recent historical norms.”
  • The Fair Model currently projects Biden will receive 51.46% of the two-party presidential vote (and thus that Trump will receive 48.54%).
  • PollyVote currently projects that Biden will receive 49.8% of the two-party presidential vote (and that Trump will receive 50.2%).

Soft landing / no recession:

• Since 1944, no incumbent president running for reelection has lost without a recession during or immediately preceding the election cycle.
• Thus, it is undoubtedly good news for Biden that “business and academic economists surveyed [in January] lowered the probability of a recession within the next year, to 39% from 48% in the October survey.” (Source)

Incumbency advantage:

• Since 1936, 73.3% of incumbents who have sought reelection have gone on to win.
• Since 1980, 57% of them.
• “[From 1968 to 2016], the percent of individuals who vote for the incumbent […] is 52%, consistent with a slight incumbency advantage” (Source)

Net neutral data:

Inflation and other economic indicators:

• Bad for Biden:
  • “[I]nflation [is] a close second [to immigration], named by 32 percent of respondents [as their paramount concern]” (Source)
  • “[E]conomists expect the unemployment rate will climb from 3.7% in December 2023 to 4.1% in June and 4.3% by the end of the year” (Source)
  • “55% [of voters] picking Trump and 33% choosing Biden” as to “which candidate would do a better job handling the economy” (Source)
• Good for Biden:
  • “Economists see inflation [...] falling to 2.3% at the end of 2024 from 3.2% this past November” (Source)
  • And partially as a result, “U.S. consumer sentiment improved in January, hitting the highest level in 2-1/2 years amid growing optimism over the outlook for inflation and household incomes” (Source)

Signum's view:

• Taken at face value, the above outline shows 5 metrics favoring Trump to ‘only’ 3 favoring Biden.
  • Two of those five, however, arguably hold very limited predictive value:
    • National polling averages in January/February have proven off by between 4 points (Source) and 7 points (Source) and up to 12 points from the final November results in 2004-2020 cycles. (Source)
      • And while polling closer to elections is relatively more accurate, “polls conducted in the final two weeks [of the 2020 cycle had an] average error [of] 4.5 points for national popular vote polls…”
      • …and an even greater “5.1 points for state-level presidential polls” (Source)
    • Betting markets had the last two elections wrong at this stage in the race:
      • Feb. 2016: Hillary Clinton had 51.5% odds of winning, yet she lost
      • Feb. 2020: Trump 54.9% odds of winning, yet he lost

• Adjusted for these considerations, the election is arguably wide open at this stage (3 datapoints to each candidate), and our own assessment is a Biden win (at 65% odds), for the following reason: we expect Democrat-leaning voters to mobilize in greater numbers relative to Republican-leaning voters:
  • Given significant dissatisfaction with both candidates, 2024 looks set to be a low-turnout election.
    • This favors Biden...
      • Biden polls better among likely voters than among registered voters.
      • Democrats have outperformed in low-turnout special elections, and “seem to do better among high-turnout voters than demographically identical low-turnout voters” (Source)
        • Issues that have driven recent Democratic participation – primarily access to abortion and rejection of MAGA candidates – remain potent:
          • “Abortion has been on the ballot in seven states since [the Dobbs decision] and in each instance, in red states and blue states, anti-abortion advocates have lost” (Source)
          • “Preserving democracy (29%) [is] the top [issue] that [comes] to Americans’ minds when thinking about their vote this November [...] [and] preserving democracy (33%) is the most mentioned issue among independents” (Source)
        • And issues on which Biden trails Trump may prove less visceral, and thus less likely to drive Republican turnout:
          • While 35% of respondents identified immigration as their primary concern, only 17% said immigration affected them directly in the same poll. (Source)
    • Despite his low approval rating, as there is precedent for Democrats outperforming expectations derived from Biden’s relative unpopularity:
      • In 2022: “Biden himself [had] a 41% approval rating,” and “when a president's approval rating has been less than 50%, his party has lost, on average, 37 House seats in midterms since 1946.” (Source) However, of course, Democrats only lost 9 House seats, counter to expectations of a rout driven by Biden’s low approval ratings.

Signposts:

• While we do today anticipate a Biden victory, we are keeping an open mind this early in the race, and will be monitoring the following signposts to see if a change/update in call is warranted:
  • Polling that demonstrates a significant deterioration in support for Biden, especially:
    • in (swing) state-level polling,
    • following national party conventions (RNC in mid-July, DNC in late-August).
  • Recession, as no modern incumbent has won reelection having experienced a recession during or immediately preceding their campaign.
  • Resolution of Trump’s legal cases, especially the January 6 election subversion case, as:
    • Acquittal would likely provide Trump with a slight boost in support, and would certainly hamper Democrats’ messaging efforts.
    • Conviction would threaten Trump’s campaign as “20 percent of [Trump] voters from [swing] states [...] would be either “somewhat unwilling” or “very unwilling” to vote for him again if he were convicted” (Source)
  • Health risks to Biden and to Trump, as a significant health event to either candidate, even if not incapacitating, would necessitate a rethinking of the race.
  • However we do not expect Trump’s choice of running mate to prove an important signpost, as “research […] shows vice presidential selection generally has little direct effect on voters […] presidential voting mostly comes down to how people feel about the person at the top of the ticket.” (Source)