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Can I submit a request for a rebrand? Thank you. Of this segment? I've tried. Good luck, Elliot. I wish you more luck than I have. I mean, you can submit whatever you like. I would like for it to be rebranded as, Are You Smarter Than a Scottish Teenager?
Hello and welcome to the FiveThirtyEight Politics Podcast. I'm Galen Druk. How does the conventional wisdom about the 2024 election six months out compare with how we're thinking about the numbers here at FiveThirtyEight? Are elections watchers thinking in a clear-eyed way about an election that will undoubtedly produce a lot of emotion and narrative?
Unfortunately, we don't have a conventional wisdom thermometer in the office, so there's no better way to test that than a game of buy, sell, hold. We're going to look at where the betting markets place the likelihood of everything from Trump picking Kristi Noem as his running mate to Democrats winning a Senate race in Ohio. And we'll decide whether the odds are appropriately priced.
We're also going to check in on the results of a contentious set of primaries in Indiana earlier in the week. And here with me to do all of that is politics reporter Kaylee Rogers. Welcome to the podcast, Kaylee. Hi, good morning. Also here with us is director of data analytics, Elliot Morris. Welcome, Elliot.
Hey, Galen. And also here with us is senior elections analyst Nathaniel Rakich. Welcome, Nathaniel. Good morning, Galen. So, Nathaniel, you were up late on Tuesday night, by which I mean until, what, 9.30? Tracking the Indiana primaries as results came in and...
Reading the live blog, I see the takeaway from the night is it was a good night for embattled incumbents, establishment-backed pragmatists, and supporters of Israel. Does that pretty much sum up the night as far as you're concerned? Yes, although after I wrote that, the Associated Press also called a race for a tea party or so. There was kind of a little something for everyone.
But Indiana had, I think, the most interesting thing was that there was one incumbent who was facing a serious primary challenge. That was Representative Victoria Spartz, who's kind of been a little bit of a thorn in the side of the GOP establishment, not like really from a Tea Party way, but she just is very indecisive. She waffled on whether she was going to run for re-election. She retired initially and then decided to jump back in the race a couple of months ago. And she unsurprisingly had
There were several people who were running at the time who were like, well, I want to be in Congress, so I'm going to keep running. Sorry. So she faced a competitive race that didn't need to be competitive, I think. But she ultimately prevailed, although only by single digits over a self-funding state representative.
And then otherwise, there were three open races in safely Republican seats. So obviously, that means that basically these primaries determined who was going to go to Congress. And there were a lot of battles between kind of the establishment Republican Party and the Tea Party kind of conservative hardliner wing of the party. And that was kind of mixed. So you had the one Tea Partier win, as I mentioned. You had one establishment guy who was more moderate win in kind of the suburbs and exurbs of Indianapolis. And then in the 8th District, which used to be like the
competitive district in the country. It used to be called the Bloody Eighth because it would basically go Democratic, Republican, Democratic, Republican. Now it's all a Republican because it's a rural area in southwestern Indiana. But that race was won by State Senator Mark Messmer, who benefited from a lot of spending from pro-Israel groups because of anti-Israel positions that had been taken by his opponent.
So there wasn't really a big takeaway from the night. Like it's not like the, you know, the tea party won every open seat race or anything like that. But there was a lot of intrigue on all sides.
You know, one takeaway from last night is that, as you mentioned, the single embattled incumbent in Indiana who was running for re-nomination won. And that means that so far this cycle, only one incumbent has lost re-nomination so far. Now, the primaries won't be over until the end of the summer, but...
But is that par for the course, particularly given that if you look at the polling approval for Congress is in the pits like the teens? Yeah, it's still early. I am fairly confident you're going to see a couple more incumbents lose throughout the cycle. I think Cori Bush and Jamal Bowman, two high profile members of the squad, are in serious trouble. You've got serious Republican primary challenges against representatives like
Bob Good, who helped to oust former Speaker McCarthy. Nancy Mace, same situation.
I think it's just, you know, we're like maybe roughly a quarter or a third of the way through. And I don't have the numbers in front of me, but typically you get like a handful of incumbents lose renomination every year. So I would say we're roughly on pace. And lastly, on Tuesday night, Republican voters in Indiana basically selected the people who are going to be the next senator and governor from the state. We don't expect those races to be competitive.
And these people were newly nominated. What do we know about the almost presumptive or very likely next governor and senator from Indiana? Senator Mike Braun decided to leave the Senate and run for governor. He was only served one term in the Senate, which maybe tells you how fun Washington, D.C. is. What? Yeah, I know, right? Shocker. Nathaniel, doing your own city dirty like that.
Oh, yeah. Well, whatever. Well, you know, Washington, D.C. as a city is cool. I think, you know, it's within the boundaries of Capitol Hill that people don't really like their jobs. But, yeah, so he basically waltzed to the—well, actually, he didn't really waltz. He won the Republican nomination for governor. He foxtrotted? He sauntered. Ooh.
He he's slow. He's slow dance, perhaps. OK, OK, OK. He won it. It wasn't particularly close, but it was closer than it usually is when senators run for governor. Obviously, you can imagine that they have a pretty big advantage with all the name recognition and kind of political network that they have.
You know, he is, you know, fairly standard conservative guy. He's wealthy. Like that was a theme actually of the night. A lot of self funders, a lot of wealthy people winning Republican primaries. And then the Senate seat that he left open was won by Representative Jim Banks, who is also a, you know, kind of standard conservative Republican. Interestingly, he didn't face any opposition. He basically was handed the seat. The NRSC cleared the field for him essentially.
It was interesting, like a lot of there have been polls showing that people don't really know him very well because he just hasn't had to campaign and such. So that'll be interesting to see what he's like as a senator. All right. Well, thank you for that update, Nathaniel. Now let's play a round of buy, sell, hold. But first, a break.
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Let's look ahead to the rest of 2024 with a round of buy, sell, hold. Now, we've played this game before, but a little refresh before we begin. I'm going to read you a prediction and give you the rough percentage chance that it will happen based on the betting markets. If you think that percentage is too low, that it underestimates the likelihood of the outcome, you will buy.
If you think the percentage overestimates the likelihood, you will sell. Buy low, sell high. And if you think it's just right, you will hold.
To establish the going rate of these predictions, we will turn to who else but the Scottish teens. That's a deep cut. I know back in the day we decided that those were the folks who were betting on these online markets for politics. In jest. In jest, of course. Of course, in jest. I'm sure there are teens of all nationalities who are betting on these. Scots of all ages. Bots, teens, scots.
And because, like I mentioned, we don't have a perfect way of measuring conventional wisdom or narrative or whatever, this is our stand-in. Everyone ready? Let's do it. I hate this game. And that makes it all the more fun. The enthusiasm is palpable. Do you really hate it? Why do you hate it?
I just, it's so confusing. As someone who has not taken an economics course in my life, I cannot keep straight the buy, sell, hold thing. Like, I don't know. Like, I can tell you what I roughly think the odds are of various events happening, but like, I have to like, this requires too much brain power. Nathaniel, I don't believe you. I just, I think this is a bit, this is a bit.
All right, for the first one, we're just going to get this out of the way, the presidential matchup in 2024. But I promise these will get a little weirder as we go through. So first, according to Polymarket, there is a 47% chance that Trump wins the presidential election. Buy, sell, whore.
hold. Kayleigh, what are you doing? Buy. You're buying. Elliot? I'm buying. I think it's at least a couple percentage points higher. Elliot's also buying. Nathaniel? I will also buy. All right. We have a buy, buy, buy. 47% chance that Trump wins the election. Folks say it is higher. Now, I'm curious...
Elliot, you said a few percentage points. Kaylee, are you also buying a fairly narrow margin or are you placing this closer to like 55%? In my head right now, again, this is like based on vibes because the forecast isn't actually out yet, so.
Elliot probably has more insight than I do, but I feel like it's closer to 50-50 right now, basically. So for some context here, Polymarket rates Biden's chance of winning the presidential election at 44%. So based on all of this, there is a 9% chance that it is neither Trump or Biden, which could mean not just third party, but either third party or Biden.
a real wild card. Yeah, the issue is both of those candidates should be higher. Like, I would say the wild card scenario is like 1% or something like that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I would be selling, is that right? The wild card scenario. Oh, I would smash the sell button on that third-party option for sure. This is a weakness of the betting markets. They always love the black swan scenario. Gavin Newsom
coming up over that, over that hill on a horse. Like, does he ride horses? I don't know. Probably. People really rush into certain possibilities and then drop them at like the first sign of problem, which we will get into when we talk about Kristi Noem. Uh,
And her likelihood of becoming Trump's running mate. But, Elliot, where, you know, I know you're working on the model in the background, but where, you know, if not 47%, where are you putting this at? Elliot needs to recuse himself here. Yeah, unfair. Because he's seen numbers, actual numbers on this. Unfair advantage. Yeah, I would buy, I mean, I would buy that Trump probability before I would buy the Biden probability. I think the Trump probability is lower, it's too low.
compared to the Biden probability, which is lower, but not too low. Interesting. And to give you a little hint, but this is kind of the question I'm asking myself in my head is like, what situation would I hold under? And
It depends somewhat on the amount of money we are able to bet in this scenario. If we could bet an infinite amount of money, then a one or two cent difference is very valuable to me. I'm logging off. Okay, so say you got infinite money. Are we holding at 55? I would hold at 55.
I would hold. I would sell at 55. For Trump? Okay. All right. Sell at Trump, 55. So somewhere between 47 and 55, but we're not going to get any more specific than that because the forecast is not yet out. Okay, moving on. According to PolyMarket, there is a 4% chance RFK Jr. wins the presidential election. Buy, sell, hold. Sell? Come on. I'm selling. Sell. Sell.
All right. And we're moving right along. Okay. No explanation needed. Next one. Next one. There is a 14% chance that Joe Biden drops out of the presidential election. Sell. That's a tougher sell, but I would make myself sell. Sell. But do you know if dropout includes like... For our purposes, let's say not the candidate come November 5th. I mean, I don't think he's going to die either. I would say there's like a...
I think there's probably like a 1% chance of him dying and a 1% chance of him dropping out. So, yeah. Interesting. Okay. All right. So, moving on. According to Polymarket, there is a 78% chance that Republicans flip a 2020 Biden state in 2024. Buy, sell, hold. I would hold. Interesting. Elliot? I think I'd buy. Okay.
Nathaniel? Hold. Oh, I'm with Elliot. I'm buying that all day long. Come on. Georgia, Arizona? Buying meaning you think it's higher. I think it's higher. I think there's at least an 80% chance that Republicans flip Biden 2020. I mean, if you look at the Sun Belt right now, this is not saying that Trump is going to win the election. It's saying that there's going to be some...
some rebound from the lows that Trump experienced in the Sun Belt in 2020? It's basically saying there's a 22% chance that Biden will meet or exceed his 2020 performance. Right, right. When you flip it that way, then maybe I would buy. So, yeah. I mean, like, that could happen because it is like the same two candidates. I think just like a straight up repeat is, would not shock me at all. I guess I would be surprised if he does better. Well,
Well, okay, let's ask that. According to the same betting market, there's a 31% chance that Democrats flip a Trump 2020 state. It's not the same. That's not the reverse. It's not the opposite, right? Because, like, I could see Biden winning North Carolina, but losing Georgia or Arizona. Yeah, you could buy both of these. Yeah, you can buy both of these. It's called a realignment, if you will. No, it's not. It's not.
It's called hedging your bets. 30%. 31% chance that Democrats flip a Trump 2020 state in 2024. What's the optimal Kelly criterion for allocating our money? Sell. You're selling. Selling. Okay. It's less than a 31% chance. Yeah. I don't know that it's... Odds are so hard. That's fair. Elliot, where are you coming down on this? I think I'm also selling. I think there's a less than 30% chance.
probability that Biden flips North Carolina, Texas, Florida, Ohio, or Iowa. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's basically North Carolina. I guess he has an outside shot at Florida or Texas, but I think by far the easiest state for him would be North Carolina. And I do think he has a less than 30% chance of carrying North Carolina, so I will sell. And right, I don't think it's that big of a difference, but I do think it's big enough to sell.
Okay, this is our final electoral presidential map question before we move on to some funkier ones. According to Smarkets, there is a 74% chance that the Democratic Party will win the popular vote in the 2024 presidential election. Again, a 74% chance that the Democratic Party will win the popular vote.
I'm going to hold. All right. This is where things get interesting. Elliot? Yeah, this one's tough. Oh, I think I have to sell this one. Ooh, okay. All right. Less than a 74% chance for a small profit. Nathaniel? Yeah, I'm going to sell. You know, the polls can absolutely change, but right now Trump is leading in our polling average by about one point nationally.
Even if you take into account the fact historically that Democrats have won the popular vote in seven of the last eight presidential elections, and that's kind of the fundamentals part of your mental model, the odds are probably less than three and four. Your fundamental model?
Oh, it's very fun. Okay, now let's get to some funkier stuff. According to Polymarket, there is an 82% chance that Trump and Biden will debate before the election. 82% chance that they debate before the election. Now that we're switching topics, we're going to go in reverse. Nathaniel, starting with you. That's an easy one. I'm going to sell that.
You're selling that? Okay, Elliot. They're not going to debate. Selling the crap out of that one, yep. Yeah, my instinct is to sell. I'm like, did something happen that I missed where they planned a debate? The thing that happened is that Biden said that he was going to debate. Now, Trump has said he wants to do more debates. He wants to do them earlier in the cycle. And Biden told the press at the time, I fully plan on participating in debates, presumably later.
ones that are regularly condoned or normally condoned through the normal process, which Trump has taken issue with. I don't see how either campaign sees a benefit to a debate. Really? They both have to pretend that they want to debate. Yeah.
And so that's why you see this dance. But like, I don't think either one actually wants to debate. Well, the conventional wisdom is that Trump wants to debate, but Biden doesn't. I think Trump would probably be more likely to benefit from a debate, but I don't... What's the evidence that Trump wants to debate? He continuously skipped a bunch of debates and like seems to be... He seems to be very disdainful against them. Come on, that's a different story. The primary versus the general? In like 2020, he also like tried to get out of debates.
I don't think he feels that he needs them as any kind of benefit. He's got lots of other platforms. I don't think debating really helps either one. I have like a very thesis about this that's very informed by polarization. And especially because we already know who they are and the issues that they're treading ground on.
Unless they're banking on the other person really, really having a terrible time, then there's no incentive for them to debate. So I think the probability is at least less than 50%, so that's why I'm selling. All right. So apart from the RFK probabilities, the first resounding, resounding sell. Moving on to vice presidential possibilities for Trump.
A 20% chance that Trump picks Tim Scott as his VP. 20% chance, Tim Scott. Nathaniel, buy, sell, hold. If you like assume there's like five finalists and they each have an equal chance.
I guess I'll hold. That sounds about right. You know, he's like, yeah, one of about five people in the mix. I'm going to buy, not because I'm expecting profit, but because in the case that he does pick Tim Scott, I want to be like, oh, I bought this. All right. Kaylee? I was going to hold. That sounds about right. Like, he's in the mix, but I don't know that it's a guarantee. I'm buying. I'm buying because of the...
other possibilities being overrated. I mean, that's the same as Tim Scott, I guess, being underrated. But it's just not... This seems like a clear choice. The other picks are accompanied by a lot of either baggage or questions or whatnot. And so I think at this point, after Kristi Noem has sort of not...
made her entrance on the national stage in a graceful way. And I've always thought there was a little argument for somebody like Elise Stefanik, the other people like JD Vance or Marco Rubio. It's a little like, what is he getting here? So yeah, I'm buying Tim Scott at 20% and not just because I want to brag when or if he's picked, but because I actually think that. What would you sell at? 50. Oh, that's
That's high. That's too high. At this stage? For any one person. All right. All right. Okay. So now let's move on to a spicier one. A 2% chance that Trump picks Kristi Noem as his VP.
Buy, sell, hold. That's the current going rate on Polymarket, by the way. Okay, actually, now that I am looking at the chart, it is down to a 1% chance that Kristi Noem becomes the VP pick from 2% yesterday. And this is down from an all-time high of, wait for it, wait for it,
Can anyone guess? Actually, can anyone guess what the all-time high was for Kristi Noem? 1840. 56% chance. Nice, yeah. Some people made money off that. Some people lost a lot of money. But this, my friends, is why the political betting markets can be off the rails sometimes. Anyway, back to the matter at hand, a 1% chance that Kristi Noem
is Trump's pick for a running mate. Nathaniel, buy, sell, hold. I guess I'll hold. Like, yeah, I was a big Kristi Noe. I was sure it was going to be her. But now, obviously, I think it would be pretty silly. You keep the 1% chance, I guess, because Trump is unpredictable. He did come out, I think, yesterday to be like, oh, I still really like her. But I would assume that his advisors would be like, dude, you cannot pick her. I'm selling. I'm selling at 1%. That's too high. Yeah.
Okay. Kaylee? Do I think Chrissy Nome will be the running mate? No. Would I buy this? Yes. Because...
The markets are so weird. I don't know. I could tick up just a little bit. I could make a little extra money before people really get the memo. Wait, that wasn't part of the parameters of the game, Galen. We were only getting paid out. I thought we were only getting paid out at the expiration of the contract. If it's at the end, then yeah. Like sell. Yeah. I don't want another stock.
All right. Final veep question before we move on to Trump legal liability. According to Smarkets, there is an 89% chance that Kamala Harris will be on the Democratic ticket. Sorry, I didn't hear what you said. I was too caught up on this thing being called Smarkets. I hate that so much. Wow, I love it. Is it smart or smarmy? Smart markets. Yeah, right.
Speedy? It's the Speedy markets. Nathaniel, buy Selhol. Buy, unless she has a secret love child, she will be on the Democratic ticket. And even then, you know, is that really a reason she won't be on the Democratic ticket? Elliot? I guess I'll buy that. Yeah, buy that.
All right, moving on to our next section. And Elliot, we're going to begin with you here. According to Polymarket, there is a 19% chance that Trump goes to jail before Election Day. A 19% chance that Trump goes to jail before Election Day. Buy, sell, hold.
I mean, I wouldn't be in this market at all, but conditional on having to do something, I guess I sell it. But just because of the amount of uncertainty, I just think that's really unlikely. I mean, if it's uncertain, then I should buy because it's reverted to 50-50, but I don't think it's... Anyway, I'm between selling and holding. I might hold just because of the warning he got from the judge this week about continuing to break his gag order. I think he's going to keep doing it.
Yeah, I mean, with the huge caveat that, you know, I'm an elections analyst and not a legal analyst, and therefore this is analyzing something I have absolutely no expertise in.
I guess I would hold because just gut-wise, yeah, for what Kayleigh said seems right to me, but I really truly have no idea. With the same caveats, I guess I would say Sal. And the reason is because I think at this point, it's very likely that the Manhattan case is the only one that goes to trial before Election Day. And given that he has, Trump has no criminal past, it's unlikely that
based on conversations with legal analysts that he would end up in jail over this case. Um,
So I guess there's the off chance that Judge Huamarshan puts him in jail for violating a gag order. I mean, that's huge. I have to imagine there's a lot, a lot, a lot of reasons not to do that. So 19% chance seems quite high. 19% does seem high, yeah. That does seem high. You've convinced me. You just made a lot of money off of movement in the market, Galen. Good job. Okay, moving on. We are going back to...
A couple more elections questions before we wrap up. Thank God. According to Predict It, there's a 52% chance that the Democratic Party will win the 2024 U.S. Senate election in Ohio. Sherrod Brown, what do you think, Elliot? Buy, sell, hold.
I'll hold Sherrod Brown at 52. Okay. Oh, interesting. All right. I might buy it. You might buy it. Really? Wow. I'm between a buy and a hold. No, I'm selling for sure. It's extremely rare these days for the state to vote for a different presidential candidate as Senate candidate. Ohio is very probably going to vote for Trump. And Sherrod Brown is actually not that strong of an incumbent.
He has basically run to expectations in three strong years for Democrats. 2006 was good. 2012, Obama carried Ohio. And 2018, of course, was a blue wave year. So I do not think that Sherrod Brown has any special secret sauce. I think that Jon Tester has a better shot in Montana.
Well, I was between hold and sell, but that really just tipped me over there, that analysis from our senior election analyst, Daniel Rakich. So I'm going to sell that. All right. Final, final question. This is an oddly priced one. Going back to Polymarket, there is a 4% chance that Nikki Haley endorses Donald Trump before June. So specific. This month, the month of May. Wouldn't she have done it already?
4% is pretty low. You want to buy a lot of things at 4%, but why is this even a market question? Yeah, it's weird. Why not? How much money can we suck up from people by adding dumb questions to our website? I'll hold it for...
I mean, I guess I would buy because, yeah, 4% is just like very low. But I agree that like I don't think I think either she would have endorsed him shortly after dropping out or she's going to wait till like October when the pressure is on her. Yeah, I would hold for those same reasons. I just I'm trying to think of a reason why in the next three weeks she would suddenly come up with an endorsement.
All right. And that is a wrap. Your checks or debts will be in the mail. Thank you so much for participating, Kaylee, Nathaniel, and Elliot. Thanks, Galen. Thanks, Galen. Yep. Ripped my wallet. My name is Galen Druk. Our producers are Shane McKeon and Cameron Chertavian. And our intern is Jayla Everett. You can get in touch by emailing us at podcasts at 538.com. You can also, of course, tweet us with any questions or comments. If you're a fan of the show, leave us a rating or review in the Apple Podcast Store or tell someone about us. Thanks for listening, and we will see you soon.
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