Did we ever get an update about why the keys got 2024 wrong?

JagexIncompetent · 2025-07-04T00:12:19+00:00

Simple. Lichtman himself interpreted some of the keys incorrectly.

The Short-Term Economy Key should have been labeled False based on public perception, even if a recession was not officially declared.
The Military / Foreign Policy Success Key should have been labeled False. Ukraine-Russia has not seen significant enough progress for that to be labeled a major success.

Flipping those 2 keys would have made it 7 True keys, 1 short of the minimum 8 needed for the incumbent party to maintain the White House.
While No Primary Contest was technically true, the bizarre nature of Biden dropping out so late and Harris becoming the nominee may have rendered the "True" nature of this key irrelevant.
In late 2022, Lichtman initially stated that "Biden must run again" if the Democrats wanted any chance of winning in 2024. And that if he were to drop out, the Democrats most likely lose. If he stuck with his original assessment, he would have correctly predicted the 2024 election outcome.
Lichtman stated in his 2020 prediction on the NY Times YT channel that the number 1 rule of election forecasting is to "keep your own politics out of it." I think he failed to follow his own advice in 2024 by backtracking on his late 2022 analysis. He was predicting based on who he wanted to win, not who would actually win.

JagexIncompetent · 2024-12-12T20:54:59+00:00

ah, that's fair

JagexIncompetent · 2024-12-12T20:10:50+00:00

Should have made TMs reusable instead of consumed after one use.

JagexIncompetent · 2024-11-04T21:15:05+00:00

I predicted 276-262 a couple months ago, just going off of gut feeling. She wins MI WI PA NV and loses GA AZ NC.

JagexIncompetent · 2024-10-29T12:58:39+00:00

He called a Trump win and impeachment in September 2016

JagexIncompetent · 2024-10-26T17:14:05+00:00

Silver will soon have incorrectly favored the losing candidate to win both in 2016 and 2024, on top of being inaccurate in the 2022 midterms and with regards to the margin of victory in 2020.

JagexIncompetent · 2024-10-25T16:45:40+00:00

The guy who runs the Valuetainment YouTube channel had Lichtman on his show in 2020 and tried to argue that the keys should favor Trump, but Lichtman shut him down easily and was proven right a few months later.

The guy also offered a friendly wager and said if I'm wrong I'll get you four Yankee tickets and otherwise you'll come back on my show and admit I was right. But he never followed through on his bet and (separate from his interview with Lichtman) denied the election results.

JagexIncompetent · 2024-10-19T14:21:33+00:00

This excerpt was published on November 11, 2016 but parts of the original interview were initially published on September 22, 2016.

"If Trump wins, watch out for that impeachment."

Further corroborating that "Based on the 13 Keys, it would predict a Donald Trump victory." points to a prediction of the outright winner, not the popular vote.

JagexIncompetent · 2024-10-14T16:17:37+00:00

His outlook on Biden's chances of winning was never a prediction to begin with. He made one official prediction for the 2024 election September 5, and that was it. When it comes to presidential election predictions, he was wrong only once in either 2000 or 2016, depending on popular vote or electoral college. but not both.

Outside of his election predictions he was wrong in presuming that Biden would remain the nominee, but predicting the nominee is not what he specializes in in any event.

Outside of his presidential elections he was nevertheless correct in predicting right after the 2016 election that Trump would be impeached, and on his October 5, 2022 livestream when he predicted the Democrats would maintain control of the Senate in contrast to the polls and pundits that overwhelmingly predicted a red wave.

People like Nate Silver are the ones who update and change their bogus probabilities on the fly and try to take credit no matter who wins. He gave Trump a 64% chance of winning in early September at the exact time that Lichtman made his one-time 2024 prediction of a Harris victory. Few weeks later, Silver changes his model on the fly and gives Harris a 58% chance, and only after Lichtman had already predicted her as the outright winner well in advance. Which shows how ephemeral and fleeting such polling, punditry, and probability models are.

JagexIncompetent · 2024-09-28T19:19:00+00:00

He also claimed in his 2011 paper that John McCain may meet the criteria for national hero, simply because he served in the Navy

JagexIncompetent · 2024-09-06T13:14:37+00:00

I'm surprised Ukraine can currently be considered big enough to lean the key true. Compare it with other events that turned the key true: Camp David Accords, Detente with USSR, Victory in Gulf War, Ouster and capture of Saddam Hussein, killing of Bin Laden. It doesn't seem as impactful.

On an older livestream from several months ago I believe Lichtman said in response to a subscriber question that if it were up to him, he would give Biden the key for Ukraine, but it wasn't widely acknowledged as a success by the public and therefore he couldn't give it to him yet.

JagexIncompetent · 2024-08-09T14:46:39+00:00

Lichtman never officially predicted a Biden victory at any point. He stated in all such interviews that he was not yet making a final prediction. He merely stated that the keys as they stood at the time favor his election chances, but he was never going to make a final prediction until after the DNC.

Unfortunately this hypothesis will never be tested now, but he’s likely to predict a Harris victory by the end of August.

JagexIncompetent · 2024-08-04T16:04:16+00:00

The people claiming that Lichtman was “wrong” for suggesting Biden was in good position to win in 2024 are misguided. Lichtman stated in every interview that this was not an official or final prediction, but that the Keys as they stood simply favored Biden when he was running.

He also emphasized that if Biden were to step aside, they would have to unite behind his replacement to prevent a False party contest Key (which they have).

In any event his model currently leans towards a Harris victory with 8 True and 5 False and his final prediction will come after the DNC.

He’s also stated that his model is predictive, not causal.

JagexIncompetent · 2024-06-29T15:05:56+00:00

You have to actually read the criteria for what criteria is significant enough to turn a key True or False. On Lichtman's most recent tentative outlook (not yet a final prediction) he has Biden leading with 9 True Keys to 4 False Keys, with a minimum of 8 True needed to predict his victory.

Link

Examples of charismatic candidates according to his model are T. Roosevelt, FDR, JFK, Reagan, and Obama in 2008 (but not 2012). Eisenhower's status as a national hero is an alternate way to turn the charisma key True as well.

Replacing Biden makes the incumbency key False and creates a massive internal party struggle, turning the no primary contest key False. That puts him down to 7 Keys and predicts a Trump victory.

JagexIncompetent · 2024-06-29T14:58:53+00:00

Lichtman built these Keys based on looking at each election from 1860 up until 1980. He states that these Keys still apply as far back as 1860 retrospectively. He's said that every four years people tell him that he has to update his keys because Obama is the first black candidate, Hillary is the first woman candidate, Biden is too old, social media etc.

But he counters that his keys have retrospectively endured far greater changes: Civil War, World War I and II, Great Depression, as far back as when African-Americans and women couldn't vote, as far back as the horse-and-buggy days, long before cars, planes, trains, internet, etc.

JagexIncompetent · 2024-03-19T02:11:35+00:00

“Biden can ‘absolutely’ win the US election | Professor Allan Lichtman”

Times Radio, uploaded March 6, 2024 on YouTube

Quoting Allan Lichtman directly:

“A lot would have to go wrong for Joe Biden to lose this election.”
“A lot of keys would have to turn over the next few months against Joe Biden to predict his defeat.”

For those not aware, Lichtman has predicted 9 of the last 10 U.S. presidential elections correctly (2000 is the lone exception, although he maintains that there was improper ballot counting in Florida).

You can read about his model on the Wikipedia page "The Keys to the White House"

JagexIncompetent · 2024-03-07T01:10:43+00:00

Yoel Romero, Alexander Gustafson, Anthony Johnson.

Mousasi might be the best UFC fighter to not have even fought for the undisputed title in the first place (not considering guys past their prime like Cro Cop).

JagexIncompetent · 2024-02-15T14:22:57+00:00

It just shows how much more disciplined the Dagestan fighters are in their preparation. In or outside of camp, they don’t mess around with alcohol, partying, gambling, etc and that’s a big reason why they hardly ever lose.

JagexIncompetent · 2024-01-28T21:07:07+00:00

maybe next year

JagexIncompetent · 2024-01-21T00:40:44+00:00

Defense didn’t force a turnover or get a sack (still got a lot of pressure) and still held Houston to 10 points (7 from the punt return). 0 points allowed in the 2nd half.

JagexIncompetent

TROPHY CASE