Historian Allan Litchman has been right 9 out of 10 times. But critics say his model is flawed
Allan Lichtman, a historian with a penchant for predicting U.S. presidential elections, says Democratic Vice-President Kamala Harris is on track to become the first female president of the United States. (Pedro Ugarte/AFP/Getty Images)
As It Happens6:33Kamala Harris will win, says man with near-perfect record of predicting U.S. elections
The man who accurately predicted the outcome of nine of the last 10 U.S. presidential elections says this is going to be one for the history books.
Allan Lichtman, a U.S. presidential historian at American University in Washington, D.C., says Democratic Vice-President Kamala Harris will defeat her Republican rival, former president Donald Trump.
"Kamala Harris will become the first woman president of the United States, at least putting a big crack in the glass ceiling, if not shattering it entirely," Lichtman told As It Happens host Nil Köksal.
Using a formula he developed with late geophysicist Vladimir Keilis-Borok, Lichtman has accurately predicted the winner of every U.S. presidential election since 1984, except George W. Bush in 2000. He even predicted Republican Donald Trump's victory 2016 in the face of widespread polling that suggested his Democratic rival, Hillary Clinton, would win.
Despite his track record, Lichtman's methods have repeatedly come under scrutiny from pollsters, political scientists and other historians, who say his model is unscientific and subjective.
"I'm used to the whips and scorns of criticism," Lichtman said. "Show me your 40-year track record before you throw stones at mine."
The 13 keys to the White House
The key to Lichtman's success, he says, are his keys. Specifically, the 13 keys to the White House, his election-predicting formula that he says is based on analysis of every U.S. presidential election dating back to 1860.
The keys are a set of true/false statements that act as checklist for the incumbent party — in this case, the Democrats. If six or more keys go against the incumbent party, then its candidate is predicted to lose.
"Six strikes and you're out," he said.
The keys are: Party mandate: After the midterm elections, the incumbent party holds more seats in the U.S. House of Representatives than after the previous midterm elections.
Contest: There is no serious contest for the incumbent party nomination.
Incumbency: The incumbent party candidate is the sitting president.
Third party: There is no significant third party or independent campaign.
Short-term economy: The economy is not in recession during the election campaign.
Long-term economy: Real per capita economic growth during the term equals or exceeds mean growth during the previous two terms.
Policy change: The incumbent administration effects major changes in national policy.
Social unrest: There is no sustained social unrest during the term.
Scandal: The incumbent administration is untainted by major scandal.
Foreign/military failure: The incumbent administration suffers no major failure in foreign or military affairs.
Foreign/military success: The incumbent administration achieves a major success in foreign or military affairs.
Incumbent charisma: The incumbent party candidate is charismatic or a national hero.
Challenger charisma: The challenging party candidate is not charismatic or a national hero.
Lichtman has awarded eight keys to Harris: contest, third party, short-term economy, long-term economy, policy change, social unrest, scandal, and challenger charisma.
WATCH | Allan Lichtman breaks down his 13 keys:
American historian Allan Lichtman has accurately predicted the outcome of 9 out of the 10 last U.S. elections. And now he's predicting Democratic nominee Kamala Harris will win the 2024 contest. Lichtman explains his prediction on Power & Politics.
He justified those decisions in a recent TV interview with Power & Politics host Dave Cochrane. He said Harris's successful fundraising efforts and large crowd sizes aren't enough to net her a "charisma" key.
"Nothing against her. I think she is appealing. But that's not the definition of the key," he said. "You have to be one of those once-in-a-generation, truly inspirational, transformational candidates who broadly appeals across party lines."
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Lichtman says the widespread protests over the Israel-Gaza war aren't enough for Harris to lose the "social unrest" key.
"To turn that key, it has to be massive sustained social unrest that calls into question the stability of the country," he said.
Despite being a Democrat, she doesn't get the incumbent key because she took over for President Joe Biden — something Lichtman warned against at the time.
"I was worried they would push him out, which would cost one key, the incumbency key, but that they would make a big mistake and have a big party brawl … which would cost them a second key, the contest key," he said.
"Well, it turned out they did somehow grow a brain and a spine. They united behind Harris, which saved the contest key."
Two keys, foreign military success and foreign military failure, he says, remain undecided, but they aren't enough to flip the table.
Eschewing polls and punditry
Lichtman says his formula works because it eschews polls and punditry for a deeper historical analysis.
"The keys tap into the structure of how American presidential elections really work," he told Köksal. "They're fundamentally different, which is another reason why I get criticized."
And he does, indeed, get criticized.
Harris, left, will take on her Republican rival, Donald Trump, in a televised debate on Tuesday evening. (Charles Rex Arbogast/The Associated Press) Julia Azari, a political scientist at Marquette University in Wisconsin, says the "fuss" around Lichtman formula is "silly at best."
"The 13 keys are at their most useful as starting points for questions: what makes for a damaging, divisive primary contest? What counts as a policy failure? What is charisma? These are interesting and important questions. But it is not in any real sense a 'model,'" Azari told CBC in an email, echoing a statement she provided to Newsweek.
In that same Newsweek article, James E. Campbell, a professor emeritus of political science at the University of Buffalo, said: "Many of the keys or indicators are highly subjective. Whether there has been social unrest or a major scandal or whether either candidate is or is not charismatic, for instance, are judged 'in eye of the beholder.'"
Election too close to call: pollster Nate Silver
Pollster Nate Silver, who has often butted heads with Lichtman, told CBC Radio earlier this week the election remains too close to call.
"Kamala Harris had had a lot of momentum coming out of her replacement of Biden. She consolidated support among the Democrats very quickly. But now there perhaps has been a turn in the polls," he told The Sunday Magazine host Piya Chattopadhyay.
"If we had an election today, it would be very close, perhaps an edge toward Trump."
LISTEN | Nate Silver on the U.S. election and the usefulness of polls:
The Sunday Magazine20:26Nate Silver weighs the rewards of taking risks in politics and beyondNate Silver rose to prominence in American politics for election forecasting. But before he became a well known statistician and created the polling aggregator FiveThirtyEight, Silver was a poker player. That’s where he learned the importance of taking – and avoiding – risks in both gambling and politics. Silver joins Piya Chattopadhyay to talk about his new book On the Edge: The Art of Risking Everything and how both luck and risk are shaping the current United States election.
As of Tuesday, Silver's newsletter — Silver Bulletin, which aggregates and analyzes national polls — had Harris in a slight lead. But he told Fox News on Sunday that Trump is better poised to win the Electoral College.
Nevertheless, Silver says Tuesday night's debate between Harris and Trump "will be probably more important than what the polls say."
Lichtman, meanwhile, says he issued his prediction before the debate to make a point. After all, he says, Hillary Clinton was widely declared the winner of the 2016 presidential debates.
"I wanted to get across my message, which I've been screaming about for 40 years: It's governing, not campaigning, that counts," he said.
"If people understood that, and if candidates acted on it, we could get away from these meaningless, negative, sound bite-driven campaigns and have campaigns on real substance."
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