Do endorsements matter to Trump Supporters?

USA Today came out with an editorial declaring Donald Trump unfit for the presidency.  USA Today is known to be one of the least biased media organizations. Many other local and national newspapers have called out Donald Trump.  No former presidents have endorsed him.  Very few senators and congressmen have endorsed him.  But yet Donald Trump could still pull off at least 40% or even 45% of the overall vote in November. The question is how is Donald Trump surviving as a candidate when so many people publically denounce him as "unfit for the presidency" or "inexperienced" or "unprepared".  I am going to look at this poll from The Economist/YouGov about Trump supporters opinions on the media and government. I  choose it because it is more comprehensive than most polls and has demographic breakdowns of every question.  In my analysis a Trump supporter is someone  who will likely vote for Trump in November.  And I am assuming that most Trump supporters is voting for him because they like him as candidate in general regardless of their opinions of the other candidates (88% of polled Trump supporters had a "very favorable" or "somewhat favorable" view of him).

The data is here: https://d25d2506sfb94s.cloudfront.net/cumulus_uploads/document/q8r0rkibs1/econTabReport.pdf

Since this is one poll you can't use these results as exact percentages of all Trump supporters but you can learn some things about the typical or average Trump supporter.

The Media

72% of polled Trump supporters (remember there is going to be some variability in this number) think the media is done a "worse than usual job" covering this election than previous elections. A 95% confidence interval would be (67.6%,76.4%) so we could safely say it is very likely that most Trump supporters do not think the media is doing a good job with this election.

For comparison 50% of Clinton supporters (and 58% overall) think the media has done a "worse than usual job")

The Government

6% of polled Trump supporters "Strongly approve" or "Somewhat approve" of Congress's job performance (the percentage for all responses was 13%, and 12% of republicans).  18% of polled Trump supporters were neutral.
A 95% confidence interval would be ( 3.8%,8.22%) for "strongly approve" or "somewhat approve" of the performance of congress.


95% of polled Trump supporters say the country is on the wrong track.
For comparison this number was 65% overall.

The  top 4 most important issue  (listed in order) of the Trump supporter in this poll are: Terrorism, Social Security, Immigration, The economy.

For comparison for all respondents the four top issues were : Social Security, the economy, Terrorism, Health Care.  For polled Clinton supporters they were : Social Security, the economy, health care, the environment/gun control (these were tied).

Conclusion

The typical Donald Trump supporter doesn't like the media coverage of the election, direction of this country, and Congress, more so than other people.  Because of this they may not care about endorsements as much as the usual voter.  Another interesting thing is that 51% of polled Trump supporters said they felt enthusiastic about Donald Trump, but only 38% of polled Clinton supporters felt enthusiastic about Hillary Clinton.   Since this is one  poll from a few days it's not going to give us the answers to the opinions of all Trump supporters but it can help to explain  Trump's consistent support regardless of his actions. These opinions may also explain why Trump won the primary with very few endorsements from politicians (compared to previous years).   Trump's supporters (especially those who have been with him since the primary) are not going to change their mind at this point.

First Debate Response

I watched the debate and various pre-debate analysis. I am watching the post-debate analysis.  Here are my initial thoughts on what tonight means.

I don't think anyone won.  Trump and Clinton both acted as I expected.  Trump was open about his opinion and wasn't afraid to call out Clinton but he didn't do it in a professional way.  Clinton is the better debater in my opinion, but as much as she said she prepared I was unimpressed.  I thought she seemed canned and rehearsed. It looked like she planned every statement she said about Trump and didn't do a good job improving.  If there is a shift in the polls, it will probably be small.  I will be monitoring the response of polls  and researching the statements asserted by both candidates.  I noticed a few things that I knew where not true from both sides, but I don't know a enough about either candidate to know if most of the statements tonight were factual.

Debate Preview

I have been sick off and on this week so I forgot about the friday post.

Debate Preview:

The first debate is tomorrow.  Here is what I am watching for all the candidates.

Hillary Clinton

Hillary has debated before this election cycle.  She is more experienced than Trump, and has been pretty level headed.  Her poll numbers have been steady since her nomination.  Her biggest weakness is some people don't see her as honest and trustworthy. What I am looking for is her engagement of the voters who don't like her or Trump.  If she can convince people that she is better than Trump, and that the third-party candidates are not good options (mainly because neither third party candidates have a real shot at winning).  

Donald Trump

It seems that the presidential acting Donald Trump has diminished and him and his surrogates are returning to the brash, controversial, honest style.  His biggest weakness because he doesn't do a good job at outlining policies, and often insults various groups. Donald Trump's path to the presidency means he must convince more people to support him, and make sure that all his supporters vote for him.  My current theory is that Donald Trump won the nomination by having a very large percentage of his supports turn out to the primary (a crowded field helped this as well).  

Gary Johnson (Libertarian Party)

Gary Johnson did  not qualify for the debate. However, he was close and has a chance of making the cut in the future debates. He will be at Hofstra University and is holding a rally there.  If he can get some press both tomorrow and in the future he could qualify for the next debate which I think would skyrocket his polls.  His biggest challenge is he is not getting the coverage the two main party candidates are.

Jill Stein (Green Party)

Jill Stein has no chance of making a debate.  I think she even knows this.  Her campaign is not about winning as much as it is about bringing attention to climate change and foreign policy.  She will be periscoping  (live video streaming) during the debate at Hofstra University but not inside the debate hall.

Overall I am excited to see how things play out over tomorrow.

Is Trump beginning to look presidential?

This week Trump announced this plan to lower child care costs and enable nationwide maternity leave.  Trump also called out Clinton for saying half of his supporters are "deplorable".  Trump hasn't made any major mistakes or made any major isolating comments lately.  Of course he is still attacking the media in general, and isn't behaving like most presidents but I have noticed an improvement in his tone.  Does this mean he has a better chance to win if he keeps up this good behavior? Yes, but it will be an uphill battle and he will probably have to apologize to voters to gain enough support to win the white house.  I will have to watch how this plays out in the coming weeks and months.

Is 2016 a repeat of 1992?

In 1992, Bill Clinton won the presidential election with 370 electors. The republican candidate was George Bush and he was running for re-election which historically is easier to win. But there was a third party candidate Ross Perot who got 18% of the popular vote.  Ross Perot was conservative and appealed to many traditional republicans.  Because of this Clinton was able to win states that are historically red: Kentucky, Tennessee, and Montana, and also he won most of the swing states. 

Fast forward to 2016: a Clinton, a strong 3rd party candidate, and a republican with personality are running.  Gary Johnson, the libertarian candidate, is polling around 10% when his name is included (often he is categorized under other).  I don't think that Johnson will win, or that he will even win a state.  But Johnson will have a major effect on the election.   If Johnson gets 5% of the vote in a swing state and his voters are conservative (at least economically) he  could lower the percentage that Donald Trump gets.  Trump is already struggling in some swing states like Florida and Colorado.  If Trump loses Michigan, Florida, and Pennsylvania it would be basically impossible for him to win.   Most national polls are within the margin of error, but on a state-by-state view Clinton is leading.

Johnson isn't perfect.  This week he didn't know the significance of Alepo in Syria. But since he and his running were republican governors in blue states they could make some ground. A lot of the swing states are going to be close and if conservative voters  vote for Johnson instead of Trump that could make 2016 deja vu of the 1992 election.

My Initial Beliefs about this election

Between the end of my predictions and today I have continued to monitor current events and their possible effect on the election. After watching press conferences, speeches, and the news media I had learned about the dynamics of this race.  I have decided with the help of Politco's Swing State information that I am considering the following 11 states swings states for the purpose of this election.

1. Colorado

2. Florida

3. Iowa

4. Michigan

5. Nevada

6. New Hampshire

7. North Carolina

8. Ohio

9. Pennsylvania

10. Virginia

11. Wisconsin

These states have a total of 148 electoral college electors.

To help learn about these states I will be monitoring senate races, house races, and gubernatorial elections in these states to help me predict these states.

Based on previous elections I have divided the remaining states into red and blue.  This classification are fluid and some states in these categories may change before the election. For the sake of space and time I will not list these states at this time, but I will provide the electoral college total for each candidate from these states. I am currently assigning 0 states to both the Green Party and Libertarian Party Candidate because I do not foresee them winning a state at this time.

Red States (Donald Trump) : 173

Blue States (Hillary Clinton): 217

To win the election you need 270 electors.  Because of Hillary Clinton's lead in multiple polls and the fact she has 44 additional electors from non-swing states leads me to believe that Hillary Clinton has a better chance of being president than Donald Trump or the third party candidates.  However this may change.  But Donald Trump's recent comments about African Americans, immigration, and mexico have caused some voters to turn to Hillary Clinton or Gary Johnson (Libertarian Candidate).  From a math standpoint to win the election you must attract multiple demographics.  You need to appeal to voters regardless of gender, education, and race.  Now Hillary Clinton also has come up recently in the news about her email scandal.  But the information and narrative email scandal has not really changed in a few months so it shouldn't have a major effect on her (except in the unlikely event that Hillary gets charged with some crime relating to the emails).  

Bias Statement: I am currently undecided on who I will vote for in the election, although I consider myself a republican I do not have strong ties to any candidate in this election.

Looking Forward to November

I wanted to reupdate my blog as I begin preparing for the November Election.  My rules and format will be very similar to what I did in the primary process. I am planning on Participating in the American Statistical Association's Prediction 2016 contest.  This means on top of generating a state by state call I will also predict turnout,and voting patterns among certain demographic groups. Information on the contest can be found here: http://thisisstatistics.org/electionprediction2016/ .

Prediction Rules
1. All states final call for accuracy purposes will by November 5th 10:59 PM CST.
2.  A report will be made with a current call of the election  after October 24th based on my submission to the Prediction 2016 contest.  It is expected that these numbers will change before my final call.  The exact date of this post is to be determine but it will be before the final call on November 5th.
3.  I will provide an weekly update every friday before the election excluding November 4th, 2016 . These subjects will include my thoughts on the election and possible predictions. These predictions may be more fluid and not exact calls (i.e. I think Clinton will win based on the information I have as of 9/2/16).
4.  My calls for my predictions will be broken up into multiple posts and a summary post will also be made.
5.  All calls will include a margin of error, but the electoral college elector assignment will be rounded to the nearest whole number.
6. After the election both the data from the primary  and the general election will be written into a paper to submit for publication.
7.  Posts will not be edited, but rather corrections will appear in the comments.





Prediction Methodology:
I am currently exploring the idea of using a python program to process Pollster files to create my model.  I am planning on using Bayesian ideology and possibly Bayes Rule.  Updates on my programming progress will be included.  If I can not get the program to work I will continue my method from the primary process and use excel for data processing.



Any edits to my methodology will be commented on this post.

Later today I will post my current views of the race in an article.