BY MARIKA MALAEA |
Newsweek
President Donald Trump and Melania Trump at the
official launch of the Trump 2020 campaign at the Amway Center in Orlando, Florida.
(Photo: MANDEL NGAN/GETTY)
Though President Donald Trump
currently trails several leading Democratic candidates in early national polls,
a research firm with a historically accurate model has him winning the 2020
election by a wide margin.
The Moody's model has predicted
presidential elections with success since 1980 until its first miss in 2016.
Like so many others, they predicted a Hillary Clinton win.
"In our post-mortem of the
2016 presidential election model, we determined that unexpected turnout
patterns were one of the factors that contributed to the model's first
incorrect election prediction," wrote Mark Zandi, Dan White and Bernard
Yerbos of Moody's Analytics.
"The model did not account
for the individual attributes of the candidates other than whether they
belonged to the incumbent political party. In other words, it assumed Donald
Trump and Hillary Clinton were generic candidates, which they were not,"
the research firm concluded.
Moody's uses three models to
come up with its forecast; in each case, Trump gets at least 289 Electoral
College votes.
The "pocketbook"
measure focuses on three economic variables: the change in gas prices, the
change in house prices, and changes in personal income. This is where Trump
shines brightest, grabbing a whopping 351 electoral votes.
"If voters were to vote
primarily on the basis of their pocketbooks, the president would steamroll the
competition," the report said.
The "stock market"
model relies on fewer economic variables than the pocketbook model and is the
least favorable model for Trump, but it still currently predicts a victory for
the president. Meanwhile, the "unemployment model" predicts a more
comfortable win for Trump than the stock market model.
Moody's Analytics may have
missed on the previous election but an economic analysis released in 2016 by
the research firm forecasting Trump's presidency has largely come true.
"Broadly, Mr. Trump's
economic proposals will result in a more isolated U.S. economy. Cross-border
trade and immigration will be significantly diminished, and with less trade and
immigration, foreign direct investment will also be reduced," Mark Zandi,
Chris Lafakis, Dan White and Adam Ozimek wrote in the
report.
The report also determined that
Trump's plans would hit the middle class the hardest while high-income earners
would benefit the most from his tax breaks, concluding with a simplified
overview.
"Even allowing for some
variability in the accuracy of the economic modeling and underlying assumptions
that drive the analysis, four basic conclusions regarding the impact of Mr.
Trump's economic proposals can be reached: 1) they will result in a less global
U.S. economy; 2) they will lead to larger government deficits and more debt; 3)
they will largely benefit very high-income households; and 4) they will result
in a weaker U.S. economy, with fewer jobs and higher unemployment."
The authors of the report,
however, warned that quantifying the real estate mogul's economic policies was
"complicated by their lack of specificity."
Zandi, chief economist at
Moody's Analytics, also acknowledged that sometimes numbers can't control the
outcome.
"It could be that this
election may be so out of bounds with history that the models just aren't going
to work," said Zandi.
"It could turn out this
thing runs on a dynamic you just can't model."
_________________
RELATED
ARTICLES
Sarah Sanders: Dems on debate stage knew
Warren is frontrunner and Biden is 'finished'
2020 Democrats have finally realized Sen.
Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., is now the party's frontrunner following
Tuesday's debate, and has eclipsed Joe
Biden in the race for the White House, said Sarah
Sanders Wednesday on "Fox &
Friends."
"The big loser... was Joe Biden," she
said. "It was incredibly telling that all of the fire that was
taken on stage was by Elizabeth Warren, and not Joe Biden --
indicating that even Democrats on that stage know that Biden
is finished and that Warren is the new frontrunner."
Sanders claimed Warren's ascension is a net positive for
Trump and said her new position as frontrunner will rebrand her as the
face of the party, to the detriment of other Democrats.
"She is the new face of the Democrat
party," Sanders said. "That is a great contrast for this
president. And I think it sets him up very nicely for
re-election in November."
Sanders also said the questioning at Tuesday's primary
debate was "pathetic" and slanted, in an effort to drag down Trump
and exonerate Biden.
"CNN accused President Trump in their
questions, yet gave Biden a complete free pass," she
said. "They gave him one question -- a very basic follow-up
and moved on. I couldn't believe that they glossed over the
corruption that we've seen exposed over the last several weeks, so
quickly as they did last night.
"Nobody else on stage even thought to call
Biden out," Sanders added. "I think they have
already decided to write him off and they're focusing their
fire on Elizabeth Warren."
Nick Givas is a reporter with Fox News. You can find
him on Twitter at @NGivasDC.
_________________
Pelosi: No House vote on impeachment inquiry
BY SCOTT WONG AND MIKE LILLIS | The Hill
Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.)
said Tuesday she will not stage a vote on the House floor to officially
launch an impeachment inquiry into President Trump.
The decision came after Democratic leaders, returning to
Washington following a two-week recess, had reached out to members of their
diverse caucus to gauge the party's support for such a vote.
After back-to-back meetings with party leaders and
then the full caucus, Pelosi announced that no such vote would take
place. Democratic aides emphasized, however, that the process remains
fluid and that Pelosi may reverse course and stage such a vote at any
point in the future.
"There's no requirement that we have a vote, and so
at this time we will not be having a vote," Pelosi told reporters during a
last-minute press briefing in the Capitol.
The decision arrives as Trump and his Republican allies
are amping up the pressure on Pelosi to hold a formal vote to begin the
investigation — a move they believe would grant the GOP more power and
influence in the process, including the ability to call and subpoena their own
witnesses.
"The minority has been shut out of the
process," Rep. Michael
McCaul (R-Texas), the ranking member on the Foreign Affairs
Committee, told reporters Tuesday. "It is being done in a ... classified
briefing room behind closed doors when it should be in front of the American
people so that all can see in a very transparent way the testimony of these
witnesses."
