Nate Silver Talks Harris-Trump Odds, 538’s “Broken” Model, and Why He Doesn’t Like Politics
With less than six weeks until Election Day, Nate Silver abandoned Inside the hive to discuss the recent historical race between Kamala Harris And Donald Trump. Silver, a pollster, statistician and renowned author of “Silver Bulletin,” had Harris winning 53% and Trump winning 47%, which he noted was “close to 50-50.”
“This doesn’t mean Harris is going to win by six points,” he continued. “This means that, like a coin flip, maybe the coin, there’s a little extra metal or something on Harris’s side. But I don’t think we’ve seen a race this close since 2004.”
In the interview, Silver breaks down the latest numbers in swing states, warns against rapidly changing media narratives and addresses criticism of his model while also offering some of his own stories from his old website. 538now run by ABC News. Silver describes the 538 model as “broken” this election cycle and suggests, “I don’t think you can trust anything from that forecaster.” Silver also details the community of risk takers at the heart of his new book, On the brink, an excerpt which was recently published on Hive.
With a slew of state-specific and national numbers coming out in the final weeks, Silver urged people to “take the polls with a grain of salt.”
“You’re going to have some exceptions. Usually, the probabilities don’t change much when you’re not watching a big, important event, like a debate,” Silver said. “So in some ways, it’s like, hey, let’s relax and then vote and see what happens in November, because things aren’t necessarily going to change that much.” And, he added, “Don’t take any polls as reality.”
Despite his reputation as an authority on polling, Silver said he doesn’t actually “like” politics. “I think elections are fun,” he said, adding that it would be better if “people cared less about politics.”
“Vote, but don’t treat politics as a hobby,” he suggests. “I think there is a very low correlation between being an informed citizen and being a political enthusiast, and in some cases, it may be inversely correlated.”
