Nate Silver's 'Gut' Prediction On Trump Could Miss: A Look At His Past Election Fails

Popular polling guru and founder of website FiveThirtyEight Nate Silver revealed that his 'gut says' that former President Donald Trump will beat VP Kamala Harris on November 5. He, however, added that polling data indicates that the race could still go either way. The 46-year-old explained that surveys underestimated the Republican nominee in each of the last two elections. “In an election where the seven battleground states are all polling within a percentage point or two, 50-50 is the only responsible forecast,” Silver wrote in a New York Times op-ed published Tuesday. His model currently says that Trump has a 53.1% chance of becoming the 47th president. Read More: “Yet when I deliver this unsatisfying news, I inevitably get a question: ‘C’mon, Nate, what’s your gut say?' So OK, I’ll tell you. My gut says Donald Trump. And my guess is that it is true for many anxious Democrats.”However, Silver doesn't have a 100% prediction record. He went off on several occassions, including the 2016 presidential election. 1) 2016 US Presidential Election: That year, Nate Silver's FiveThirtyEight model gave Hillary Clinton a 71% chance of winning. Trump was at 29%. However, the latter won the Electoral College despite the Democrat winning the popular voter. Read More: 2) 2016 Republican Primary: Silver was skeptical of Donald Trump's chances initially. He predicted that the billionaire's chances of becoming the GOP nominee were below 5%. But Trump won. Silver later admitted that he underestimated the 78-year-old's ability to appeal to a broad base. 3) 2018 Florida Senate Race: Silver's FiveThirtyEight model had incumbent Democratic Senator Bill Nelson a 69% against Republican Governor Rick Scott. However, the latter managed to secure a narrow victory, by a margin of 0.12%.