Forecaster who hasn’t missed a presidential prediction in 40 YEARS reveals how much of an impact RFK can have on the November election
A prognosticator who has successfully predicted every presidential winner over the past four decades has predicted Robert F Kennedy Jr.’s prospects. unveiled before this year’s elections.
Allan Lichtman, a professor of history at American University in Washington, DC, has dashed RFK’s hopes of entering the White House.
He dismissed him as a “third party candidate” who is likely to “disappear as the election approaches.”
“It is not even clear how many ballots RFK junior will receive,” he said Fox 5describing why he does not see him as a threat to Biden’s Democratic nomination.
Lichtman devised a system for predicting election results, which he calls “13 Keys to the White House.” He recently said that “a lot would have to go wrong” for Joe Biden to lose the White House to Donald Trump
Allan Lichtman, professor of history at American University in Washington, DC, has quashed RFK’s hopes of entering the White House
He dismissed RFK as a “third party candidate” who is likely to “fade as the election approaches”
He says his key technique allows him to “predict the outcome of the popular vote based solely on historical factors and not on polls on candidate preference, tactics or campaign events.”
He rates candidates on thirteen key criteria, and whoever wins more is his prediction to win the election.
One of the keys concerns third-party candidates. But Lichtman dismissed Biden losing key and said RFK’s 8.5 percent polling will likely fade as November approaches.
He also hit back at pundits who say Biden should resign to make way for a younger candidate, insisting the Democrat’s “only chance” of winning lies in their current position.
Despite polls showing Biden in trouble nationally and trailing in several swing states, Lichtman believes it is still in the president’s favor to retain office, with two of his thirteen keys – lack of a serious primary challenge and incumbency – are already in Biden’s favor.
“That’s two keys from the top,” he said. ‘That means that six more keys must be dropped to predict his defeat. A lot would have to go wrong for Biden to lose.”
However, he acknowledged that the president has already lost two keys.
The first is mandate, following the loss of US House seats in 2022, and the second is charisma.
“He’s no John F. Kennedy or Franklin Roosevelt,” Lichtman said. “There are also four shaky keys that would have to fall to predict Biden’s defeat.”
These include his performance on foreign policy, social unrest and the threat posed by a third-party challenger.
“Third party, how strong will RFK emerge as we get closer to the elections? So far he’s been all over the map.”
However, he added that he “really doesn’t expect” Biden to lose on this key.
In contrast, there are currently productive scenes of social unrest across the country, as college campuses explode in pro-Palestinian protests over the Israeli bombing of Gaza.
Despite polls showing Biden in trouble nationally and falling behind in several swing states, Lichtman believes it is still in the president’s favor to remain in office
Lichtman devised a system for predicting election results, which he calls “13 Keys to the White House.”
While he said this year’s outcome is too early to predict, he stated that “a lot would have to go wrong” if Joe Biden were to lose to Donald Trump in November.
Both the conflict and the war in Ukraine could also be deadly for Biden, according to Lichtman’s system.
“A lot would have to go wrong with these keys for Biden to lose, but that’s still possible,” Lichtman added.
The professor criticized experts who rely on opinion polls for their predictions, emphasizing that they only present a snapshot of sentiment at that moment.
An example of this was the 1988 election, in which Republican candidate George HW Bush trailed his Democratic opponent, Michael Dukakis, by 17 percent.
But Bush eventually reduced his 49 states to one.
Lichtman has successfully predicted the winner in every election since 1984.
It should be noted that while he was technically incorrect in 2000 when he predicted Al Gore would win, he believes this was a stolen election and said Gore won the popular vote.
However, he also gets credit for correctly delivering Trump’s victory in 2016, despite Hillary Clinton winning the popular vote.
He admits that no matter the outcome, no system can ever be completely foolproof.
“It’s nerve-wracking because there are a lot of people who would love to see me fail.” And if he does? ‘I am a human. It doesn’t mean my system is wrong. Nothing is perfect in the human world.”