Historian Who Called the Last 9 of 10 Presidential Elections Reveals This Cycle’s Pick

An American University professor who has correctly predicted the winners of nine out of the last ten presidential elections shared his 2024 pick with journalist Chris Cillizza.

Cillizza interviewed history professor Allan Lichtman for his Substack and excitedly spoke about it on his YouTube channel.

“The big news in politics today is these New York Times/Sienna College polls that have Donald Trump leading in, I think, six out of the seven swing states that they tested,” Cillizza said, adding that polls are really just “snapshots in time” of presidential races. That’s where Lichtman’s predictor comes in.

“He basically has 13 statements, ok? If eight or more of these statements is true, the incumbent party wins; if eight or less of the statements are true, the challenger party wins. It’s that simple.”

Cillizza listed all 13 statements, or “keys,” in the interview, but discussed just a few on his YouTube. For example, “Number two is ‘Contest: There is no serious contest for the incumbent party nomination.’ That is true for Biden.” Cillizza said.

“Number six, ‘Long-term economy: Real per capita economic growth during the term equals or exceeds mean growth during the previous two terms.'”

“Here’s the thing,” Cillizza continued. “In nine of the last 10 presidential elections, that little thing that I said, the 13 keys, the Lichtman Model, has accurately predicted the winner of the presidential election. That includes, I’ll note, 2016, when no one — this guy included — thought Donald Trump was going to win, Allan Lichtman did, and I know it, because I talked to Allan Lichtman. I was at The Washington Post at the time. I talked to Alan Lichtman ’cause he was one of the only people out there saying it.”

Cillizza explained that Lichtman developed his model with the help of an earthquake specialist.

“They were going to focus on stability or earthquake, as it relates to politics. Stability being the incumbent wins, earthquake being the challenger wins. And they came up with these criteria based on a historical analysis of, sort of, what matters in an election.”

Cillizza said the election where Lichtman wasn’t right was in 2000, when “hanging chads” turned the tides in George W. Bush’s favor. Lichtman had predicted Al Gore would win and Cillizza pointed out that Gore “did win the popular vote.”

“But that’s the only one Allan Lichtman has missed in the last 40 years!” Cillizza said.

So, who is the professor’s pick for 2024?

“He thinks Joe Biden is going to win. That is right. So, even though we have polling today that shows that Donald Trump’s ahead, and even though there’s been polling for months that shows that Donald Trump is ahead in key swing states, Allan Lichtman believes Joe Biden — not because of polling — but because of economics, because of incumbency, because of not scandal, etc. These 13 keys, there are enough there that Joe Biden is going to be re-elected.”

Cillizza added that Lichtman won’t make his final prediction until later this summer.

Read the Substack article here and watch Cillizza’s report via YouTube above.

Have a tip we should know? tips@mediaite.com