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American University professor Allan Lichtman, who's correctly picked the winner in nine of the past 10 presidential elections, was seen coming to the realization that his prediction of Vice President Kamala Harris winning the presidential election was wrong.
Licthman, 77, livestreamed the 2024 election with his son, Sam, and repeatedly said "I don't get it" as former President Donald Trump was predicted to win Pennsylvania, a key swing state in his eventual victory, Tuesday (November 5) night.
“This is the first moment of the night where I’ve lost hope a little bit,” Sam Lichtman said after several media outlets called Pennsylvania for Trump.
"Good thing I have nothing to do tomorrow. And I’m not doing any interviews," the elder Lichtman said while appearing to be frustrated by the data.
Lichtman used his 13 keys to the White House method to predict Harris as the winner of the 2024 election last month.
“Foreign policy is tricky, and these keys could flip,” Lichtman said in a video shared by the New York Times. “The Biden administration is deeply invested in the war in Gaza, which is a humanitarian disaster with no end in sight. But even if both foreign policy keys flipped false, that would mean that there were only five negative keys, which would not be enough for Donald Trump to regain the White House.”
“At least that's my prediction for this race, but the outcome is up to you, so get out and vote," he added.
Lichtman's "keys" are included below:
- Party mandate
- Contest
- Incumbency
- Third party
- Short-term economy
- Long-term economy
- Policy change
- Social unrest
- Scandal
- Foreign/military failure
- Foreign/military success
- Incumbent charisma
- Challenger charisma
Licthman's formula has accurately predicted nearly every presidential election since 1984, with the exception being the 2000 election, where it forecasted a victory for then-Vice President Al Gore over eventual President George W. Bush.
Trump won 276 electoral college votes, surpassing the 270 needed to be elected and will become the first president since Grover Cleveland to serve two non-consecutive terms. The former president defeated Vice President Harris in the key swing states of Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Georgia, all of which he lost to President Joe Biden in the 2020 presidential election.
The Republicans also took control of the Senate on Tuesday and currently leads in control of the House of Representatives.