INQUISITR.COM / News & Politics

2016 Election Prediction: Who Will Win The 2016 Presidential Election? Early Voting In Swing States May Give The Answer

By Nathan Francis
Published on: 06:06 PST, Nov 7, 2016

The 2016 presidential election predictions have grown more difficult in the past week, with Donald Trump leading a late charge to close the once-large gap with Hillary Clinton just days before voters pick the next president.

That leaves a murky question: Just who will win the 2016 presidential election?

Early voting results may hold the answer.

While Donald Trump was able to put the controversies of October behind him as the calendar turned to November — with the help of a public announcement from James Comey that the FBI had a new batch of emails to investigate related to Clinton’s otherwise closed case — he has still had trouble breaking through in enough swing states to turn the electoral college projection in his favor. The final 2016 presidential polls showed that Hillary Clinton maintained a small but clear lead in key states of Florida, North Carolina, and Nevada. As the map stands now, Donald Trump would still need to flip at least one more state currently in Clinton’s column in order to win.

And the 2016 election predictions show that will be difficult. Early voting results from the key states of Florida and Nevada show what appears to be a firewall for Hillary Clinton, with a large turnout among Democrats that could already put Donald Trump at a big disadvantage on Election Day.

As the Huffington Post noted, there was a surge of early voting in Florida on Sunday, and the results look very good for Hillary Clinton. A record 6.5 million people voted early in Florida, which experts say will end up being two-thirds of those voting in Florida.

And while Democrats had initially trailed Republican early voting in Florida, the results shifted dramatically in the final days, the Huffington Post reported.

“Those trends shifted during the last four days. Black turnout jumped substantially, boosted by Obama’s multiple Florida visits and Sunday’s “souls to the polls” voting drive led by black churches.

“Black turnout in Florida will end up higher than in 2012, Daniel Smith, a University of Florida political science professor and election data analyst, predicted on Sunday.”

While it may be too early to make a clear prediction of the 2016 presidential election based on these results alone, experts believe the early voting results point toward a win for Hillary Clinton.

“I do believe this thing is tracking towards a Clinton victory,” wrote Steve Schale, a Democratic strategist in Florida.

If Hillary Clinton can win in Florida, Donald Trump would have virtually no path to the presidency outside of flipping one of the more reliably blue states like Pennsylvania, Michigan, or Wisconsin.

And there could be more good news for Hillary Clinton. In Nevada, the early voting results point toward an even stronger showing for Democrats than in 2012, when Barack Obama won the state by 7 points. There are reports of a high Latino turnout in Nevada — a demographic that tilts heavily toward Clinton — and Democrats ended up dominating the early voting results, Reuters reported.

“For one thing, Clark County has seen a surge in early voting. Between in-person and absentee voting, registered Democrats have now returned over 72,000 more ballots than registered Republicans there. Those figures do not indicate which candidate voters picked, only the party with which the voters are registered.”

There is a chance that Clinton could need both states, as early voting results from North Carolina show an opposite trend — Democratic voting falling compared to 2012.

But other pollsters note that it is especially difficult to make an accurate election prediction in 2016. While the latest presidential polls are moving back toward Hillary Clinton and early voting results are in her favor, it has been difficult for pollsters to grasp the support Donald Trump might have. Back in the Republican primaries, polling often underestimated his support — it remains to be seen whether that will also be the case on Election Day.

[Featured Image by Joe Raedle/Getty Images]

Share this article: 2016 Election Prediction: Who Will Win The 2016 Presidential Election? Early Voting In Swing States May Give The Answer
hillary clinton
More from Inquisitr