Polls prophet Allan Lichtman, often called the "Nostradamus of US presidential elections", has predicted that Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris will win the race to the White House this year. In an exclusive interview with NDTV, Mr Litchman, who has correctly predicted nine out of 10 election results, said that Vice President Kamala Harris will beat Republican Presidential nominee Donald Trump.
To accurately predict who will occupy the Oval Office, Mr Lichtman has designed what he calls "13 keys to the White House," a groundbreaking method that revolutionized election forecasting. The keys, comprising a series of true or false questions, assess various factors such as party mandate, contest, incumbency, third party, short-term economy, long-term economy, foreign success, social unrest, incumbent charisma and challenger charisma.
Mr Lichtman explained that if six or more keys go against the White House party, they are predicted losers, or else they are predicted winners. While Kamala Harris has secured eight of Mr Litchman's keys to the White House, Trump only has three of his keys.
"They lost the mandate key, which is based on losses in US house election. They have obviously lost the incumbency key with Biden not running. But with the party uniting around Harris, the avoided the loss of the contest key. Finally, the third key that they lost was incumbent charisma key," he explained, adding that Democrats will hold on the White House.
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Foreign Policy Success, Failures Undecided
Mr Litchman, who has successfully predicted election outcomes since 1984, said foreign policy failure and success remain undecided.
"The only other two keys that are shaky are the two foreign policy keys, he explains, because the wars in the Middle East and Ukraine are so fluid. I think those keys will split and Harris will be down 4 keys. But even if they both flip negative, this means Harris is down only 5 keys, still one key short of defeat. All other keys are locked in her favour," he added.
Asked about areas of uncertainty, the US historian said "Two areas of uncertainty are two foreign policy keys- foreign military success and failure. We don't know exactly what could happen in Ukraine or Middle East. But they won't affect my prediction that Kamala Harris is going to be the next President of the United States. These two keys are not enough to predict that Donald Trump could regain the White House."
On Short-Term, Long-Term Economy
"My two economic keys are statistical and they are very specifically defined. The short-term economy key says there is no recession in the election year. You can't just have recession in a couple of months, it takes much longer than that.
"The long term economy key asks whether the per capita growth on the current term is equal to the average of previous two terms. And per capita growth under Biden is double or more that that of the average of previous two terms," he explained.
Asked if Republicans could do anything to fare better, the election forecaster said, "There is actually nothing they can do. That's the whole point of the keys. It is fundamentally different that all of the conventional wisdoms."
Mr Lichtman's predictive prowess faced its most significant test in the tumultuous 2000 election between Al Gore and George W Bush. While he forecasted a victory for Gore, the controversial outcome cast a shadow over his prediction.
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