Welcome to POLITICO’s West Wing Playbook, your guide to the people and power centers in the Biden administration. Send tips | Subscribe here | Email Eli | Email Lauren In 1981, American historian ALLAN LICHTMAN met one of the world’s leading authorities in earthquake prediction, VLADIMIR KEILIS-BOROK, while teaching at the California Institute of Technology. This unlikely pairing became, as Lichtman describes it, the “Odd Couple of Political Research.” And together they developed “The 13 Keys to the White House” — party mandate, no primary contest, incumbent, no third party, strong long-term/short-term economy, major policy change, no social unrest, no scandal, foreign/military failure and success and candidate charisma — to predict who would win the White House. Since 1984, Lichtman has correctly predicted the outcome of every presidential election (small asterisk next to 2000, which Lichtman argues AL GORE was cheated out of.) In 2016, he predicted DONALD TRUMP’s longshot win, after which Trump wrote Lichtman: “Professor — Congrats — Good Call.” So what’s his call this year? West Wing Playbook sat down with Lichtman to ask. This conversation has been edited for length and clarity. How do you do it? What’s your secret? We reconceptualized American presidential elections in geophysical terms. Not as Republican vs. Democrat. Not as Liberal vs. Conservative. But as stability — the White House party keeps power — vs. earthquake — the White House party is turned out of power. We used Keilis-Borok’s methods of pattern recognition to see what patterns are associated with stability and earthquakes. And we looked at every election from the horse and buggy days of politics through 1980. That research yielded the 13 keys to the White House. If six or more of the keys are false — that is if there are six or more strikes against the White House party — you have earthquake. Fewer than six strikes, you have stability. So, what does your crystal ball say this time around? I have not made a final call. And don't expect to make one until August. A lot would have to go wrong for Biden to lose. It could happen. But a lot would have to go wrong. Biden has definitively only lost two keys. The mandate key, which is based upon the fact that Democrats lost U.S. House seats in 2022. And the incumbent charisma key because Biden is no Franklin Roosevelt or John F. Kennedy. And there are now four shaky keys: third party, social unrest, foreign military failure and foreign military success. What do you say to Democrats who are freaked out by Biden’s polling? Not only are we too early for polls, but the error in polls is vastly greater than the pundits would tell you. What could change in the next few months that would have a significant enough impact on Biden to put the keys in or out of his favor? I mentioned there were four shaky keys. First, third party, which counts against the White House party, because it's a sign of discontent with governing. I've seen [Robert F. Kennedy polling] as low as 3 percent, as high as 15 percent. That's why I can't call the key yet. Social unrest. I thought that was pretty safe for the Democrats. Then we had the campus protests. But so far, they're not nearly great enough to turn that key. And then we have the foreign policy failure and success key, which depends clearly upon what will happen in the next few months in the wars in the Middle East and the war in Ukraine. Have you changed the keys at all since Donald Trump got involved? Every four years someone says to me, things have changed. You have to alter your keys. And my answer is always the same. The keys are a very robust system. It’s possible, an event outside the context of the keys could be unprecedented enough, cataclysmic enough to have an influence — and of course, what is unprecedented here [is] a former president being convicted of 34 felonies. I'm not saying that's gonna influence the election. But I'm not changing my analysis of the keys. How will the Trump conviction play into the election? Let me say this: I don't think Donald Trump's base is going to crack because of this. But he can't afford any loss in his base. Flipping it to the other criminal trial — Hunter Biden. Is his trial and controversies enough to be considered a scandal in terms of your keys? To turn the scandal key against the White House party, it has to meet two criteria. One, it has to touch on the president himself. And two, there has to be at least some bipartisan recognition. The Hunter Biden situation neither implicates President Biden, nor is there bipartisan recognition. And by the way, throughout our history, there have been all types of problems with presidential families. On election night every four years, are you more concerned about the outcome of the election or breaking your streak? Yeah, every four years, I'm nervous. My system goes against the grain of the pundits, the pollsters and all the other academic systems. So there are a lot of critics out there. MESSAGE US — Are you an ALLAN LICHTMAN truther? We want to hear from you. And we’ll keep you anonymous! Email us at westwingtips@politico.com. Did someone forward this email to you? Subscribe here!
| 
