‘No, It Doesn’t Suggest That’: Nate Silver Hits Back At El-Sayed Supporter’s Rosy Take On Election Win

(AP Photo/Paul Sancya)

Veteran political forecaster Nate Silver had no patience on Wednesday for Abdul El-Sayed supporter Ryan Grim’s rosy take on Michigan’s Democratic Party Senate primary result.

El-Sayed won the Tuesday night contest over Rep. Haley Stevens (D-MI) by just around 1 percentage point, despite polls showing a strong lead.

Grim, a longtime hard-left commentator, commented on a post from a local Detroit political reporter noting the big turnout the Democrats had in their primary compared to the GOP. Detroit News’s Craig Mauger wrote, “As of this morning, there’s a noteworthy difference in the number of votes cast in the 2 Michigan primary races for governor. Democrats: 1.5 million. Republicans: 0.9 million. ‘We have not seen this kind of split before,’ said Richard Czuba, a longtime Michigan pollster.”

Grim shared Mauger’s post and added, “On the one hand, this suggests El-Sayed’s polling with Dems and Dem leaning independents was actually not that far off. That’s good for him in terms of his strength.”

“But it also means the excitement over the explosive turnout was a bit misplaced,” he added.

Silver found Grim’s analysis severely lacking and let him know it in a reply, writing, “No, it doesn’t suggest that. The polling average was off by ~13 points. Instead, it might suggest that while AES generates a lot of enthusiasm, he also generates enthusiastic opposition.”

“Don’t get me wrong, I think AES has some strengths. But a lot of Republicans are pretty unmotivated to vote in these midterms. Even enthusiasm for Trump is tepid. So one mechanism for a close race/AES loss is if Republicans get off the sidelines when they’d otherwise sit out,” Silver added.

Notably, in the Republican Senate primary, Rep. Mike Rogers (R-MI) ran uncontested, and the U.S. Senate race on the Democratic Party side ate up far more media attention than did the gubernatorial race. Furthermore, several moderate Democrats in Michigan, including Rep. Hillary Scholten (D-MI), made clear throughout the primary that they could not support El-Sayed in the general election, accusing him of sexism and embracing anti-American rhetoric.

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