HUFFPOLLSTER: What Does Obama’s Approval Rating Mean For 2016?

Americans expect Obama to accomplish less in the next two years, but his ratings are rising anyway. And historical precedents points to a close race in 2016. This is HuffPollster for Friday, January 23, 2015.

WHAT RISING OBAMA APPROVAL MEANS FOR 2016? – Nate Cohn: “After a difficult year, President Obama is enjoying a modest rebound ahead of State of the Union address Tuesday….It is a relatively small increase, but it is more impressive in the context of the unusual stability of Mr. Obama’s approval rating, which hovered between 42 and 44 percent for 15 consecutive months. In 2016, the president’s approval ratings should be a telling indicator of whether the country is likely to support another Democratic administration….The balance of evidence suggests that the break-even point for the presidential party’s odds of victory is at or nearly 50 percent approval. If the only thing you knew about the 2016 election was Mr. Obama’s approval rating on Election Day, you might guess that the Democrats had a 37 percent chance of holding the White House with a 46 percent rating — rather than a 23 percent chance with a 41 percent rating. The difference between 41 and 46 might be worth between one and two percentage points to the Democratic candidate in 2016 — the difference between a close race and a modest but clear Republican victory.” [NYT]

Predicting vote with approval – Alan Abramowitz: “[The chart below] displays the relationship between the incumbent president’s approval rating in the final Gallup Poll before the election and the share of the major-party vote won by the candidate of the president’s party in the six open-seat elections since World War II: 1952, 1960, 1968, 1988, 2000, and 2008. The line shown on this graph is the regression line for predicting the incumbent party vote share from the incumbent president’s approval rating….[These data] suggest that barring a dramatic change in President Obama’s approval rating in the next two years, the outcome of the 2016 presidential election is likely to be very close. If the president’s approval rating remains below 50% in the fall of 2016, the Republican nominee should be a slight favorite; if the president’s approval rating is above 50% by the fall of 2016, the Democratic nominee should be a slight favorite. However, the results of recent open-seat races also indicate that candidates and campaigns matter: The prediction of a close election could be upset if either party nominates an unusually appealing or unappealing candidate or runs an exceptionally effective or inept campaign.” [Sabato]

-2015 will be the UK’s first “truly data driven election.” [Sky News]

-Remembering George Downs. [WashPost]

Janie Velencia contributed reporting.

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