这对共和党来说是一场惨烈的竞选活动，他们面对的是一位不受欢迎、无处不在的唐纳德·特朗普，以及对他政策感到愤怒的选民。总统曾承诺降低美国人的物价，却发动了一场战争并征收关税，导致物价上涨。在众议院通过选区划分来操纵胜利的企图看来已告失败——我们的预测模型显示民主党有94%的几率夺回众议院控制权。共和党被迫在过去的据点捍卫参议院席位，这些中期选举的广告支出预计将创下新纪录，甚至超过2024年总统大选的支出。
IT HAS BEEN a bruising campaign for Republicans, who have faced an unpopular, omnipresent Donald Trump and voters furious over his policies. Having promised to lower Americans’ prices, the president has started a war and imposed tariffs that have raised them. Attempts to gerrymander a victory in the House of Representatives look set to have failed—our forecast model gives Democrats a 94% chance of flipping the lower chamber. Republicans have been forced to defend Senate seats in former strongholds, with ad spending on these midterms expected to set a new record and surpass even the presidential election of 2024.
但随着美国人前往投票站，共和党迎来了数月来首个利好的新闻周期。在密歇根州，支持以色列的民主党人海莉·史蒂文斯在党内参议员初选中以微弱劣势败给了更进步的阿卜杜勒·埃尔-萨耶德（图），她在最后关头背书了共和党候选人迈克·罗杰斯。在阿拉斯加参议院竞选中，民主党提名人玛丽·佩尔托拉因《纽约时报》的一篇报道而陷入动荡，报道称她的竞选团队招募了一名与她的共和党对手同名的候选人，以分流对方选票。这些斗争重要吗？
But, as Americans head to the polls, Republicans are enjoying a good news cycle for the first time in months. In Michigan Haley Stevens, a pro-Israel Democrat who narrowly lost the party’s Senate primary to the more progressive Abdul El-Sayed (pictured), has issued a last-minute endorsement of Mike Rogers, the Republican candidate. In Alaska’s Senate race, Mary Peltola, the Democratic nominee, is being shaken by a report in the New York Times that her campaign recruited a candidate with the same name as her Republican opponent, to deplete his votes. Will these fights matter?
这两则新闻爆出太晚，民调平均值尚未检测到其产生的任何影响。预测市场对这些消息无动于衷，尽管围绕佩尔托拉竞选团队的法律纠纷看来将拖延数周。在Kalshi平台上，佩尔托拉获胜的几率仍为72%，与《纽约时报》报道前夕持平；而到11月2日下午，埃尔-萨耶德博士的获胜概率上升至78%。后一个数字反映了交易者对《纽约时报》/锡耶纳大学合作项目——美国最知名的民调机构——发布的最后一批民调的反应。
Both stories broke too late for polling averages to detect any impact from them. Prediction markets have shrugged off the news, even as legal skirmishes over Ms Peltola’s campaign look set to drag on for weeks. On Kalshi Ms Peltola has the same 72% chance of victory she had on the eve of the Times piece, while Dr El-Sayed’s probability of victory rose to 78% by mid-afternoon on November 2nd. The latter number reflects traders’ reaction to the final batch of surveys from the New York Times/Siena University partnership, America’s most prominent pollster.
这些民调于11月1日发布，不仅暗示将出现“蓝色浪潮”，更预示着一场“海啸”：埃尔-萨耶德博士领先11个百分点，而在其他参议院战场州，民主党候选人领先幅度在1到7个百分点之间。
They were published on November 1st and imply not just a blue wave but a tsunami: Dr El-Sayed led by 11 percentage points, while Democrats in the other Senate battlegrounds were up by anywhere from one to seven points.
市场现在将民主党视为赢得参议院的75%热门人选。Nate Silver——美国最知名的量化选举预测专家——给出了民主党82%的胜率。但《经济学人》自己的预测模型则更为谨慎，将参议院翻转的概率仅定为53%。造成这一分歧的主要原因是，我们的模型基于历史数据预测，全国民调将民主党领先幅度高估约一个百分点。这种偏差在通常投票给共和党的州更为明显——而今年包括对民主党参议院控制权至关重要的德克萨斯、阿拉斯加、爱荷华、堪萨斯和俄亥俄等州。
The markets now have Democrats as 75% favourites to win the Senate. Nate Silver, America’s most prominent quantitative election forecaster, gives Democrats an 82% chance. But The Economist’s own prediction model is more cautious, putting the probability of a Senate flip at just 53%. The main source of this disagreement remains that our model predicts, based on history, that polls across the country will overestimate Democrats’ margin by about a point. That mismatch is more pronounced in states that usually vote for Republicans—which this year includes states crucial to Democrats’ hope of Senate control, such as Texas, Alaska, Iowa, Kansas and Ohio.
我们的模型大致与市场的蓝紫色州一致，但对民主党深入共和党腹地的能力更为怀疑。我们对民主党在核心红战场州（阿拉斯加、爱荷华、堪萨斯、俄亥俄和德克萨斯）的胜率估计，均比Kalshi的价格低约20个百分点，对应大约2.5个百分点的领先优势。在俄亥俄，民主党候选人Sherrod Brown对共和党现任州长Jon Husted的民调领先优势正在缩小。
Our model is roughly in line with the markets in light-blue and purple states, and much more sceptical of Democrats’ ability to burrow deep into Republican terrain. Our estimates of the party’s win probability in the core red battleground states—Alaska, Iowa, Kansas, Ohio and Texas—are all around 20 percentage points lower than Kalshi’s prices, which corresponds to about 2.5 points of margin. In Ohio polls show a shrinking lead for Sherrod Brown, the Democrat, over the Republican incumbent, Jon Husted.
即便如此，我们的模型仍足以在足够多的州为民主党赢得49个参议院席位。它还给予民主党在另外三个州（阿拉斯加、俄亥俄和德克萨斯）甚至平局的机会——这可能就是决定50席和多数席的第五十一个席位。
Even so, our model favours Democrats in enough states—including Maine, Michigan and North Carolina—to win 49 Senate seats. It gives them even odds in three more—Alaska, Ohio and Texas—that could be the 50th and majority-making 51st.
这证明了特朗普先生及其许多“被指定的候选人”（如德克萨斯的Ken Paxton和堪萨斯的Roger Marshall）令人望而却步的特质。民主党胜选可能性较低但并非不可能的地区，现在包括南卡罗来纳——特朗普两年前以18个百分点优势赢得了该州。代表南卡罗来纳在参议院任职超过20年的Lindsey Graham于今年7月去世，由他的妹妹Darline接任，后者是政治新手。上周，《纽约时报》/Siena民调团队发现该选区民调结果持平。
That is testament to the repellent qualities of both Mr Trump and many of his anointed candidates, such as Ken Paxton in Texas and Roger Marshall in Kansas. States where a Democratic victory is unlikely, but far from impossible, now include South Carolina, which Mr Trump won by 18 points two years ago. Lindsey Graham, who represented South Carolina in the Senate for more than 20 years, died in July and was replaced by his sister Darline, a political novice. Last week the New York Times/Siena polling team found the race to be tied.
在竞选最后几天，各党正向选民发出最后呼吁。特朗普的收官论点不遵循惯常套路；他没有对自己的执政记录提出连贯的辩护，主题包括指控埃尔-赛义德是圣战分子的虚假言论、吹嘘首都倒影池换了新水管，以及对哈斯特德屁股的赞美。特朗普秀或许能帮助一些候选人动员基本盘，但在摇摆州却构成难题。
So, in the final days of the campaign, the parties have been making their last appeal to voters. Mr Trump’s closing argument does not follow the usual tropes of the form; rather than offer a coherent defence of his record, themes include spurious claims that Dr El-Sayed is a jihadist, boasts about new pipes in the capital’s reflecting pool and adulation for Mr Husted’s posterior. The Trump show may help some candidates to turn out the base, but poses a problem in purple states.
民主党的信息更简单：特朗普更在乎增加自己的财富，而非帮助普通美国人。“我们面临负担能力危机，是因为我们面临腐败危机，”詹姆斯·塔拉里科周六在休斯顿的一场集会上宣称。塔拉里科正试图成为三十多年来德克萨斯州首位民主党参议员。我们的模型给他 52% 的获胜几率。竞争如此胶着，既说明了特朗普不受欢迎创造的机会，也凸显了民主党将其转化为胜利的挑战。■
Democrats have a simpler message: that Mr Trump cares more about boosting his own fortune than about helping ordinary Americans. “We have an affordability crisis because we have a corruption crisis,” declared James Talarico at a rally in Houston on Saturday. Mr Talarico is trying to become the first Democratic senator from Texas in more than three decades. Our model gives him a 52% chance of succeeding. That the race is so close illustrates the opportunity created by Mr Trump’s unpopularity—and Democrats’ challenge of converting that into victory. ■