Undecided voters are a rarity in modern politics. There are many reasons for this independent of the specific candidates involved, but then add in the candidates, starting with the Presidential Election this year and it’s evident why not many undecided voters exist. A quick sweep of head-to-head polling over the past week shows about 7.6% of voters haven’t made up their mind in the Presidential election. This is slightly below the historical average of 8%. Elections are often won and lost by consolidating a majority of these truly undecided voters.
History does provide a bit of a guide. Here are the historical factors which determine the trends in how undecided voters typically break:
- What type of election cycle is it?
- Are there any historical trends in the cycle?
- If there are any breaks in the trend what were they and why?
- How do undecided voters typically break in a given election in a given cycle?
And then know how to use the polls. Accredited polling of likely voters averaged from adjusted sampling derived only from the most recent week and projecting undecided & 3rd party voters along historical lines. We can answer all of the election questions. It’s a Presidential Election cycle with an incumbent Republican running for reelection. Historically incumbents win 65% of the time, there’s no indication of a trend buster despite the pandemic muddying the waters and as for how undecided voters break in this type of cycle. At least in terms of the national polling averages, the incumbent President outperforms the national head to head polling averages by 2.05% on Election Day.
In other words, undecided voters who haven’t been convinced by a challenger to change course are most likely to consolidate behind the incumbent. This is part of the incumbency advantage enjoyed by Presidents running for reelection and will represent a tailwind for President Trump this November.
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