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I Expect Huge Win for Gingrich in South Carolina

1/20/12

The polls have done a great job thus far in the Republican nomination process -- except to factor in late minute movements. Gingrich is the clear momentum candidate in South Carolina.

• Real Clear Politics average has Gingrich ahead but only by two points (32-30).
• Nate Silver of NYTimes has Gingrich ahead by eight points (38-30).
• PPP has Gingrich ahead by nine points in their latest poll BUT ahead by 14 points (40-26) if only looking at the last date of their poll.

The 40-26 results PPP had on the last day does not look way out of place when you put it into context of how Gingrich polled the last time he was considered a front runner (late Nov, early Dec).

These polls were not only taken at a time when there were a lot of candidates in the race but also at a time when Santorum was still the "barely above Margin of Error candidate". A stronger polling Santorum may depress the upside Gingrich has. These polls show Gingrich ahead anywhere from 12 to 23. And I would not be surprised to see Gingrich's win in South Carolina on Saturday to fall in that range.

Santorum was surging in Iowa but the polls were late to accurately measure that. He outperformed his polling average by 5 points. Romney outperformed his polling average by 3 points but the next three spots were spot on.

Pollster	Date
Final Results	1/3-1/3, 2012	25	25	21	13	10	1
AVERAGE		21.6	20.4	20.6	13.4	10.8	3.0
Nate Silver Iowa Model Prediction	1/3-1/3, 2012	19	24	21	15	9	4
Mark Blumenthal Prediction	1/3-1/3, 2012	22	17	19	14	10	3
Scott Elliott Prediction	1/2-1/2, 2012	23	24	22	9	15	1
Nate Silver FiveThirtyEight Prediction	1/2-1/2, 2012	22	19	21	15	10	4
Charles Franklin PollsAndVotes Prediction	1/2-1/2, 2012	22	18	20	14	10	3

How did the pollsters do at predicting New Hampshire? They were spot on for all the candidates except Ron Paul, who outperformed his polling average by 5 points. This was to be expected. There were no surges by any candidate so a poll conducted two days before the primary could be expected to be as accurate as Election day. The reason Paul outperformed his polling average by was, in part, due to an undersampling of younger and Independent voters.

Pollster	Date
Final Results	1/10-1/10, 2012	39	23	17	9	9	1
AVERAGE		38.6	18.0	16.6	10.2	11.4	1.0
Steve Lombardo Projection	1/10-1/10, 2012	42	18	19	9	11	1
Mark Blumenthal Prediction	1/10-1/10, 2012	37	18	17	10	11	1
TPM PollTracker Prediction	1/10-1/10, 2012	37	17	17	10	12	1
Real Clear Politics Average	1/10-1/10, 2012	38	18	13	10	11	1
Nate Silver Projection	1/10-1/10, 2012	39	19	17	12	12	1

So the polls are going to be right in some way. Romney will get around 30%, Paul and Santorum will fall in the 14-17 range. And Gingrich could really just clean up the rest with 40%. Underestimating a candidate by five points seems to be the norm so I expect a huge Gingrich win in South Carolina.

Also read our last poll on Newtmentum.

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