How Election Week 2022 Went Down

Adding onto Nathaniel’s answer, the Needle is a model that considers the votes that have already been counted, which precincts/counties those counted votes came from and estimates or predictions for the remaining votes. It’s not going to tell us the future, but it’s a clear way of visualizing what we (and namely, the New York Times) very well might see.

Chad, I’m a fan of the Needle! It’s essentially a much more efficient, computerized way of doing what we election analysts do when we say, “Warnock is doing X in Fulton County, and that’s above/below what he needs to win.” In general, I think it’s reliable, but the one thing I hope they figured out is how to handle the differences between mail and in-person votes. Mail votes obviously skew Democratic, and in-person votes obviously skew Republican, and you have to know which one you’re looking at before saying a certain vote total in a certain county is good for Democrats or Republicans.

The New York Times’s infamous “Needle” is live. It is a live forecast of what’s to come for the rest of election night, and as of this writing, it is saying the Senate is a toss-up and the House “probably” going into Republican control. Does anyone have any tips for readers about how best to understand what the Needle can and can’t tell us?