Trump poised to win but Biden may turn victor after mail-in votes are counted, predicts Mike Bloomberg data firm
Former Democratic presidential candidate Michael Bloomberg’s political data and digital agency has warned of mass chaos on Election Night as it appears incumbent Donald Trump is poised to win a second term. But when the mail-in votes come into the picture, then the plot is highly likely to change. Currently, both Trump and his Democratic opponent Joe Biden are caught in a close race to occupy the White House before they lock horns on November 3.
Josh Mendelsohn, the CEO of Hawkfish, which Bloomberg used for his own self-funded campaign till it met an unsuccessful end, said in an interview with Axios on HBO: “The reason we talk about a red mirage is in fact because we believe that on election night we are going to see Donald Trump in a stronger position than the reality actually is.” The interview was aired on Monday, August 31 night.
In a preview of the interview that came out earlier in the day, Mendelsohn told Axios’ White House and politics editor Margaret Talev that unfavorable factors for the Election Day in the middle of the coronavirus pandemic are paving the way to potential chaos. He also added that while it may appear on November 3 that the GOP leader is going to win the contest, it is likely that the actual results will not be known for days as an unusual amount of mail-in ballots will be used in the election instead of physical voting as a precaution against the pandemic which has affected more than six million people and killed more than 183,000.
Biden may have the last laugh
Bloomberg’s data analytics firm predicted that after the mail-in ballots are included, Biden is highly likely to have the last laugh. Trump and his aides have been vehemently criticizing the mail-in ballot system claiming it would lead to massive electoral malpractice with the president even targeting the postal service in a bid to make it unsuccessful.
Hawkfish was founded by Bloomberg, a former New York mayor, last spring to support ‘Democratic candidates, good causes, and common sense solutions’. A few months later, the billionaire announced that he was running for the presidency. He joined the late race but abandoned it fast after failing to impress in the March 3 Super Tuesday and endorsed Biden, who many expected he would challenge in the primaries. He could only win American Samoa.
The run-up to the election, which is just over two months away now, is witnessing more heat as both parties are attacking each other on strong terms. Trump has given all the hints his opponents feared -- from deferring the polls to not accepting the results -- while Biden has said the military will remove him from the White House if he did not concede defeat.
Mendelsohn took over as the CEO of Bloomberg’s tech company at a time when it was struggling to make new client contracts. The new CEO is a managing partner at Hangar, a start-up investment firm based out of New York City, and has been involved with the Bloomberg-backed business since the early days of Hawkfish.