It’s a notorious piece of tech and one that suggested Hillary Clinton had a 95 per cent chance of winning the 2016 US election — and now it’s done the same for Donald Trump.
The New York Times’ infamous ‘Needle’ is pointed towards an almost certain win for Donald Trump, declaring he had a minimum 95 per cent chance of returning to the White House.
The update came just moments before Fox News declared Trump had won Pennsylvania and its 19 electoral college votes, a key swing state Kamala Harris needed to win to cement her path to victory.
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Harris and her camp went to bed on Wednesday night however Trump was due to address his watch party in Florida before 2am, local time. His decision to front his supporters comes as he sits just 24 electoral votes shy of winning the US presidency, or a few votes if the Fox News prediction is included.
Earlier, former White House spokesman Pete Seat, who is featuring on 7NEWS’ election day coverage, advised viewers to treat The Needle’s projections with caution.
In 2016, it pointed heavily in Hillary Clinton’s favour.
There was also doubt it would be in operation this year at all, because the news outlet’s tech staff, that power the predictive data, went on strike.
“(They) didn’t think it would get up and running in time,” Seat said.
“I will read this from Vox. They did a story not long ago.
“’The Times’ has continued to tweak its model and display for the needle over the past two years and to explain repeatedly how exactly the needle works and why you shouldn’t develop too much of an attachment to its predictions.’
“The guys who run it are even saying don’t put too much stock into this.”
Sunrise host Natalie Barr, in the US for the election, offered some advice for viewers: “Don’t do your noodle on the needle.”
Harris is expected to speak tomorrow, the co-chair of her campaign Cedric Richmond said.
“We still have votes to count,” he told supporters.
“We still have states that have not been called yet.”
His announcement comes after CNN projected former president Donald Trump will win two of the key battleground states: North Carolina and Georgia.
Richmond said the campaign will continue to fight “to make sure that every vote is counted. That every voice as spoken”.
Georgia is a relatively new battleground state in presidential politics and helped deliver President Joe Biden his White House victory in 2020. Georgia flipped blue for the first time in nearly 30 years when Biden won by just 11,779 votes.
The state also determined Democrats would control the Senate in two runoff elections in 2021. The state then, again, backed the Democratic candidate for Senate in 2022, helping Democrats maintain control of the chamber.
Georgia became a focal point of national politics after the 2020 presidential election, when Trump called on Georgia state officials, including Republican Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger to “find” enough votes to flip the state for him to win.
The former president and several of his advisers have been indicted for their actions in Georgia during the 2020 election.