Forecasting Maine

With Platner Likely Out, What do the Markets Say?

Platner Out (Probably)

Politico’s reporting from Monday afternoon on a serious sexual assault allegation against Platner was the final shoe to drop. While a steady string of unsavory findings about Platner’s past have been uncovered over the last few months, this was a bridge too far for most of Platner’s backers. Bernie Sanders, Jon Favreau, Ro Khanna, and others have all asked him to step aside, and markets believe he will with 97% confidence.

Platner is dragging out the process, with the intent of extracting some kind of concession from the Maine Democratic Party to nominate a candidate with a similar political ideology. As a result, it’s very possible that the saga lasts into next week, although a July 13th deadline to get Platner off the ballot and find a replacement constrains the timeline somewhat. Markets think there’s nearly a 2/3 chance he resigns by Friday:

If and when Platner drops out, there’s a highly uncertain process to replace him. Maine Democrats are trying to design some rapid process that involves voter participation. But markets are unsure who this would end up selecting.

Who’s Next?

Troy Jackson is a heavy favorite, though, as he is (1) not Graham Platner but (2) close to Graham Platner in policy and style. Jackson finished third in the Maine governor primary after Nirav Shah and Hannah Pingree, just a month ago, and was a backer of Platner.

Shenna Bellows, the second most likely candidate, finished fourth in that election, and also seems loosely ideologically aligned with Platner. Unfortunately, she already lost to Collins in a landslide Senate election in 2014!

Shah is not ideologically aligned with Platner, but finished narrowly second in the governor’s primary (and indeed won the first round) making him an obvious candidate for replacing Platner.

It appears that Platner’s choice himself (despite denials that he’s putting a thumb on the scale) might be Valli Geiger, a state representative in Maine. Author and Platner supporter Stephen King also comes in at longshot odds of 0.3%, if Maine voters decide to go in a very outsider direction.

Odds in November

I’m skeptical of the Platner campaign’s internal polling of potential replacements, which were leaked earlier today, but fortunately running multiple conditional markets on each of them is feasible on Manifold, unlike other prediction market platforms!

Jackson, Shah, and Bellows would all be slight favorites going into the general election in November, and broadly speaking, market on Democratic odds for that Senate seat are around 60%, just above what they were before Platner’s latest scandal dropped (and well above what they were when people briefly thought he might not drop out but weather the scandal).

In case you were interested in the other election in Maine, well, there’s not a ton of intrigue there…

Happy Forecasting!

-Above the Fold