More Evidence That Comey Swung The Election To Trump

Here is more evidence, as if we needed it, that James Comey was the decisive factor in the 2016 election. A brand research company that also started including questions about presidential candidates since 2008 has shown that Comey's letter eleven days before election created at 28 point move in Trump's direction. That is simply massive and it was the decisive factor in the election.

According to the author, "[I]t is our conclusion that the Comey letter, 11 days before the election, was the precipitating event behind Clinton’s loss, despite the letter being effectively retracted less than a week later. In such a close election, there may have been dozens of factors whose absence would have reversed the outcome, such as the influence campaign of the Russian government as detailed by US intelligence services. But the sudden change in the political conversation after the Comey letter suggest it was the single, most indispensable factor in the surprise election result."

The company runs a daily online survey that asks consumers about what consumer products they have been talking about in the last 24 hours. Looking at that data over time helps them to model behavior rather than just opinion at a particular moment in time. When combined with other data, this methodology has been able to predict about 25% of sales in certain product categories.

The data collected from the presidential questions showed what we already knew, namely that both candidates were viewed fairly negatively. But, after the first debate, Clinton was viewed far less negatively than Trump right up until the Comey letter. That precipitated a 17 point increase in Clinton's negativity rating and an 11 point improvement in Trump's. What had been a 24 point advantage for Clinton almost immediately became a 4 point disadvantage. And that disadvantage never moved again before election day. Here is the devastating story in graphical form:

Comey's intervention in the election was unprecedented, unethical, and potentially illegal. His willingness to discuss the ongoing investigation into Hillary's emails stands in stark contrast to his silence regarding Trump's Russian connections as well as his unwillingness to publicly repudiate Trump's charge that Obama wiretapped him. And we should never forget that all the horrible things that the Trump administration will do and has already done are on his hands and, hopefully, his conscience.