- [x] Get past electoral college results since 2000
- [x] Get number of electors for each state with the new census
- [x] Combine the two to get an initial base rates analysis
This initial approach gives a 25% to republicans winning in the 2024 election. Why is this? Well, consider the number of electoral college votes:
| Year | Republican electoral college votes |
| ---- | --- |
| 2000 | 271 |
| 2004 | 286 |
| 2008 | 173 |
| 2012 | 206 |
| 2016 | 304 |
| 2020 | 232 |
| Year | Democrat electoral college votes
| ---- | --- |
| 2000 | 266 |
| 2004 | 251 |
| 2008 | 365 |
| 2012 | 332 |
| 2016 | 227 |
| 2020 | 232 |
When Democrats won with Obama, they won by a lot, whereas when Republicans won with Bush and Trump, they won by a smaller amount. Or, in other words, this initial approach *doesn't take into account that states are correlated*.
Remedy: consider the conditional probabilities? But how? Or, relax assumptions using Laplace's law?
