FiveThirtyEight’s Nate Silver now believes Joe Biden will win Arizona

FiveThirtyEight founder Nate Silver is ready to declare a Joe Biden victory in Arizona Friday — after calling on outlets like Fox News and the Associated Press to retract declaring the state a victory for the Democrat earlier this week.

The statistician reversed course following a batch of votes that trickled in from Maricopa County that showed Trump closing in on Biden’s lead, but likely not a strong enough performance to capture the state’s 11 electoral votes.

“I have been an optimist on the Trump comeback in Arizona [but] that was really bad news for Trump,” Silver said on ABC News Friday. “I think Biden is the more likely winner now in Arizona.”

Silver believes Biden will also take the other outstanding swing states, Nevada, Pennsylvania and Georgia — for 306 total electoral votes.

“Different corners of the map,” Silver told host George Stephanopoulos. “That Arizona batch was just quite bad news for Trump.”

On his blog earlier this week, Silver was less confident in a Biden win in Arizona, saying the AP and Fox News were premature to call the state for the former vice president.

“I don’t know, I guess I’d say that Biden will win Arizona if you forced me to pick, but I sure as heck don’t think the state should have been called by anyone, and I think the calls that were previously made should be retracted now,” Silver wrote.

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