Marlow senior predicts the 2024 election with 100% accuracy

A senior at Marlow High School has done what nearly every veteran political analyst couldn’t- he called the 2024 Presidential Election’s electoral map down to the state ahead of last week’s election race between Donald Trump and Kamala Harris.

Every election year, Marlow High Social Studies teacher Haleigh Elroy has her class fill in an electoral vote prediction map ahead of the election, and this year for the first time ever, one map turned out to be a 100% accurate prediction.

Jonah Barton has been in Elroy’s class a few times throughout his high school career, and Elroy said that this is undoubtedly worth celebrating. 

“This is something that political scientists and professional statisticians got totally wrong this election cycle,” Elroy said, “and we at Marlow High School are so incredibly proud of Jonah.” 

Jonah’s map accurately predicted the split states of Maine and Nebraska as well as the rest of the United States, but it wasn’t until the votes were finally called days later in Arizona and Nevada that Elroy and Barton knew he had called the election with 100% accuracy.

Jonah loves statistics and politics, and he said now it could be a viable career path.

“I’ve always wanted to predict an election, and I’m looking forward to forecasting the 2028 one when that time comes,” said Jonah.

“I have a hobby of map-making, learning history, and weather stuff, and I have been thinking about what I want to be when I grow up. I thought maybe becoming a history teacher, meteorologist, or sports broadcaster… but maybe I would try to do political stuff too.”