How Google Searches Pretty Much Nailed the New Hampshire Primary
Real-time trending search queries foretold the outcome of the election.
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Google’s ability to look into the future of political contests just notched another win: New Hampshire.
Searches of presidential candidates conducted by Google users in New Hampshire on Feb. 9 corresponded closely with the voting results of the state’s primary. The top-searched Democratic candidate was Bernie Sanders, who won with 60 percent of the vote in New Hampshire, according to the Associated Press. He got 72 percent of the searches, according to Google, while Hillary Clinton got 28 percent of the queries and 38 percent of the vote.