Frank Underwood Would Definitely Lose the Election

Obviously, there are spoilers below.

At the end of the fourth season of the Netflix series House of Cards, President Frank Underwood, the most Machiavellian, murderous politician of our time, is in a serious mess. Journalists are starting to take seriously the allegations that he was involved in the overthrow of his predecessor. His Republican opponent is far ahead of him in polls. Terrorists have just executed an American captive. He has no way out.

It probably goes without saying that in the real world, Underwood would almost certainly lose the upcoming election, even with one of his two-steps-ahead methods up his sleeves. House of Cards is (hopefully) far, far from the real world, but assuming there actually was a President Underwood up for election in 2016, here's an analytical look at his actual chances.

The biggest myth about American elections is that they are a race between two candidates. They are not. They instead are a referendum on the party in power. The winner wins essentially based on how satisfied or disappointed the American electorate is in the incumbent administration. Underwood's short amount of time in office is certainly tumultuous, but he still has elements that favor him. The simplest factor in his favor is that incumbents are really hard to defeat. In the past 11 presidential cycles, only Jimmy Carter and George H.W. Bush lost their re-election bids. Underwood would join them.

Let's consider what "The Keys to the White House" would say about his chances. The Keys system was developed by American historian Allan Lichtman and Russian scientist Vladimir Keilis-Borok in 1981 to predict the popular vote winner of presidential elections using 13 true/false statements (or "keys") based on factors from every presidential race from 1860-1980. If six or more statements are false, the incumbent loses. If you're skeptical of this system, let me mention that it's been quite accurate: the model has accurately predicted every U.S. presidential election from 1984-2012.

Let's use the Keys to predict Underwood's chances of survival:

1. Party Mandate After the midterms, the incumbent party holds more seats in the U.S. House of Representatives than after the previous midterm elections.

The timeline of the fictitious universe of House of Cards starts in 2013 during the Walker Administration. The Speaker of the House of Representatives at the time is Bob Birch (Larry Pine). In an early episode of season four, Underwood is addressing Congress during the State of the Union, and the Speaker is now a Republican. We can assume that the Democrats have lost control of the House of Representatives in 2014.

Verdict: False 

2. Contest There is no serious contest for the incumbent party nomination.

The contested convention, something that almost always dooms the incumbent party, at least in recent history, is one of Underwood's biggest obstacles. A house divided often does not survive election. (Think when then-Governor Ronald Reagan challenged President Gerald Ford, or in 1980 when Senator Ted Kennedy challenged President Jimmy Carter.) Underwood loses a host of states to his opponent, Heather Dunbar (Elizabeth Marvel), a former Solicitor General. Then he is actually challenged by his own Secretary of State Kathy Durant (Kayne Atkinson) at the convention when she learns that Frank has been politicking to get his wife, Claire (Robin Wright) the nomination for vice president and not Durant, as originally promised. This alone should drive a nail in his re-election bid's coffin.

Verdict: False  

3. Incumbency The incumbent candidate is the sitting president.

Despite an assassination attempt, Underwood survives and lives on to be his party's candidate for the general election, helping his party's chances.

Verdict: True

4. Third Party There is no significant third party or independent campaign.

This would have to be a significant third party challenge akin to Theodore Roosevelt in 1912 or Ross Perot in 1992. (Both President Howard Taft and President George H.W. Bush lost those elections.) As of season four of the show, there is no evidence that Underwood would face a third party challenger, and we have no reason to believe he will.

Verdict: True

5. Short Term Economy The economy is not in recession during the election campaign.

We know from season three that the economy is in a slump. Underwood proposes a controversial solution called America Works, a plan with the aim of adding 10 million new jobs, essentially (and unrealistically) doing in 18 months what President Obama did in six years, and bringing about full employment. Aside from the fact that zero employment is impossible, Underwood marches on.

But he has other economic problems. The shortage in gas produces long lines at stations, likely increasing anger at Underwood and increasing the chance of a recession. (The 1979 oil shock resulted in a U.S. recession.)

While the show doesn't explicitly state so, the House of Cards universe is probably going through a recession or recession-like conditions.

Verdict: False

6. Long Term Economy Real per capita economic growth during the term equals or exceeds mean growth during the previous two terms.

This is the most challenging to predict, as, outside of the economic conditions previously mentioned, the show has not revealed what the economic growth is like. For the heck of it, let's just cut Frank some slack and say that despite all his other troubles there is good enough economic growth.

Verdict: True

7. Policy Change The incumbent administration effects major changes in national policy.

It doesn't appear that the Underwood administration is actually able to pass any kind of change in national policy. They make a go for it with gun control reform but likely will come up short.

Verdict: False

8. Social Unrest There is no sustained social unrest during the term. 

There don't appear to be any protests or unrest similar to those of the late 1960s.

Verdict: True

9. Scandal The incumbent administration is untainted by major scandal.

This is by far the biggest obstacle to Underwood's success in 2016. During the final episode of season four, reporter Tom Hammerschmidt (Boris McGiver) and the Washington Herald publish a chronicle of the revolting ways Underwood made his way to the top, including orchestrating the overthrow of his predecessor. While the revelation that he also murdered two people are not included, these charges are serious enough to provide a political maelstrom similar to Watergate.

Verdict: False

10. Foreign/Military Failure The incumbent party suffers no major failure in foreign or military affairs.

In season two, the U.S. (under then-incumbent president Garret Walker, played by Michael Gill) experiences a major trade war with China. In season three, the Underwoods (with Claire as Ambassador to the UN) are dealt a setback with Russia; it's such a serious blow that it serves as the impetus for their marriage troubles we see at the start of season four.

These may be setback, but they do not constitute a foreign or military affair failure akin to "losing China" in 1949 or 9/11.

Verdict: True

11. Foreign/Military Success The incumbent party achieves a major success in foreign of military affairs.

If you need examples of this one, think of the Bin Laden raid in 2011 or the peace treaty between Egypt and Israel in 1979 (even though Carter still lost in 1980). If anything, the Underwoods experience tense situations in foreign policy, especially with regards to Russia. Claire does score a victory by negotiating with Russia while Frank is fighting for his life in the hospital, but nevertheless it's not a major foreign policy victory.

Verdict: False 

12. Incumbent charisma The incumbent party candidate is charismatic or a national hero.

As his rivals for the presidency point out, Underwood has never served in the military. And despite his Southern charm (and reminding ourselves that his fellow citizens are not aware that he actually threw a woman in front of a moving train), Underwood is not a charismatic candidate like Franklin Roosevelt, John Kennedy, Ronald Reagan, or Barack Obama.

Verdict: False

13. Challenger charisma The challenging part candidate is not charismatic or a national hero.

Kinnaman plays Conway as a tough (almost macho), youthful candidate opposite the ailing Underwood. His Kennedy-esque photogenic qualities put him on magazine cover after magazine cover, and his military record stands in contrast to the lack of service from Underwood.

But like Underwood, he may have charm, but he doesn't have charisma, and his military service in Afghanistan does not make him an almost mythical national hero in the eyes of the public similar to Ulysses S. Grant or Dwight Eisenhower.

Verdict: True



Frank Underwood probably has at least seven false keys, absolutely assuring us that he would lose to Conway. But that wouldn't make for a very entertaining fifth season, would it? This is House of Cards, after all, the only show that succeeded in making The West Wing look like neo-realism. Frank and Claire will find a way out, just as they always do.

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House of Cards

At first I couldn't stop telling myself that it seemed like I was watching a dumbed-down version of "The West Wing."  At times, the first season attempted to remedy this by throwing in a few paragraphs of jargon regarding education or energy policy. But I soon found out that I was the dumb one. Season 2 of Netflix's "House of Cards" featured a thrilling quorum debacle in which Frank Underwood, played by Kevin Spacey as a man of haunting ambition, navigates. The scenes are fascinating and intelligent. Gone were the certain silly moments that all too easily induced eye-rolling, like when Claire, played by Robin Wright, learns of Frank's adultery and calmly asks what good it will bring them. (Incidentally, they tell us that the Underwoods are not meant to be the Clintons.) In its place were trade wars with China, cyberterrorism, and an energy crisis.

"House of Cards," the groundbreaking Netflix show, seemed at first to take itself a bit too seriously, seeing itself as almost Shakespearean. Ian Richardson (himself a Shakespearean actor) played the character in the original British series with a certain amount of lightness bordering on conviviality; just compare the opening music to both and you'll notice an obvious difference in tone. Perhaps that's a sign of the times; our television heroes today seem to be Walter White, not Jeb Bartlett. "House of Cards" can be good fun, but it can also be toxic. Such are the times.

Underwood, our anti-hero protagonist in an era of television anti-heroes, is a Democrat. The reason is obvious: avoid criticism and make the show transparent. Why bother making him a Republican when just about any viewer--liberal or conservative--would shout allegations of bias? In an era of such pessimism, there's a feeling of a plague on both our houses. Underwood being a Democrat was the only choice. But there is an additional question: why make him a Southern Democrat when there hardly is a thing anymore? The answer is provided in David Sirota's fascinating interview with show creator and head writer Beau Willimon:

There's a catchphrase in the British version where Francis Urquhart [Richardson's character] says, "You very well might think that--I couldn't possibly comment." It was something I wanted to resurrect in a couple of places as an homage. It just felt wrong to do "House of Cards" and not have that line exist somewhere. The problem I ran up against in my mind, is that this is not the way Americans talk, it is not idiomatically part of our vernacular to speak with that diction unless you put it in the mouth of someone with a South Carolina upcountry accent. Then it rolls of the tongue and kind of works.

My dad's side of the family is from South Carolina, and I know that accent well, and then it got me thinking about what Frank Underwood's story might be. The American mythology is that anyone could be president--you could be from a town called Hope and be president--so I thought him coming from a small town and coming from nothing is a much more American tale, as opposed to coming from aristocracy, which is much more a British political trajectory.

And so I asked my dad if there is a small town in South Carolina that would be appropriate and he mentioned Gaffney, which, of course, is perfect. It was represented for years by a Democrat, John Spratt. Underwood is in no way like Spratt, but the fact that a Democrat represented a mostly rural district in a mostly red state is fascinating.

How so?

It speaks to a way that Southern politics works differently than other places; it is a lot more about personal relationships and connections you make. You have a tradition of Southern Blue Dog Democrats being a lot more conservative than many of their peers from elsewhere...a lot of them historically seem to vote as though they should be in the Republican Party, but because their father was a Democrat and their father's father was a Democrat, they are a Democrat.

That means politics there has been, up until recently, less about party affiliation, and that means stuff there is inherently more political as opposed to ideological. I found that to be appropriate for Francis Underwood--someone who doesn't define himself by party of ideology, but operates on personal connections and traverses the political web as a free agent.

Underwood may be a free agent, but he's also a sociopath (and these folks agree). Just look at these common traits of a sociopath and it becomes crystal clear: superficial charm, absence of nervousness, untruthfulness, lack of remorse. egocentricity, inadequacy for love and a sex life that is impersonal and trivial. Frank.Under.Wood. Look at this quote: "Sociopaths, as mentioned previously, can also be dangerous, especially when they feel they have been wronged in some way." Underwood has been wronged--his rejection of being nominated for Secretary of State in the first episode--and so he becomes quite dangerous indeed. (For more on the psychology of Francis Underwood, click here.)

Spacey, as exceptionally talented as he is, does not do accents well. His Southern drawl here is as bad as it was in "A Time to Kill" two decades ago. The character at first is practically two dimensional, so much so that he frequently and annoyingly breaks the fourth wall to have a chat with us, and it's not until Chapter 8 that we see that there's something actually there. Part of me thinks that's the point, that it's meant to symbolize the facade that just about every politician seems to exhibit, or that it's meant to demonstrate that Frank Underwood is a farcical character in a farcical show. I haven't figured it out yet. Nonetheless, despite his accent, he is commendable and also supported by an exceptional cast, most of all Wright as Claire. Her performance is haunting, and yet she is surely the more sympathetic of the two--watch her powerful (and slightly untruthful) interview in Season 2 for an example. Providing the show's most interesting character as Pete Russo, a recovering alcoholic congressman who can't seem to do anything right, is Corey Stoll. There hardly is a bad performance anywhere in the show--also great are Michael Gil as the president, Michael Kelly as Underwood's tough as nails chief of staff, Rachel Brosnahan as a former sex worker caught under Underwood's grasp, and Gerald McRaney as a multimillionaire energy tycoon doing battle with Underwood.

It may seem that my criticisms will make me conclude that this is a show that I don't like to watch. That is totally untrue. I can't think of another show that features such crisp cinematography (by Igor Martinovic, Eigil Bryld, and Tim Ives) and hauntingly beautiful music (by Jeff Beal). I complained that the show takes itself too seriously, but actually there are often shows that don't take themselves seriously enough. There's an enormous amount of effort, skill, talent and thought in "House of Cards," and is reminiscent of that wonderful line in Oliver Stone's "Nixon." When the title character looks up at a portrait of his old adversary, John F. Kennedy, he mutters, "When they look at you, they see what they want to be. When they look at me, they see what they are." "The West Wing" might be what we want our political system to be; "House of Cards" might simply be what it is.

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