The media’s predictions of President Donald Trump’s certain defeat are about as confident this year as they were in 2016. You would think pundits’ embarrassing errors in 2016 would provoke some humility, but the narrative has been roughly the same for months: Joe Biden is going to win the election, likely in a landslide.
Charlie Cook declared the race “over” and Hillary Clinton the winner on the strength of a Fox News poll that was issued on October 13, 2016. Four years to the day later, he said Biden will win and that there’s a 40 percent chance he will win “big.” He also said, according to a press release that was just issued, that “if Biden is able to win the states Hillary Clinton lost, he could get enough electoral votes to win the election.” Not much to say about that insightful comment.
It is absolutely true that national polls would predict a clear Biden victory if the country elected presidents through the popular vote. He’s up 10 points in the Real Clear Politics poll average nationally. What is left out of the media’s discussions of whether this or the 2016 race is winnable for Trump is the Electoral College. And for that discussion, it’s worth a look at the states whose electoral votes will decide the election.
In 2016, Trump won by winning battleground states that few expected him to win. Right now, he’s polling slightly and relatively better in those states than he did four years ago.
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04.19.2024