Were there any red flags that indicated the race would be closer than polling suggested?

[Motorcity]

This might be a personal thing, but the unusual high number of undecided

Biden was never leading by 8 points

The polls were usually

Biden: 51-53%
Trump: 43-45%
Undecided/Not sure: 4-7%

Everything from my personal experience was "undecideds" were usually Trump supporters who didn't want to look racist.

In my opinion, any poll that has a high number of undecided voters is not a reliable snapshot of the ground.

[Motorcity]

According to the book “Lucky”, the Biden campaign internal polls showed a much closer race. That’s why they sent both Biden and Obama to Michigan those last few days. They also knew they were never competitive in Texas, Ohio, and Iowa.

The week before the election, they gave up on Florida. They did not expect to carry it by Halloween. To their credit, they did predict winning Georgia.

At the end of the day, the only state they were wrong about were North Carolina but they expected it to be a toss up anyway

[Motorcity]

I know this isn't too relavent to the discussion, but is it weird that I felt better as election day approached?

Throughout the campaign season, I was a nervous wreck. I was scared it was going to be a repeat of 2016. But I am just a overly cautious person.

But on November 2nd, I did a poll. I teach 6th grade Social Studies. The results were 39 votes for Trump and 35 for Biden. Mind you, I live in a small southern town, almost all white, and poor. The principal said he would have expected 75-90% for Trump when I told him. Such a close margin in the heart of Trump country made me feel better.

Another thing. All the people I knew who did not vote because of #bothsides or voted third in 2016 were voting for Biden. This was the key to a Biden victory, consilating the ampathy vote of 2016

[Motorcity]

And even if they had gotten a D+8.6% margin, they would have only gotten 241 seats (disturbingly, Republicans got that exact seat total in 2016 with a 1.1% popular vote win).

This is disturbing. A huge part of this is gerrymandering, but the system favors republicans in widespread districts not Democrats in jam packed cities