Here is a blank map for general use:
Without electoral votes and with no distinction for districts:
Please don't post here yet. "1.5" is still alive.
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The fundamental beginning of the 2020 Presidential campaign -- states and districts within 10% of being even in the 2016 Presidential election:
2016 result among states decided by 10% or less:
8% or more -- saturation 7
4% to 7.99% -- saturation 5
1.5% to 2.99% -- saturation 3
under 1.5% -- saturation 2
States in gray look too far away to be affected by a shift in votes from 2016 to polling in 2018. Should any such state go into play, then differences between 2016 and 2020 ar profound in the extreme. This range of states is between 203 and 413 electoral votes for a Democrat (and 125 and 335 for Trump). Assuming that no state that Trump lost by 10% or more in 2016 will vote for him in 2020, President Trump has at most a chance for being re-elected much like Obama in 2012 -- but he can lose as badly as GHWB did in 1992.
Remember that if such a state as Oregon goes into play for Trump, then the Democrat is in supreme trouble and at risk of losing a landslide. On the other side, if a state such as Missouri goes into play, then Trump is at risk of a landslide loss. Because there is no distinction between winning with 270 and 335 (or 413, or even 538 electoral votes)... the significance of a landslide win or loss is coattails in Congress
This is still relevant 43 months after the 2016 election and 5 months before the 2020 election.
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Furthermore, the electoral histories of the states are relevant over the last five Presidential elections. All but the 2008 election were close, and I am not going to show anything before 2000 because several states that used to be reliably D in their voting are quite the opposite now.
How states have voted from 2000 on:
all 5 for the Republican
4 R, 1 D
3 R, 2D
3 D, 2 R
4 D, 1 R
all five for the DemocratIf there is to be any show of any swing to 2016, then it is from 2000 if it is to show any change in state's electoral habits. The 2016 election is more similar to that of 2000 than to any other and thus as it begins it is more comparable to 2004 in that
(1) both involved open seats
(2) both followed a Democrat who had won decisive majorities in the electoral vote in the two prior elections
(3) both had the winner of the plurality of the popular vote losing the electoral vote
(4) neither election was a decisive mandate for change although the winner so interpreted the election as such
(5) both Dubya and Trump promised peace and prosperity with a basis in pro-business solutions above all else
(6) both Dubya and Trump had rather thin experience in electoral politics (Dubya had been Governor of Texas, but that is a largely ceremonial task; Trump had no experience in electoral politics)
(7) both Dubya and Trump were derided in elite-to-mass media as ignorant buffoons.
(8 ) neither Dubya nor Trump had much margin for losing electoral support from their first Presidential election and winning the second time.
This is not to say that 2020 will be analogous to 2004. An economic meltdown like that of 2008 could make 2008 or even 1932 more relevant. I can think of results analogous to 2008 for the 2020 election, but not 1932 (or 1980); such would unfold before us in unpredictable ways.
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Flips based on 2000-2016 by margin:
(**favorite son as nominee in 2000. No asterisk for 2016 because both nominees were from New York
* state 'flipped" from 2000 to 2016)
swing 10% or more 80% saturation
swing 5-9.9% 60% saturation
swing 2-4.9% 40% saturation
swing under 2% 20% saturation
Utah -- a third-party nominee finished in second place above the Democrat in 2016, so I show this in green with no other significance.
Ignore districts of Maine and Nebraska, as I have inadequate data on those.
color shows the direction of the swing of the margin -- red to the Democrat, blue to the Republican
You are welcome to draw whatever conclusions you wish. Except that tiny swings from 2000 to 2016 were enough to swing Wisconsin and New Hampshire, swings that flipped the other states (CO, IA, MI, PA, VA) were much larger than necessary. It's obvious that except for Mississippi (which seems to vote close to an ethnic divide), the good old days for Democrats in the Mountain and Deep South (and this includes Missouri) from the New Deal to the 1990's are much in the past. Otherwise, Democrats seem to be doing better in the western US but decidedly worse (except for Illinois) in the Rust Belt. You are also welcome to draw conclusions of applicability to 2020.
I may not be accurate, and I would not pay much attention to small swings unless you want to make your changes.
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Repeated verbatim from "1.5", as it has not really changed:
Assumptions that we can all reasonably make, lest everything be void:
1. That Donald Trump will be the Republican nominee for President -- that he will not decide not to run, that he will not die in office, and that he will not removed for diminished capacity (as after entering an irreversible coma).
2. That we will not have a military coup. Sure, we have never had one. But Seven Days in May is becoming much more plausible with this President, if for very different reasons. Doddering old leader? Check. Highly unpopular leader? Check. "Too liberal"? The opposite. "Too squeamish about taking harsh measures"? Exactly the opposite.
I would not rule out that the military would turn on him rather than soil itself in aggressive war against Iran or Venezuela. Yes, the military has not intervened in the government at any time in American history, and 240 years of civilian control of the military will come to an end only under exceptional circumstances.
So imagine that you are a four-star general and you must choose between overthrowing Donald Trump or becoming complicit in war crimes. You don't know what you would do? Even I can't speak for myself.
3. That the elections of 2020 will not be rigged. The 2018 Congressional, Senatorial, and Gubernatorial elections looked clean enough.
4. That the Democrat (Joe Biden) will not be exposed in having done something discreditable -- insider trading, having sex with minors, being involved in a business failure the result of malfeasance, having a dishonorable discharge from the military, or having a criminal record. That is clearly in the category of 'unforeseen events' that have nothing to do with polling.
5. That we can derive any conclusions from polling. By November 2010 we could see Obama within easy reach of winning re-election even if his Party was severely defeated in the midterm election -- it would take a spirited campaign by him and competent strategy as a candidate to turn approval in the 45-47% range into either a bare majority or even a plurality. It is a reasonable assumption that a spirited campaign and good campaign strategy were good for turning something like 45% approval into 51% of the vote. Obama ran a competent enough campaign with which to win despite a disapproval rating in the mid 40s around September 1 (just after the Republican national convention, I guess). 44% + 7% = 51%, so it looks as if he did what he needed.
I look at recent polling numbers for Donald Trump, and he will be lucky to get 46% of the popular vote. Sure, he won with 46% of the popular vote because Hillary Clinton ran up the vote totals in places like California and New York -- but just look at the polling for Arizona, Florida, Michigan, Minnesota, Ohio, and Wisconsin. Trump could lose every one of those states based on polling that we have already seen.
That disapproval of a nominee is in the 50s may not assure that that nominee will lose 54-46 to the opponent. Maybe it will be more like 49-46-5, which only looks sort of close.
6. That Democrats will not be facing a strong left-wing alternative that guts their support. This is the most likely thing to go wrong for the Democratic nominee for President. I cannot yet rule it out.
7. That there will be no event that changes American political culture by identifying the President with some rush of patriotism or a movement toward a right-wing 'religious revival' to the benefit of 'conservative' politics. I see nothing of the sort. Today's young adults are seemingly abandoning religion.
But I can't completely rule out such things as an invasion from outer space, an eruption of a supervolcano or meteor strike that does great damage to human populations, a zombie apocalypse, or the Coming of a Messiah, either. Any of these makes the Presidential election an irrelevant concern.
Time is running out for any of those things to change.
Voter participation:
