A state has to swing to be a swing state, so no.
Not really. It must have the potential for a swing so that the favored party will have to invest money in it in order for the state to remain it in their own column.
Under that definition, South Carolina and Nevada are swing states, too.
Both parties have invested enough in Minnesota to know that Republicans can't just win if they tried more. Republicans haven't won a gubernatorial or federal race in MN since 2006 and the state has ambiguous trends. If Republicans couldn't win in 2010 or 2014 it's clear that it would need to be a GOP landslide for it to go red. And if a state can only flip in a landslide, it's not a true swing state.
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