1) In a Presidential election held around now, a Republican wins 49 states against a Democrat. What is most likely to be the state that votes Democratic? (DC is not a state, but will obviously be the last electoral votes).
2) In a Presidential election held around now, a Democrat wins 49 states against a Republican. What is most likely to be that last state?
#1 I'm really not sure at all. Purely on CPVI, you have Hawaii at D+20, Vermont behind at D+16 and several other states all well behind at D+11. But those are Obama-specific numbers, go back to the Bush years and those states are much further back. Nate Silver's
elasticties for each state gives us an indication - HI, VT, RI and MA are all strongly Democratic states that are nonetheless all well-above average in elasticity, and hence could easily vote for a Republican running strongly nationally. MD and NY, as strongly Democratic and inelastic states, may well be the last holdouts.
#2 Utah is the obvious pick. Wyoming seems slightly more elastic (see it electing a fair number of Democratic governors recently). I could see Oklahoma against the wrong kind of candidate (a highly successful Obama-clone?), but it has ancestral Democratic support that could turn out for a broadly successful national Democrat. Alabama and maybe Mississippi are the other possibilities - less Republican than Utah, but much more inelastic. Still, they have a bit of residual Blue Doggedness.