Biden’s best path to reelection is through the Great Lakes, not the Sunbelt

CNN
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How on earth did Joe Biden win re-election? National polls show him trailing Donald Trump more often than leading him, a position unusual for an incumbent at this point in a campaign.

But these national polls mean little. Elections are won state by state through the Electoral College. In 2020, the closest swing states (i.e., states decided by 3 points or less) are those around the Great Lakes (Michigan, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin) or along the Sunbelt (Arizona, Georgia, Nevada, North Carolina). It was either.

Biden will be re-elected if he wins every state in either region, as long as he retains the remaining states he won in 2020.

But for now, the easiest path to Phase 2 appears to be through the Great Lakes, not the Sunbelt.

Take a look at two FOX News polls released Thursday. In Wisconsin, which the president won by less than a point in 2020, Biden and Trump were tied. In Georgia, another state that Biden won by less than a point four years ago, Trump held an 8-point lead.

These Fox News polls are not an outlier. Trump is not in the lead in Wisconsin polls this season (even within the margin of error), which meets CNN’s criteria. Meanwhile, polls in Georgia haven’t trailed in more than a year.

These two states fit into a larger pattern identified in the polling data. For the most part, Trump has a clear advantage in Arizona, but Biden and Trump traded leads in Pennsylvania. A recent Pennsylvania poll from Franklin and Marshall College and Quinnipiac University showed Mr. Biden receiving a slightly higher percentage of the vote than Mr. Trump, but his lead was within the margin of error.

Similarly, polls in Nevada generally favored Trump. The limited North Carolina polling also did not look good for Biden.

Michigan is Biden’s weakest state in the Great Lakes battleground state polls, but the state polled better than any other Sun Belt battleground state. Michigan also performs better in polls of likely voters than registered voters. That includes a New York Times/Siena College poll last fall that found him trailing Trump by 5 points among registered voters, but among likely voters. So it was the same number.

(This large gap between registered voters and likely voters is consistent with what we’ve seen nationally, and is likely to be even larger in Michigan because of its universal voter registration.) (In other words, Biden is doing worse among people who are less likely to vote.)

If you look at the national polls, the fact that Biden is doing better in the Great Lakes than in the Sunbelt makes a lot of sense. People like me have long pointed to the historically weak Democratic support for Biden among Hispanic and Black voters nationally.

Hispanic voters make up a disproportionate share of the electorate in Arizona and Nevada compared to the national level. Black voters make up a disproportionate share of the electorate in Georgia and North Carolina compared to the rest of the country.

The racial group Biden tends to attract is white voters. Recent polls from CNN/SSRS, The New York Times and Quinnipiac show Biden doing about the same with this demographic as he did in 2020.

White voters made up at least 80% of the 2020 electorate in Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, according to both network exit polls and U.S. Census Bureau data. Nationally, he was between 67% and 71% in the two data sets.

Michigan is the Great Lakes battleground state with the lowest percentage of white voters in the electorate. Again, this is consistent with the state being a Great Lakes battleground where Biden will perform worst in 2024.

Biden is expected to visit more Wolverine States, as he did earlier this week.

Now, none of this is to say that Biden should rely solely on wins in Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. Aside from the fact that Michigan polls poorly (he’s trailing in many polls), if Biden wins these three states plus every other state he won by at least 5 points in 2020, If they do, they will have at least a minimum victory in the Electoral College.

Winning exactly 270 electoral votes leaves Biden with no margin for error, especially if he does worse among white voters than current polls indicate. (This is what happened in 2020.)

On the other hand, if Mr. Biden begins to gain support among Hispanic and black voters, his support in the Sunbelt region could improve as well. There is a lot of time between now and November, and Biden will have to give himself multiple options.

Still, if anyone were to place a bet at this point, it would seem that Biden’s easiest path to winning 270 electoral votes would be through the North, not the South.