The states that will decide America’s next president
Insights from our election forecast model
KAMALA HARRIS enjoys a four-point lead over Donald Trump in national polls. But that foretells little about the actual outcome of America’s presidential race. The victor is determined not by the popular vote, but by the electoral college, which is why The Economist’s forecast model considers the race a toss-up. Electoral-college votes are allocated to every state and the District of Columbia roughly in proportion to their population; the winner of the popular vote in each state takes all its electoral-college votes. (Only Maine and Nebraska do things differently, awarding a vote to the winner in each congressional district.)
This gives outsize importance to the seven states that are truly competitive; the outcome everywhere else is practically assured. Consider what happened in 2020, when Joe Biden’s victory came down to 311,000 ballots cast for him in six battleground states. He won Georgia by a margin of 0.2%, Arizona by 0.3%, Wisconsin by 0.6%, Pennsylvania by 1.2%, Nevada by 2.4% and Michigan by 2.8%. He lost North Carolina by 1.3%. All of these states are up for grabs this year and, once again, the margins look exceptionally tight.
Ms Harris’s likeliest path to 270 electoral college votes—the number needed to clinch the presidency—runs through the Midwestern “Blue Wall” states of Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, which together have 44 votes. The Blue Wall has swung for the Democratic candidate in five of the past six elections. If Ms Harris carries all three, plus Nebraska’s second congressional district (which encompasses the Democratic city of Omaha in an otherwise deep-red state), she could lose the other battleground states and still win the White House. Pennsylvania, with 19 electoral-college votes, is the largest prize of the swing states and thus the most likely “tipping point” in our simulations. Pollsters call it an “almost must-win” state for either candidate. Recent polls there have Ms Harris and Mr Trump tied.Voters in Pennsylvania and the other Rust Belt states are older, whiter, a bit more rural and a bit less educated than the electorate at large. Ms Harris could afford to forgo, say, Michigan (with its 15 votes) and still triumph if she performs well in the Sun Belt, which is younger and more racially diverse. In theory those demographics should be auspicious for Democrats. But historically they have had less success in the South: Arizona, Georgia and North Carolina lean Republican (though Arizona and Georgia went for Mr Biden by a whisker in 2020). Only Nevada has voted consistently Democratic since 2008.
Ms Harris may be hoping that weak and wacky down-ballot Republicans dampen turnout for Mr Trump. Kari Lake, the Republican candidate for Senate in Arizona and a strident election denier, is polling well behind her Democratic opponent, Ruben Gallego. In North Carolina, Mark Robinson, the Republican candidate for governor, is embroiled in scandal and practically guaranteed to lose his race. Meanwhile, a ballot measure that would enshrine abortion rights in Arizona’s constitution may juice Democratic turnout there.
That Ms Harris is even competitive in the Sun Belt shows how much the race has changed since Mr Biden dropped out in July. Mr Trump is still favoured to win Arizona, Georgia and North Carolina, but our forecast model shows that Democrats have moved from roughly a 20- to a 40-in-100 chance of winning these states since Mr Biden dropped out. In the four other states, Ms Harris has boosted the Democrats’ chance of winning by more than 25 points. With a race this close, slight shifts could tip the fortune of the election.
