WASHINGTON (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 07th August, 2020) Presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden's lead in the polls has narrowed slightly over the past three weeks despite the incumbent getting poor approval ratings over his handling of the pandemic and anti-racism protests, although the challenger still appears to have a stranglehold on the electoral map.
BIDEN STILL DOMINATES WHERE IT COUNTS
With less than 90 days remaining until Election Day, Biden leads President Donald Trump by an average of 6 percent in six of the most recent national polls posted on Realclearpolitics.com (RCP) as of Thursday evening. This represents a 3-point drop from the former vice president's lead in the RCP average that was captured in a Sputnik review on July 17.
However, national polling is no more than a general barometer of the race because US presidential elections are not determined by a direct popular vote but through a federalist system called the Electoral College, which apportions 538 electors among 50 states in a way that ensures all regions are adequately represented.
Each state then awards all of its "electoral votes" to whichever candidate wins the statewide vote (except for 2 states that proportionately allocate). This is the reason why polling in key states is much more relevant than the national picture.
There are often a dozen or so "swing states" or those considered "up for grabs" in every election and the top five largest prizes in 2020 include Texas (38 electoral votes), Florida (29), Pennsylvania (20), Ohio (18), and Michigan (16).
According to RCP's most recent average of polling, Biden leads in all of the top five states except for Texas, where Trump has a 1 point lead. Biden leads by five in Florida, 4 in Pennsylvania, 2 in Ohio and by six points in Michigan.
In fact, overall, the former vice president is ahead in eight out of the top ten battleground states and, if the election were held today, would likely win by an Electoral College landslide.
Biden, meanwhile, also hopes to get a "VP bounce" in the polls after he unveils his running mate, an announcement that may be coming within the next few hours or days.
TRUMP STOPS THE BLEEDING, SOMEHOW
The only real good news for the Trump campaign is that the bleeding has stopped in some of the bigger states. For example, over the past three weeks Trump has narrowed Biden's lead by one point in Florida, 3 points in Pennsylvania, and shaved a point off in Michigan.
It is hard to explain Trump's ability to "stabilize" in the polls, as CNN analyst Harry Enten adeptly put it on Thursday, considering the president has seen atrocious favorability numbers with respect to his handling of the nation's most pressing challenges.
According to an ABC News/Ipsos poll published last week, Trump's approval on COVID-19 is stuck in the low 30s while only 36% of those surveyed said they approve of the way he has handled the protests over racism and police brutality.
Enten suggested that perhaps the slight reduction in coverage of the anti-racism protests helped prevent his poll numbers from dropping further.
Trump also must not like his position in the polls given the way he has been flinging Hail Mary passes, including trying to claim mail-in ballots present a high risk of fraud - except in the state of Florida because he trusts the Republican governor. The Trump administration has even been criticized for imposing new rules that could disrupt the flow of mail.
The New York Times' Jamelle Bouie has argued that Trump does not believe the pandemic or the protests really matter if he can exploit the Electoral College system and win the presidency again despite losing the popular vote. Trump, he claimed, is deliberately making policies that satiate only those voters residing in Republican states or winnable battleground states.
"He bases key governing decisions on whether he won a state or group of states in the previous election. If the United States does not have a national strategy for the pandemic, it is at least in part because... the administration originally believed the problem was restricted to 'blue' [Democratic] states," Bouie wrote in an August 4 op-ed piece.
In short, his behavior, policies and rhetoric leave the impression that the president, perhaps, does not want every American to vote, especially in states where he cannot stop the bleeding through natural means.
