Thursday, August 11, 2016

The Electoral College Map (8/11/16)

Latest Update



New State Polls (8/11/16)
State
Poll
Date
Margin of Error
Sample
Clinton
Trump
Undecided
Poll Margin
FHQ Margin
Alabama
6/19
+/- 2.0%
4100 adults
33
57
--
+24
+24.00
Florida
8/10
+/- 4.0%
622 likely voters
45
44
3
+1
+2.19
Georgia
8/4-8/8
+/- 2.5%
1604 likely voters
39
43
--
+4
+0.60
Idaho
5/18-6/4
+/- 3.99%
603 adults
32
49
18
+17
+19.36
Iowa
8/8-8/10
+/- 4.4%
500 likely voters
36
37
18
+1
+2.04
Maine
8/4-8/8
+/- 2.2%
2046 likely voters
43
33
--
+10
+8.69
New Hampshire
8/7-8/8
+/- 3.4%
820 registered voters
41
31
13
+10
+4.60
New York
8/4-8/8
+/- 2.4%
1717 likely voters
48
34
--
+14
+19.17
South Carolina
8/9-8/10
+/- 2.7%
1290 likely voters
39
41
13
+2
+2.00


Polling Quick Hits:
There was a flood of new polling from old and new battleground states alike and a couple of backlogged polls freshly added to the FHQ dataset. Here is a quick tour.


Alabama:
One of the older polls comes out Dixie. There is quite a bit of support not going to the two major party candidates, but Trump led Clinton by 24 points. Both are underperforming where their 2012 predecessors were in the Yellowhammer state, but the margin is in line with the spread in November 2012. Even if there is a blue wave that surges into the most Republican columns below on the Electoral College Spectrum, Alabama figures to be one the hold outs on the Republican side of the partisan line.


Florida:
One has to wonder if the volatility in the polling in Florida is dying down some after the narrow margins of the last two days of survey releases. That said, Quinnipiac -- yesterday's entrant -- has leaned more Republican this cycle. It could be that there is a tighter new normal in the Sunshine state, or that could be a function of the firms that have released polls in the last two days. It will just take some more data to answer that question.


Georgia:
In the Peach state, there is yet more evidence that Georgia is more competitive in 2016. The head-to-head in the new Gravis poll has Trump clinging to a one point advantage, but the multicandidate results show a larger gap with most of the support for the third party candidates being siphoned off of Clinton's. Either way one goes -- and FHQ uses the multicandidate numbers in these situations -- Trump is just a hair ahead of Clinton in the FHQ averages. Georgia is essentially tied along with Arizona and Nevada.


Idaho:
Dan Jones and Associates polled Idaho just before the end of primary season. As was the story in the firm's July survey of the Gem state, Trump was ahead by a comfortable margin, but running behind recent GOP nominees in the state. Like Alabama above, Idaho will likely be red in the fall, insulated from any Clinton advances. It is only August, but these are data from before the conventions.


Iowa:
Like Florida, another day brought another close poll in the Hawkeye state. The slight Trump edge nudged the FHQ average down enough that Florida and Iowa switched places with each other on the Spectrum, and both are now fairly tightly knotted in a group with Ohio in terms of their average margins. What is perhaps more interesting about Iowa is that no candidate has garnered anything more than 44% in any poll this year (with the exception of the very first survey back in early January). And now both candidates in the last two days of polling have dipped into the 30s. Iowa is close, but there is a deep reservoir of undecideds there. That should taper off as election day approaches, but could swing Iowa depending on how that segment breaks.


Maine:
There has not been a lot of survey work done in Maine yet. Thus far in 2016, there has been but one poll, and it showed Clinton ahead, though in the lean range. Another poll -- this one from Gravis -- has the race in the Pine Tree state in a similar position, but with a slightly larger Clinton lead. That was enough to bump the FHQ average in the state up, but keep Maine in the Lean Clinton category.


New Hampshire:
If Florida and Iowa have had a series of closer post-convention polls, New Hampshire can be said to be moving in the opposite direction. Rather than a second close poll, there is now a second double digit lead for Clinton in the Granite state in the wake of the two national conventions. One the weight of those polls, New Hampshire enters the Watch List -- on the verge of shifting into a Lean Clinton state -- and pushes past Virginia on the Electoral College Spectrum, breaking the electoral college "tie" scenario that occurs when Pennsylvania and Virginia are on the Democratic side of New Hampshire. [Tie is in quotation marks above because the partisan line pushes well beyond where those three states are in the alignment of states. It is not at all a likely scenario at this point in time.]


New York:
There are a number of ways one could frame the current picture in New York: home state of both candidates, tighter than usual margin, etc. But it is pretty clear that Trump is hovering right around where Romney did in the Empire state in 2012. That makes New York a story of Clinton underperforming Obama in the state. Yet, even given that trend, the margin there is comfortably blue. It would be more noteworthy if Trump was actually running ahead of Romney's pace there. He isn't and that is likely to keep New York in the Democratic column.


South Carolina:
Changes (August 11)
StateBeforeAfter
South CarolinaLean TrumpToss Up Trump
Finally, the first presidential polling data of 2016 emerged from South Carolina. It might be easy to get carried away with the small two point advantage Trump has in the Palmetto state. And it is a surprising number at first glance. However, South Carolina ended up a couple of percentage points redder than Georgia in 2012. And if Georgia is tied, then South Carolina +2 to Trump is right in line with what would be a uniform shift of states. And truth be told, that is not that far off. South Carolina is still in range of its positioning on the Spectrum in November 2012. It is simply closer there in 2016 if much stock can be put in just one survey. Of course, this one does harken back to the 2008 Zogby poll of South Carolina; the one where Obama was narrowly ahead.

South Carolina shifts from Lean to Toss Up Trump with the addition of this poll, and jumps to a spot next to Georgia on the Spectrum after the Peach state switched places with Arizona.



NOTE: A description of the methodology behind the graduated weighted average of 2016 state-level polling that FHQ uses for these projections can be found here.


The Electoral College Spectrum1
HI-42
(7)
NJ-14
(175)
NH-4
(260)
MS-6
(155)
TN-11
(58)
MD-10
(17)
DE-3
(178)
VA-133
(273 | 278)
MO-10
(149)
LA-8
(47)
RI-4
(21)
WI-10
(188)
FL-29
(302 | 265)
AK-3
(139)
SD-3
(39)
MA-11
(32)
ME-4
(192)
IA-6
(308 | 236)
UT-6
(136)
ND-3
(36)
VT-3
(35)
NM-5
(197)
OH-18
(326 | 230)
KS-6
(130)
ID-4
(33)
CA-55
(90)
MI-16
(213)
NC-15
(341 | 212)
IN-11
(124)
NE-5
(29)
NY-29
(119)
OR-7
(220)
NV-6
(197)
TX-38
(113)
AL-9
(24)
IL-20
(139)
CT-7
(227)
AZ-11
(191)
AR-6
(75)
OK-7
(15)
MN-10
(149)
CO-9
(236)
GA-16
(180)
MT-3
(69)
WV-5
(8)
WA-12
(161)
PA-20
(256)
SC-9
(164)
KY-8
(66)
WY-3
(3)
1 Follow the link for a detailed explanation on how to read the Electoral College Spectrum.

2 The numbers in the parentheses refer to the number of electoral votes a candidate would have if he or she won all the states ranked prior to that state. If, for example, Trump won all the states up to and including Virginia (all Clinton's toss up states plus Virginia), he would have 278 electoral votes. Trump's numbers are only totaled through the states he would need in order to get to 270. In those cases, Clinton's number is on the left and Trumps's is on the right in bold italics.

To keep the figure to 50 cells, Washington, DC and its three electoral votes are included in the beginning total on the Democratic side of the spectrum. The District has historically been the most Democratic state in the Electoral College.

3 Virginia is the state where Clinton crosses the 270 electoral vote threshold to win the presidential election. That line is referred to as the victory line.



NOTE: Distinctions are made between states based on how much they favor one candidate or another. States with a margin greater than 10 percent between Clinton and Trump are "Strong" states. Those with a margin of 5 to 10 percent "Lean" toward one of the two (presumptive) nominees. Finally, states with a spread in the graduated weighted averages of both the candidates' shares of polling support less than 5 percent are "Toss Up" states. The darker a state is shaded in any of the figures here, the more strongly it is aligned with one of the candidates. Not all states along or near the boundaries between categories are close to pushing over into a neighboring group. Those most likely to switch -- those within a percentage point of the various lines of demarcation -- are included on the Watch List below.


The Watch List1
State
Switch
Alaska
from Lean Trump
to Toss Up Trump
Arizona
from Toss Up Trump
to Toss Up Clinton
Arkansas
from Strong Trump
to Lean Trump
Georgia
from Toss Up Trump
to Toss Up Clinton
Missouri
from Toss Up Trump
to Lean Trump
Nevada
from Toss Up Trump
to Toss Up Clinton
New Hampshire
from Toss Up Clinton
to Lean Clinton
New Jersey
from Strong Clinton
to Lean Clinton
Virginia
from Toss Up Clinton
to Lean Clinton
Wisconsin
from Lean Clinton
to Strong Clinton
1 Graduated weighted average margin within a fraction of a point of changing categories.





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