The Electoral College Map (10/4/16)

New State Polls (10/4/16)1
State	Poll	Date	Margin of Error	Sample	Clinton	Trump	Undecided	Poll Margin	FHQ Margin
Illinois	Paul Simon Public Policy Institute	9/27-10/2	+/- 3.3%	865 likely voters	53.2	28.4	9.5	+24.8	+15.94
Nevada	UNLV/Hart Research	9/27-10/2	+/- 3.8%	700 likely voters	44	41	4	+3	+0.27
North Carolina	Elon	9/27-9/30	+/- 3.81%	660 likely voters	45	39	6	+6	+1.26
Oregon	Hoffman Research	9/29-10/1	+/- 4.0%	605 likely voters	45	33	11	+12	+10.12
Pennsylvania	Franklin & Marshall	9/28-10/2	+/- 6.1%	496 likely voters	47	38	9	+9	--
Pennsylvania	Monmouth	9/30-10/3	+/- 4.9%	402 likely voters	50	40	2	+10	+5.06
Tennessee	MTSU	9/28-10/2	+/- 5.0%	472 likely voters	38	50	6	+12	+15.22
1Includes latest wave (9/19-10/2) of UPI/CVOTER polls from all 50 states and the District of Columbia.

Polling Quick Hits:
As the lone vice presidential debate looms over the day, there were a handful of new surveys released. The seven polls were for the second consecutive day primarily from states that are tipped toward Clinton at the moment. That leaves a seeming sea of blue across the board with just one red state represented.

Illinois:

Changes (October 4)
State	Before	After
Mississippi	Lean Trump	Strong Trump
Pennsylvania	Toss Up Clinton	Lean Clinton

For most of the year Hillary Clinton has been chasing Obama's 2012 performance in the bluest of states. That has been true in Illinois as well. But in this new poll from the Simon Institute, Clinton is on Obama's heels while Trump lags well behind Romney's pace from four years ago. Of course, overall both candidates are about the same distance apart as their 2012 counterparts were on Election Day.


Nevada:
It was not that long ago that Trump had reeled off a streak of ties or narrow leads in Nevada surveys. However, the first debate seems to have shifted that dynamic in the opposite direction. Clinton has been tied or ahead in every poll that was in the field after the Hofstra debate. The Silver state already flipped back to the Democratic side of the partisan line on the Electoral College Spectrum, but the Clinton advantage remains quite slight.


North Carolina:
The same Nevada phenomenon has been at work in North Carolina as well, although there was no Trump polling streak in the Tar Heel state heading into the first debate. Instead, leads traded hands. Now, however, Clinton has run off a string of polling edges that, while still narrow for the most part, has established a pretty firm lead of just more than a point. This shift is pretty well exemplified by the shift across Elon polls: a small Trump advantage in mid-September has been displaced by a six point Clinton lead now. And that was change built more on Trump trailing off than Clinton adding to her share of support.


Oregon:
There are a lot of undecideds in the Hoffman Research survey in Oregon. If they all broke toward Trump things might get interesting in the Beaver state. Yet, there has been nothing in the Oregon polling thus far that such an outcome is in the offing. Clinton has been behind Obama 2012 all year in Oregon, but consistently ahead of Trump by a margin right around the Strong/Lean line. The Hoffman poll is consistent with that.


Pennsylvania:
There are hints -- mostly driven by the two new polls today -- that the polling in the Keystone state is  beginning to resemble those from the post-convention period. That is to say that the margins are inching back up toward the double digits. If the more apparent debate effect dissipates any, things are likely to settle back into the five to seven point range again. The average here at FHQ nudged back above the five point (Lean/Toss Up) line on the weight of these two polls, pushing Pennsylvania back into Lean Clinton territory.


Tennessee:
The one spot of red in a batch of blue polls is an MTSU survey of Tennessee. There are not any surprises here. Trump is approaching 50 percent mark in terms of his average share of support in the FHQ graduate weighted averages and that is enough to have him well ahead of Clinton in the Volunteer state.


--
The headline changes today are the category shifts in Mississippi (based on the addition of the UPI surveys) and Pennsylvania. But the electoral vote count remains unchanged and the flips on the Spectrum of a handful of state were no more than a one cell shift. The Watch List, too, remains virtually unchanged. The list of states is the same, but the two states to change categories continue to huddle around the category lines.

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 (172)	PA-20 (263)	SC-9 (154)	MT-3 (53)
MD-10 (17)	OR-7 (179)	CO-94 (272 | 275)	TX-38 (145)	AR-6 (50)
VT-3 (20)	RI-4 (183)	FL-29 (301 | 266)	AK-3 (107)	ND-3 (44)
CA-55 (75)	ME-23 (185)	NC-15 (316 | 237)	MS-6 (104)	KY-8 (41)
MA-11 (86)	MN-10 (195)	OH-18 (334 | 222)	KS-6 (98)	NE-53 (33)
NY-29+13 (116)	NM-5 (200)	NV-6 (340 | 204)	IN-11 (92)	AL-9 (28)
IL-20 (136)	WI-10 (210)	IA-6 (198)	UT-6 (81)	WV-5 (19)
DE-3 (139)	MI-16 (226)	AZ-11 (192)	LA-8 (75)	OK-7 (14)
CT-7 (146)	VA-13 (239)	GA-16 (181)	SD-3 (67)	ID-4 (7)
WA-12 (158)	NH-4 (243)	MO-10+13 (165)	TN-11 (64)	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 Colorado (all Clinton's toss up states plus Colorado), he would have 275 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 Maine and Nebraska allocate electoral college votes to candidates in a more proportional manner. The statewide winner receives the two electoral votes apportioned to the state based on the two US Senate seats each state has. Additionally, the winner within a congressional district is awarded one electoral vote. Given current polling, all five Nebraska electoral votes would be allocated to Trump. In Maine, a split seems more likely. Trump leads in Maine's second congressional district while Clinton is ahead statewide and in the first district. She would receive three of the four Maine electoral votes and Trump the remaining electoral vote. Those congressional district votes are added approximately where they would fall in the Spectrum above. 4 Colorado 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. Currently, Colorado is in the Toss Up Clinton category.

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 Strong Trump	to Lean Trump
Colorado	from Toss Up Clinton	to Lean Clinton
Iowa	from Toss Up Trump	to Toss Up Clinton
Michigan	from Lean Clinton	to Toss Up Clinton
Mississippi	from Strong Trump	to Lean Trump
Nevada	from Toss Up Clinton	to Toss Up Trump
New Hampshire	from Lean Clinton	to Toss Up Clinton
New Jersey	from Strong Clinton	to Lean Clinton
Ohio	from Toss Up Clinton	to Toss Up Trump
Oregon	from Strong Clinton	to Lean Clinton
Pennsylvania	from Lean Clinton	to Toss Up Clinton
Rhode Island	from Lean Clinton	to Strong Clinton
Virginia	from Lean Clinton	to Toss Up Clinton
1 Graduated weighted average margin within a fraction of a point of changing categories.

Recent Posts:
The Electoral College Map (10/3/16)

The Electoral College Map (10/2/16)

The Electoral College Map (10/1/16)

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