Recently data from across the country and in key battleground states have forecast a strong advantage for Democratic nominee-designate Joe Biden over President Trump. A new Change Research polling series of seven polls, six stemming from their national polling sample (6/12-14; 1,250 US likely general election voters with subsets in AZ, FL, MI, NC, PA, and WI) finds the President gaining in his must-win states.
The national ballot test continues to give Biden a wide 51-41% national margin, but, as is the case with such polling, the Democrats’ overwhelming advantage in the big states skews the overall popular vote count. Additionally, as we saw in 2016, the national count is irrelevant in electing a US President. In the key states, however, Change Research, which is a Democratic pollster, finds Trump to be within 1-4 points in the key battlegrounds of Arizona, Michigan, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin, and down by seven points in Florida. It is these battlegrounds that will truly decide the November election. Public Policy Polling surveyed Pennsylvania’s swing 1st Congressional District (6/10-11; 753 PA-1 registered voters, half through live phone interviews and half through text messages to cell phones) in order to test two-term Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick (R-Levittown) and Ivyland Borough Councilmember Christina Finello (D). The poll comes after the June 2nd Pennsylvania primary that found Rep. Fitzpatrick scoring a disappointing 58% against a Republican opponent who exerted little in the way of campaign effort. The PPP result breaks 40-38% in Rep. Fitzpatrick’s favor, not unlike his 51-49% re-election victory margin in 2018.
The poll questionnaire included one push question, about 80% of the Trump tax reform measure and Coronavirus bailout money going to the wealthiest 1%. Based upon Fitzpatrick primary performance, this race is moving up the Democratic target list, and the new PPP data confirms that the contest is again headed to toss-up status. A story in the June 6th Business Insider publication reports that mail voting was handled well in certain states for last Tuesday’s primary, and poorly in others. Getting good marks, according to the BI story, are Iowa, Michigan, and Montana. Doing poorly, where voters were not sent their ballots, receiving incorrect ballots for their districts, or facing crowded polling stations for those who chose to vote in person, were the District of Columbia, Maryland, and Pennsylvania.
With voter turnout being way down in Pennsylvania, for example (34% under 2016 Democratic primary participation totals and 55% for Republicans), a great deal of the reasoning for such a steep fall off could be that thousands of voters simply weren’t well enough informed that the April 28th election had been moved to June 2nd. We will be hearing much more about the all-mail experience while undoubtedly seeing calls for increasing mail options for this year’s general election. Gov. Tom Wolf (D) issuing a last-minute order to allow ballots to be counted received within the next seven days if postmarked yesterday means several primaries are left uncalled.
Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick (R-Levittown) is well ahead in his Republican primary, but 56% is a weak showing at this point. In the competitive 7th District, Republican former Lehigh County Commissioner Lisa Scheller leads former Lehigh County Commissioner Dean Browning, 52-48%. The eventual winner challenges freshman Rep. Susan Wild (D-Allentown). And, in the tight 8th District, just 400 votes separate former Export-Import Bank official Jim Bognet and Afghan War veteran Teddy Daniels in the GOP primary. The eventual winner challenges Rep. Matt Cartwright (D-Moosic/Scranton) in a race that should be competitive. In another contested race, State Auditor Eugene DePasquale appears to have won the Democratic nomination in the Harrisburg/York district, with a 63% vote total. He will challenge Rep. Scott Perry (R-Dillsburg) in a race that promises to yield another tight finish. Just a day before the postponed Pennsylvania primary, Gov. Tom Wolf (D) announced that he is issuing an order to extend the deadline for receiving ballots beyond today’s election. Though he was not completely specific in his announcement as to when the primary will actually end, the Governor did indicate ballots can still be received, if postmarked today, at least seven days after the election. Therefore, if certain primaries are tight, it could be at least a week before we see who advances into the general election in certain political situations.
A total of 24 states will host nomination elections in June, ten of which are postponed from earlier dates. Tomorrow is the biggest day, with ten states holding elections. Eight will vote in their presidential primaries (Iowa and Idaho held their presidential nominating votes earlier in the year).
June 2nd hosts regular state primaries on their originally scheduled date in Iowa, Montana, New Mexico, and South Dakota. New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy (D) has postponed the presidential and state primary to July 7th, thus opting out of its traditional early June nomination date because of Coronavirus precautions. A presidential stand-alone event is occurring in Rhode Island tomorrow, necessary since their regular state primary is scheduled as one of the latest in the country on September 15th. Postponed state primaries from earlier in the year are happening in the District of Columbia, Idaho, Indiana, Maryland, and Pennsylvania. The Hodas & Associates survey research firm went into the field to test the swing Great Lakes/Mid-Atlantic states and produced surprisingly inconsistent data. Conducting surveys among sampling universes of 600 likely general election voters in Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin in early May, Hodas finds the results very different than the three close wins Donald Trump recorded in these places four years ago. While former Vice President Joe Biden posts wide leads in Wisconsin (51-42%) and Michigan (50-42%), he surprisingly trails President Trump in Pennsylvania (46-50%).
Interestingly, despite the lopsided totals in Hodas’ Wisconsin and Michigan data, President Trump would still have enough to win the national election with this Great Lakes/Mid-Atlantic performance. If he holds his five core states of Arizona, Texas, Georgia, Florida, and North Carolina, the President would be re-elected if he were to carry only Pennsylvania so long as any other previously won state doesn’t turn against him. The Pennsylvania state Supreme Court, overturned a lower court ruling that allowed voters to return their primary absentee ballots after the election so long as the envelope was postmarked by election day. The plaintiffs were asking for a seven-day post-election period for the various county election departments to receive ballots. The high court’s action means that local authorities must receive all ballots by June 2nd.
In addition to filing a lawsuit asking the judiciary to mandate ballot harvesting in the state, a new petition has been filed asking a judge to allow any mailed ballot postmarked on election day in either the primary or general election to be accepted and counted. Currently, county election authorities must receive absentee ballots no later than election day. The rulings will have to come quickly since the Pennsylvania primary is now June 2nd and mail voted has been greatly expanded.
A series of pollsters conducted several recent surveys in some of President Trump’s core and swing states. The just-published results suggest that all are turning former Vice President Joe Biden’s way. Fox News, Ipsos, and Quinnipiac University were all in the field during the April 15-21 period, interviewing voters in Michigan, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Florida.
The latter state, one of the most important for President Trump, finds him trailing Mr. Biden, 46-42%, according to Quinnipiac University. Mr. Biden leads in Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin by eight (Michigan; both Fox News and Ispos), eight and six (Pennsylvania; Fox News and Ispos), and three (Wisconsin; Ipsos) percentage points. We’ll begin observing the numbers more seriously when the candidates are able to resume active campaigning. Then, we will have a better idea if Mr. Biden’s early advantages are reliable and strong. |
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