Biden is ahead in Swing and Rustbelt states that Donald Trump was able take from Hillary Clinton by small margins….
America has changed in fours years and more people in reaction to Trump came out to vote in 2018 and have signed up to vote this year….
And there are hints that Biden has chances to steal some states from Trump even in the Sun belt….
Roaring back after Trump’s 2016 inroads, Democrats convincingly won both the governor’s and Senate races in Minnesota, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin and a Senate contest in Ohio; although Republicans held the governorships in Iowa and Ohio, Democrats also ran much better in both contests than Clinton had in those states.
In the Sun Belt, the picture remained more mixed. Democrats broke through to win Senate seats in Arizona and Nevada and the governorship in the latter. But even with charismatic candidates who inspired huge turnout — and significant gains in white-collar suburbs around cities such as Atlanta, Dallas and Houston — the party fell just short in high-profile races for the Senate in Texas (behind Beto O’Rourke) and the governorships in Georgia (Stacey Abrams) and Florida (Andrew Gillum). Veteran Democratic Sen. Bill Nelson also lost in Florida. And Democrats were routed in the Texas and Arizona governor’s races.
Something of a surprise
While Biden has clear opportunities in both regions, public polls and internal surveys by his campaign again show him in a slightly stronger position across the Rust Belt battlegrounds than those in the Sun Belt. In their internal rankings, the Biden campaign and other Democratic groups such as the super PAC Priorities USA all place the three central Rust Belt swing states as slightly better opportunities than any of the three Sun Belt showdowns.
That’s not a prospect that all Democrats or analysts (myself included) expected when the campaign began.
“When the cycle started, I was of the belief that Arizona was going to be easier for Democrats than Wisconsin,” says Democratic pollster Andrew Baumann. “I thought those were the two states that were going to be the tipping point states.”
These assessments are shaped by the core tension in the modern electoral landscape: While changes in the underlying demography are more favorable for Democrats in the Sun Belt, their capacity to win White voters remains much greater in the Rust Belt….