Which Swing States Will Joe Biden Win?

Mark Colley

It all comes down to this. There is only 1 day left until election day 2020, and the decision facing the United States is intimidating.

If Donald Trump is re-elected to another term, it will mean the cementing of his legacy and a shift in the idea of what it means to be president. If Joe Biden wins, it will be a rejection of Trumped up politics and an acceptance that the last four years were a mistake.

In short, the decision on November 3 will either reinforce or roll back the political revolution of the Trump presidency.

With so little time left, here’s my picks for who will win the election — and what states they’ll take

Joe Biden will be elected president.

Four years ago, when Americans were faced with a brutal choice and the Democrats ran a candidate with impressively low favorability numbers, it was electoral college math that determined the election.

Four years later, we find ourselves in a very different election. Trump is a known quantity. The hopes that he would govern differently than he campaigned were wrong. And Biden, for all his problems, has proved to be a far better candidate than Clinton was.

The numbers support this. While polls have tightened in recent weeks — Trump’s second debate performance certainly helped him — Biden still maintains a commanding national lead of 8.6 percent, according to FiveThirtyEight. He also holds a convincing lead in many swing states.

And yes, we should trust the polls. Even if they are wrong by as much as they were in 2016, Joe Biden will still be elected president.

All signs point to a Biden victory.

The Swing States

The large lead from Biden has added a number of states to the “swing state” category. These states could go either way — and in turn, they will decide the election. Here’s a breakdown of my predictions for how these contested states will vote.

Biden states

• Arizona
• Maine statewide
• Michigan
• Minnesota
• Nebraska: 2nd district
• New Hampshire
• Nevada
• Pennsylvania
• Wisconsin

Trump states

• Florida
  
• Georgia
  
• Iowa
  
• Maine: 2nd District
  
• North Carolina
  
• Ohio
  
• Texas
  

This would deliver Biden 290 electoral votes to Trump’s 248.

The bottom line

As I wrote two weeks ago, this election is not in the bag yet for Biden. Even as the days count down, Trump can forge an improbable comeback. We should expect the race to tighten further, especially in some of the swing states.

That’s why I predict some states that currently poll Biden as ahead — Georgia, Maine (2nd district), Florida and North Carolina — as going to Trump. The president will pick up unexpected votes in these states, as he did four years ago.

But the wall that Biden has built will be strong enough to withstand the late push from Trump, and Biden will win on November 3 — or whenever we get the results of the election.

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