State of the Race: Do not freak out—get to work

Just a little over two weeks left, and persons are dropping their freakin’ minds. And I get it: We’ve much more to lose than they do. If we win, their lives will enhance (whether or not they wish to admit it or not). In the event that they win, we’ll lose our rights.

However significantly, chill out. We’re doing what must be performed, and we’re successful.

First, listed here are this week’s 538 polling averages for swing states, as of Friday at 1:30 PM ET.

All of the strikes have been marginal, however virtually all of them have been towards Donald Trump. For these of you who wish to fake we’re dropping, you’ve received one thing to freak you out. If you happen to assign a state’s electoral votes to the particular person presently main in its polls, neither candidate on this combination hits the 270 electoral votes wanted to win. 5 of the seven states are inside a single digit.

And but regardless of a whole bunch of million spent, the nationwide race is regular as might be.

There’s extra motion within the battlegrounds, however up to now, it’s marginal.

After all, everyone seems to be fearful of polling misses à la 2016 and 2020. We are able to’t know if pollsters have overcorrected in 2024 or whether or not there’s an inherent incapability to succeed in Trump’s nihilistic supporters. However right here’s what we do know:

Democrats have far extra money than Republicans, up and down the poll. With battleground campaigns flush with money, they will make investments extra closely in get-out-the-vote operations that ought to pay dividends for all the Democratic ticket. Take Arizona’s Senate race: Democrat Ruben Gallego raised over $20 million final quarter, in contrast with Republican Kari Lake, who raised solely $7.6 million. Gallego is crushing Lake within the polls, and Lake might find yourself being a drag on all Arizona Republicans.
Republicans have outsourced a lot of their get-out-the-vote operation to billionaire Elon Musk, who is aware of nothing about GOTV and is, by all appearances, screwing it up. Democratic GOTV efforts are obvious within the (very) early vote. (Since I wrote that story, the early vote has gotten even higher for Democrats.)

Gender hole. The Supreme Court docket’s Dobbs resolution, which eradicated federal abortion rights, drove the election in 2022, and nothing means that has modified this time round. Be aware that ladies are extra more likely to vote than males. In 2020, 82.2 million ladies voted, in comparison with 72.5 million males. Don’t low cost the facility of state abortion initiatives in Arizona and Nevada, to not point out its relevance within the nationwide debate.
Republicans are relying closely on younger males. I’ve a narrative popping out on Sunday about this. Briefly—sure, younger males are trending Republican, however they’re additionally a low-turnout voting demographic.
Trump, as an individual, is fading within the stretch. He’s previous, drained, cranky, and can’t deal with the stress. The media narrative is shifting because of this. Harris seems freakin’ nice.