The path to victory -- for Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton
The tightening of the national polls in the closing days of the presidential campaign lines up with the increasing closeness in the states, according to CBS News Elections Director Anthony Salvanto. And there’s a path to victory for either Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump, though at this point, just a few days out from the election, Trump’s path is more difficult than Clinton’s.
Salvanto laid out the scenarios for a Clinton or Trump victory in on “CBS This Morning” Friday, going through the states Trump would need to win. The GOP nominee needs Florida, with its 29 electoral votes, for one. But he would also have to win Ohio’s 18 votes and North Carolina’s 15. And even then, Trump would still be shy of 270.
However, if Trump were to pick up Nevada (6 electoral votes) and Colorado (9 electoral votes), that would push him over the threshold. The other possibility would be flipping a state that’s expected to go to Clinton, like Wisconsin (10) or Pennsylvania (20).
Clinton’s path is the easier one, Salvanto says, based on the Democratic-leaning states that are expected to support her. She’s up in Pennsylvania in the latest polls, and if Clinton’s lead there holds, if she just adds a state like North Carolina, where the race is very tight, she would win the presidency.
The turnout question
There is a “but,” though. And it’s an extremely important one -- it’s about turnout. These final days of the campaign are a concerted effort for Clinton to turn out every available voter. In Ohio, for instance, looking at the northern, urban part of the state, that’s where Democrats really have to run up their numbers. “They have to get big turnout from their base, from African American voters,” Salvanto says, adding that Trump will likely win all of the rural areas of the state.
In North Carolina, CBS News’ “Face the Nation” anchor John Dickerson observes, Clinton is going to be relying on African American voters and young college-educated voters in what’s known as the “Research Triangle” in the middle of the state, while at the same time depressing turnout among the white college-educated voters who like Trump. To accomplish this, Clinton in the final days of her campaign has been painting a grim picture of life under a Donald Trump presidency, reminding voters about all the bad things Trump said earlier in the campaign -- his remarks about women, Hispanics, Muslims and other groups. She’ll try to keep the riskiest image of her opponent in front of voters all the time -- at events, in her advertising blitz. Her goal is to keep Republicans feeling nervous about Trump.
But that has been harder to do these last few days of the campaign. Trump has lately been showing more discipline than he did at other points of this campaign. He’s been keeping the attacks up on Clinton and at one point this week even talked to himself at one rally to remind himself not to get distracted. As he continues to do this, says Dickerson, Republicans have been been able to start coming home to the GOP column.