Swing State Project

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Saturday, May 08, 2004

General Election Cattle Call, May 8

Since we are still so far from the conventions, much less the election, I thought I would use my first Saturday off in many weeks to produce a monthly round-up of all polls released since the start of April. This resulted in 16 data points for the trial heat category, 13 for the approval category, and 8 for the favorables category. On the negative side, it took forever to compile this and will not be congruent with other GECC results. On the positive side, these standings contain data points from almost every single national polling outfit.

National Two-Party Popular Vote Projection
Kerry: 50.22
Bush: 49.78

How close is this election? In 2000, Gore received 50.268% of the national two party vote to Bush���s 49.732%.

With an election this close, swing states would be the sole determining factor as to who would win the Presidency. Without even using state polls, which right now are all over the place (in terms of methodology, date, question asked, and results), and instead focusing solely upon long-term voting trends, here is how I would project the electoral vote to break down in an election this close:

Kerry: 289
Bush: 259

My bet is that among the Bush states, FL, NV and NH swing to Kerry (all three states have been trending Democrat for some time now), while Bush picks up IA and WI among the Gore states. Kerry just barely holds on to NM, MN, OR and PA, while Bush just barely clings to OH and AZ.

In this scenario, Pennsylvania would be the decisive state. While Florida is trending Democratic and Ohio is trending a static, slight Republican lean, until the 2000 election PA was moving Republican. Continuing to hold off that trend and prove the 2000 rally was not a fluke is Kerry���s key to victory. Depending on the size of the voter purge, Florida should be Democratic this time around.

Posted at 04:11 PM in General Election Cattle Call | Technorati

Comments

Mark Gersh (see post below) is not so sanguine about PA. He seems to think that it's moving away from us, despite the 2002 elections.

Also, among the upper midwest states, why do you see IA and WI as more likely to flip to Bush, rather than MN?

Enjoy your day off, man!

Posted by: DavidNYC at May 8, 2004 04:37 PM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment

I doubt Kerry will get Nevada and I doubt Bush will get Iowa or Wisconsin, even though Nader is in the race.

Posted by: tony at May 8, 2004 07:12 PM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment

Interesting work. I think Nevada could be in play. The population growth is much larger than Bush's margin there in 2000 (which was 22,000 votes), Las Vegas has relatively strong hotel unions, and the radioactive waste in Yucca Mountain has likely angered some voters. I certainly wouldn't bet on it yet, but I think it's a state worth fighting for.

Posted by: Cindy at May 8, 2004 08:54 PM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment

How do you think Florida is swinging Democratic? Terry McAuliffe tried his hardest to get Jeb Bush out of Florida and the result was Jeb winning by a larger margin then when he took office.

Posted by: SOH at May 13, 2004 05:37 PM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment

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Posted by: Roy at November 11, 2004 10:36 PM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment