The Electoral College Map (9/23/16)

FHQ finally got an update up this week after a two week absence. That return has prompted some questions. Chief among them has been something along the lines of "Why aren't Florida, North Carolina and Ohio red?" Some skipped that and went straight for "you're wrong" while others went for poll "cherrypicking". On the former accusation, perhaps. The simple truth is that North Carolina and Ohio are close calls at the moment. It is exactly those close calls that tend to separate the various models in the end (see Florida, 2012). As for cherrypicking, well, it is hard to cherrypick polls when the whole aim is to include every publicly available poll out there. Like the "wrong" charge, this "cherrypicking" one ultimately comes back to the methodology.

Here are a few thoughts on that Storified from Twitter:

To the day's polls...

New State Polls (9/23/16)
State	Poll	Date	Margin of Error	Sample	Clinton	Trump	Undecided	Poll Margin	FHQ Margin
Arkansas	Talk Business/Hendrix	9/15-9/17	+/- 3.4%	831 likely voters	34	55	4	+21	+14.18
Georgia	JMC Analytics	9/20-9/22	+/- 4.0%	600 likely voters	38	44	12	+6	+2.04
Nevada	GQR/Democracy Corps	9/10-9/19	+/- 4.9%	400 likely voters	42	42	4	+/-0	+0.27
North Carolina	GQR/Democracy Corps	9/10-9/19	+/- 4.9%	400 likely voters	44	40	2	+4	+1.01
Ohio	GQR/Democracy Corps	9/10-9/19	+/- 4.9%	400 likely voters	39	41	4	+2	+0.69
Pennsylvania	GQR/Democracy Corps	9/10-9/19	+/- 4.9%	400 likely voters	46	38	3	+8	+5.94

Polling Quick Hits:
A slower day to end the work week. Two traditional red states saw new polls as well as some battleground states surveys from GQR.

Arkansas:

Changes (September 23)
State	Before	After
Arkansas	Lean Trump	Strong Trump

Polling has been light in the Natural state, but the picture has been pretty clear: Trump is ahead, but underperforming Mitt Romney from 2012. While that is still true in the latest Hendrix survey, it is less acute. The former first lady in the state is hovering right around where Obama was in the state four years ago and Trump is within shouting distance now of Romney there. In other words, if this poll is accurate, Arkansas looks normal rather than evidence of any fundamental shift across the whole map.


Georgia:
Compared to the last JMC poll from August in the Peach state, the two major party candidates have swapped positions. Now, it is Trump ahead. The survey provides a little more evidence that Georgia is tighter than 2012, but still a red state. Yes, the margin is still close-ish here, but it is growing as Trump continues his sweep of the September polls.


Nevada:
The first of today's GQR battleground polls in Nevada shows exactly what the firm did there back during its original June wave: a tie. The Silver state has slipped back into the red side of the partisan line, but only just there after a string of pro-Trump polls throughout September. This GQR survey is the first break in that streak, but serves to keep the underlying FHQ average in Nevada close. Close but favoring Trump for now, though.


North Carolina:
GQR also weighed in in North Carolina. The Democratic firm found the former Secretary of State up four, but that was down from the ten point advantage she had in their last poll in the Tar Heel state in June. Where that one may have been an outlier, this one is not, at least not as much. The established range in North Carolina has both Clinton and Trump bouncing around between 40 and 45 percent from poll to poll. The lead may change hands, but more often than not both candidates are within that range. That sort of clustering will produce a close race more often than not.


Ohio:
The same sort of story from North Carolina can extend to Ohio as well. The difference is that the two candidates are not sharing the same range. In the Buckeye state, Trump has found his support in the 40-44 percent range during September while Clinton has lagged in a 37-41 percent window for most polls in that same period. That is right where GQR plots the race right now. Now, obviously, that points to some Trump advantage in the state; an advantage that is not reflected here at FHQ. The Ohio average is slowly but surely tracking toward zero. If Trump's lead holds up in future polls, then that shift across the partisan line will occur. But that has not happened as of yet.


Pennsylvania:
Yes, yes, this GQR survey is one from a Democratic-leaning firm. Yet, there is it in black and white that Clinton's lead in the state -- across most polls -- has proven more durable than in other states throughout this September swoon of hers. Trump does not have to win Pennsylvania, but he will have to reach into the Lean Clinton area to pick off a state or two to get to 270. Pennsylvania, with its 20 electoral votes, is the quickest route to that goal, but also does not look reachable at this time.


--
The addition of these polls did little to shake things up here at FHQ. North Carolina barely inched off the Watch List but remains quite close (though still favoring Clinton). Arkansas' is off the list too. Meanwhile, Arkansas and Pennsylvania shuffled around on the Spectrum. Arkansas is still very much a red state but looks a little redder now, and Pennsylvania slid up a couple of cells deeper into blue territory on the Spectrum. The latter is part of a tightly knot quartet including Colorado, Maine and Virginia.

NOTE: A description of the methodology behind the graduated weighted average of 2016 state-level polling that FHQ uses for these projections can be found here.

The Electoral College Spectrum1
HI-42 (7)	NJ-14 (175)	NH-43 (269 | 273)	TX-38 (155)	TN-11 (56)
MD-10 (17)	DE-3 (178)	RI-43 (273 | 269)	MS-6 (116)	AR-6 (45)
MA-11 (28)	NM-5 (183)	FL-29 (302 | 265)	SC-9 (110)	SD-3 (39)
VT-3 (31)	MN-10 (193)	NC-15 (317 | 236)	AK-3 (101)	ND-3 (36)
CA-55 (86)	WI-10 (203)	OH-18 (335 | 221)	UT-6 (98)	ID-4 (33)
NY-29 (115)	MI-16 (219)	NV-6 (203)	KS-6 (92)	NE-5 (29)
IL-20 (135)	VA-13 (232)	IA-6 (197)	IN-11 (86)	OK-7 (24)
WA-12 (147)	PA-20 (252)	AZ-11 (191)	MT-3 (75)	WV-5 (17)
CT-17 (154)	ME-4 (256)	GA-16 (180)	KY-8 (72)	AL-9 (12)
OR-7 (161)	CO-9 (265)	MO-10 (164)	LA-8 (64)	WY-3 (3)
1 Follow the link for a detailed explanation on how to read the Electoral College Spectrum. 2 The numbers in the parentheses refer to the number of electoral votes a candidate would have if he or she won all the states ranked prior to that state. If, for example, Trump won all the states up to and including New Hampshire (all Clinton's toss up states plus New Hampshire), he would have 273 electoral votes. Trump's numbers are only totaled through the states he would need in order to get to 270. In those cases, Clinton's number is on the left and Trumps's is on the right in bold italics. To keep the figure to 50 cells, Washington, DC and its three electoral votes are included in the beginning total on the Democratic side of the spectrum. The District has historically been the most Democratic state in the Electoral College. 3 New Hampshire and Rhode Island are collectively the states where Clinton crosses the 270 electoral vote threshold to win the presidential election. That line is referred to as the victory line. If those two states are separated with Clinton winning New Hampshire and Trump, Rhode Island, then there would be a tie in the Electoral College.

NOTE: Distinctions are made between states based on how much they favor one candidate or another. States with a margin greater than 10 percent between Clinton and Trump are "Strong" states. Those with a margin of 5 to 10 percent "Lean" toward one of the two (presumptive) nominees. Finally, states with a spread in the graduated weighted averages of both the candidates' shares of polling support less than 5 percent are "Toss Up" states. The darker a state is shaded in any of the figures here, the more strongly it is aligned with one of the candidates. Not all states along or near the boundaries between categories are close to pushing over into a neighboring group. Those most likely to switch -- those within a percentage point of the various lines of demarcation -- are included on the Watch List below.

The Watch List1
State	Switch
Colorado	from Lean Clinton	to Toss Up Clinton
Delaware	from Strong Clinton	to Lean Clinton
Indiana	from Strong Trump	to Lean Trump
Iowa	from Toss Up Trump	to Toss Up Clinton
Maine	from Lean Clinton	to Toss Up Clinton
Missouri	from Lean Trump	to Toss Up Trump
Nevada	from Toss Up Trump	to Toss Up Clinton
New Hampshire	from Lean Clinton	to Toss Up Clinton
New Jersey	from Strong Clinton	to Lean Clinton
Ohio	from Toss Up Clinton	to Toss Up Trump
Oregon	from Strong Clinton	to Lean Clinton
Pennsylvania	from Lean Clinton	to Toss Up Clinton
Rhode Island	from Lean Clinton	to Toss Up Clinton
Virginia	from Lean Clinton	to Toss Up Clinton
1 Graduated weighted average margin within a fraction of a point of changing categories.