Amid the uproar of last-minute scandals and intrigue coming out of Washington in the final days before the presidential election, a quieter but equally important battle is underway in what wasn’t supposed to be a battleground state this election cycle: Pennsylvania.
Although Pennsylvania was a contested state from 1976 until 2004, it has voted Democratic in every presidential election since 1992, and until recently, it looked like 2016 would see that trend continue. Even now, every major poll shows Hillary Clinton with at least a couple of percentage-points lead on Donald Trump coming into the final week of the election. Some polls have Clinton up by as much as 11 points.
But all is not quite as it seems. Despite Clinton’s advantage in the polls, the race in Pennsylvania—with its 20 Electoral College votes at stake—is closer than it appears. Shifting party allegiances, concurrent with broad changes across the electorate, have put the Keystone State into play. As of this writing, Nate Silver at FiveThirtyEight pegged Pennsylvania at no. 2 on its list of “tipping point” states (defined as the probability that a state will provide the decisive vote in the Electoral College). Because there’s no early voting in Pennsylvania, we won’t know until voters cast their ballots next Tuesday...
Read more at:
http://thefederalist.com/2016/11/02/pennsylvania-trump-lures-blue-collar-democrats/
