The 2020 electoral map could be the smallest in years. Here’s why.
Dan Balz
15 hrs ago In a politically divided nation, with attitudes among many voters hardened and resistant to changing, the 2020 general election could be contested on the narrowest electoral terrain in recent memory.
Just four states are likely to determine the outcome in 2020. Each flipped to the Republicans in 2016, but President Trump won each by only a percentage point or less. The four are Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin and Florida. Many analysts point to Wisconsin as the single state upon which the election could turn.
Shifting demographics, the growing urban-rural divide and the gap between white voters with and without college educations have helped to create an electoral map unlike those of the recent past. So too have Trump’s unique profile, messaging and appeal.
“Because of the partisanship of the country and the partisanship of the president, we are now looking at the smallest map in modern political history,†said Jim Messina, who was the campaign manager for former president Barack Obama’s 2012 reelection campaign.
Both Trump’s campaign and that of his eventual Democratic challenger will seek to put other states in play. But those opportunities are fewer than in past campaigns.
Trump has done nothing to expand his base while in office, which Democrats claim will make it extremely difficult for him to win states he lost in 2016. Trump campaign officials disagree. Democrats’ aspirations for expansion rest in part on whether politically changing, Republican-held states such as North Carolina, Georgia and Arizona are truly ready to shift.
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http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/the-2020-electoral-map-could-be-the-smallest-in-years-heres-why/ar-AAGCBoX?ocid=ientp
