[liberalh8ter]

My money says the lead is a lot better than narrow.

[lodi90]

My money says the lead is a lot better than narrow.

---

My money says it isn’t. FL is going to be a dogfight. Dems are already spending money here on ads. GOP, not at all.

[HamiltonJay]

Trump will win FL far more comfortably in 2020 than he did in 16.

He will outperform his 2016 numbers across the board.

The media wants it to be a race, but it won’t be... they will pretend it will be for the sake of keeping folks clicking and watching, but short of a total economic meltdown or another black swan event of that type of magnitude between now and next November, Trump will be re-elected by the largest EC margin since Reagan.

Best case for the Dems is around 15 states plus DC... depending on how whackadoo their nominee is, They may not even get 10 states and DC.

[nathanbedford]

I agree. A poll of likely voters would usually increase Republican's tally.

It is fascinating that Elizabeth Warren is faring so well with her message which is a populist message and, because the definition of populism is so elastic, one can also say that Donald Trump's message is a populist message.

There are of course similarities in their complaints but their solutions vary in very important particulars. In essence, Warren wants more government to regulates evil corporations (her version of elitists) and Donald Trump obviously wants fewer regulations to free up markets and capitalism. Warren identifies big business as the enemy while Trump identifies miscarriages of government reproducing bad trade treaties and bad regulations as the enemy. A signal characteristic of populism is an appeal to control the "elites" on behalf of "the people." We have seen that in 2016 in Trump's campaign, when we exhorted Washington to drain the swamp. There were also echoes of this on our side in the Tea Party. No one, not even Donald Trump, better articulates the Trump brand of populism than Steve Bannon who identifies the elite as Davos, Wall Street, the City of London etc. Bannon and Warren are in full agreement, big-money elites need to be controlled. Warren wants the end result to be bigger government, Bannon wants smaller government as the end result.

Now comes Nathan Bedford's first maxim of American politics: all politics in America is not local but ultimately racial.

The left, Warren included, will seek as Democrats always have sought to win elections, by calling Republicans and Trump racists. This is because there has been a century long cleft in populism, one in which the nation is the expression of "the people" and another which claims that expressions of nationalism are inherently racist. This is why the left reacted so virulently when Trump professed himself to be a nationalist.

The effect on this election campaign will be the same as it is always been, Democrats demagoguing race, but this time it will have a slightly different twist. Bannon's answer, this brand of populism knows no color except the color of citizenship which comes in all colors. If you're a citizen you are preferred regardless of your color over illegal immigrants and citizens of other nations. This is an effective answer to the racism smear when it is well articulated.

[zeestephen]

Florida and Wisconsin are Trump's two most dangerous states.

Since 2016, about 100,000 Puerto Ricans have moved to Florida. They are voter eligible USA citizens at birth.

Also, Florida passed a voter restoration amendment (or initiative, I don't recall which) in the 2018 midterm.

Up to 1 million felons (heavily Black and Hispanic) could be restored voters in 2020. My understanding is this is still being litigated in the courts and debated in the legislature.

Wisconsin?

Almost no one realizes that Mitt Romney got more votes in Wisconsin in 2012 than Trump got in 2016 - and Romney LOST the state by 7 percentage points!

Trump won Wisconsin because the Democrats failed to get their core voters to the polls.

That will not happen again in 2020.

Wisconsin and Florida have a combined 39 electoral votes.

If there are no “Faithless Democrat Electors” in 2020, Wisconsin and Florida will give Democrats 271 electoral votes, and the White House.

[GOPJ]

You’re right - lots of elderly Floridians are afraid to tell strangers they’re backing Trump. Too many unstable liberal thugs in the state...