The core group of President Trump's electoral win 2016 was: Georgia, Alabama, Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas, Tennessee, North Carolina, South Carolina, Mississippi, and Florida.
Virgina was not part of the win because blue-state culture has metastasized into that formerly reliable electorate.
If the President can duplicate the vote in these defiant conservative states - and somehow convince the voters in several other states to buy into core American values - he will win again.
If he were to lose these core states, his reelection chances would be bleak.
"Core group" is subjective. Texas, Florida and probably North Carolina, and Georgia are key states, but Arizona, Ohio, Indiana or Missouri carries more Electoral College weight than any of those other states.
The key for Trump, though, was carrying Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Michigan. I believe Dole, McCain, and Romney carried most of those Southern states and still lost the election.
If he were to lose these core states, his reelection chances would be bleak.
Sure, and if the Democrats lost Vermont, Hawaii, Massachusetts and Maryland, their chances would be bleak too. But it's not those states or the reliably Republican ones that decide the election. It may be flattering to think it's all about a battle of values, but voting is at once more complex and simpler than that.