Election 2024:  Closer, And Less Important, Than You Probably Think

By Thomas L. Knapp Depending on whom you listen to about the constantly shifting horse race we call a US presidential election, either Joe Biden or Donald Trump is always ahead or behind by a nose … nationally. For example, a March 7-13 Ipsos/Reuters poll has Biden at 39% and Trump at 38%, while a March 10-12 Yougov/Economist poll shows Trump at 44% and Biden at 42%. Among the many problems with national polling the single biggest one is that presidential elections aren’t national. Winning a state by one individual vote brings with it as many electoral votes as winning it by a million individual votes. It’s theoretically possible to win the presidency with only 23% of individual votes& cast nationwide. In practice, the differential between popular and electoral victory is never THAT wide, but it remains the case that national polling tells us little about the likely outcome. Presidential elections almost always come down to a handful of states, and often to razor-thin margins in those states. In 2000, one state (Florida) and 537 individual votes (officially, anyway) settled the matter. The last two US presidential elections have been decided by less than 100,00 individual votes each in a...