Not-So-Great Expectations

Roughly two-thirds of Americans expect Trump to win in November, and that includes a healthy chunk of people who have no intention of voting for him, in a new CBS News/YouGov poll.  The poll also finds Sanders in the lead in national polling with 27% of the vote, but also sees Elizabeth Warren rocketing into second at 19% past Joe Biden, now at 17% heading into South Carolina on Saturday.

Whether or not they're voting for him, 65% of registered voters nationwide think President Trump will definitely or probably be reelected, including more than a third of Democrats who think so. Republicans are especially optimistic: more than 9 in 10 expect him to win.

Still, potential head to head matchups with all the major Democratic candidates against Mr. Trump show a tight race no matter who the Democratic nominee is, with no more than three percentage points separating the Democratic candidates from Mr. Trump in any matchup with the six top polling Democratic contenders.





Most voters have dug in. When it comes to who they will vote for in November, 6 in 10 voters say it doesn't matter who the Democratic nominee is, or what Mr. Trump might do over the next year.

Despite these close matchups, no Democratic candidate gets more than about a quarter of voters who thinks they would probably beat Mr. Trump (Bernie Sanders does best at 27%). Republicans are particularly confident of Mr. Trump's chances: large majorities think each of these potential Democratic opponents would be long shots to beat him in November. Democrats are less sure of their party's chances. They express the most confidence in Joe Biden and Sanders, but fewer than half of Democrats think any of the candidates is above a "maybe" to win.

This is a big indication that Trump won't get 50% of the popular vote in November, but with the electoral college as it is now, he doesn't need to.  A 47%-45% or 47%-44% result with the Democrat winning the popular vote is almost certainly going to turn out the same way as things did in 2016.

The big wild card is Florida, with the fight over disenfranchising the 1.5 million felons in the state (the vast majority who are black) who still may not be able to vote in November thanks to the GOP's Poll Tax 2.0 project, and how many of them who can get registered will turn out.  Don't expect every felon to flock to the Democrats, either.  The truth is I don't know how all that will play out in the state.

Democrats can win without Florida, but Trump will have a tremendously difficult time winning without it...unless he wins every other state he won in 2016.  If he does that, he still ends up with 277 without Florida, and he wins. It remains the ultimate battleground state, but we're actually in a situation where both candidates can win without it.  PA, WI, and MI combined are 46 electoral votes compared to Florida's 29, so the race is still going to come down to the those three Rust Belt states.

Here's what the 2016 map would look like with all four of those states as toss-ups:

Click the map to create your own at 270toWin.com

As you can see, it's basically even elsewhere in the US.  The killer is if Trump wins Wisconsin and the Democratic candidate wins Pennsylvania and Michigan, it would be Dems 268-Trump 241, and Florida decides the whole ball of wax.  If Florida then went for Trump, it would be a 270-268 victory.

That should be keeping everyone up at night.