BTRTN 50-State Electoral Snapshot #2: Trump Gaffe-a-Thon Propels Hillary to Big Lead

Tom takes another look at the Big Map....

Hillary Clinton has opened up some distance on Donald Trump as we take our second state-by-state snapshot of the Electoral College.  Keep in mind that this is indeed a snapshot and not a forecast or prediction – just a look at where things stand now, a month since our last snapshot.

It is rather devastating.  The convention dynamics are well known by now, with a modest GOP post-convention bounce more than offset by a robust Democratic convention bounce.  But perhaps even more influential on voter preferences has been the aftermath of the conventions, with Donald Trump seemingly spinning off the rails with one controversy after another:  he battled the Gold Star Kahns to widespread bi-partisan outrage, refused to endorse­ either John McCain or Paul Ryan in their primary bids, kicked a baby out of a rally, and invited 2^nd Amendment aficionados to more or less pull out their pistols and off Hillary Clinton to protect their rights.

As Trump careened from one disaster to the next, GOP luminaries started disavowing support, from lesser-known but widely respected aides of Jeb Bush and Chris Christie, to a sitting GOP congressman, to 50 higher-ups in the Bush foreign policy apparatus and to the moderate Senator Susan Collins of Maine.

The dust is hardly settling – who knows what is next – but the numbers are clear.  Clinton now has a seven point lead in the national polls (48/41) as the undecideds move toward her.  And we now have a bevy of swing state polls that look disastrous for the GOP.

As you can see in the chart below, since our first snapshot in mid-July, just before the conventions, Clinton has picked up a net of +11 electoral votes and moved more states into the leaning and solid column, with fewer  -- one – in the toss-up category.  But what is truly amazing – at this point, she has 273 “solid” votes, meaning three more than she needs to be elected.  “Solid” means she has a lead of +7 or more in a state….and the only states in which that lead is in the single digits are ones that have not had a poll since the conventions, and therefore are likely understated.

	July 15	August 11
CLINTON - TOTAL	337	348
Clinton - Solid	232	273
Clinton - Lean	70	69
Clinton - Tossup	35	6
Trump - Tossup	29	34
Trump - Lean	50	19
Trump - Solid	122	137
TRUMP - TOTAL	201	190

This does not look like a 1964 LBJ or 1984 Reagan landslide….far from it.  The election continues to hew closely to the 2008 and 2012 pattern, though moving closer to 2008 when Obama won by 365 to 173 over John McCain.  In these divided times, however, 348/190 is a rout.

• Clinton has the lead in every single traditional swing state except for North Carolina where she trails by a mere two points
• Her leads in these swing states are significant, with only one right now in “toss-up” range, Nevada
• Many leads are substantial, including in the heartland states that Trump is supposedly focusing on – Pennsylvania (+10), Michigan (+11) and Ohio (+5).  She also leads by +4 in the king-of-swing states, Florida.
• Several traditional red states – not thought of as swing states – are also now in play, including Georgia where she is up 6, Arizona where she trails by 2, and perhaps even Kentucky…there has been only one poll there, in June, and Clinton led it.
• There has been relatively little polling in traditional red states.  The polling that has been done – before the conventions – already showed some Trump weakness.  States where the GOP usually wins by double digits are only in single digits at the time of these polls – Mississippi, Alaska, Texas and Tennessee among them.

Check out the detail in the chart below.

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To explain the chart itself, columns (C) through (F) note the margin between the Democratic candidate and GOP candidate in each of the last four elections.  Looking at the first line, this means that in 2012, Obama beat Romney by 84 margin points (the actual vote in DC was 91% for Obama to 7% for Romney – a difference of 84 points.  Column (G) gives the average margin of those four years).  Column (H) gives the average of the most recent polls, and column (I) shows in what month those polls occurred and how many in that month.  Column (J) gives our rating for the state, whether it is solid, leaning or a toss-up, blue or red.  We try to avoid “too close to call.”  These ratings add up to the numbers at the top of this article.

(A)	(B)	(C)	(D)	(E)	(F)	(G)	(H)	(I)	(J)
Democrat Minus Republican	2016 Electoral Votes	2000 Mrgn (D-R)	2004 Mrgn (D-R)	2008 Mrgn (D-R)	2012 Mrgn (D-R)	Avg Mrgn Last 4	Latest 2016 Polls as              of 8/5/16	Date (#)            of Polls	BTRTN Rating
DC	3	76	80	86	84	82	none	none	Solid
Hawaii	4	18	9	45	43	29	none	none	Solid
Rhode Island	4	29	21	28	27	26	none	none	Solid
Maryland	10	16	13	25	25	20	Clinton +35	Apr (2)	Solid
Illinois	20	12	10	25	16	16	Clinton +25	Mar (1)	Solid
Massachusetts	11	27	25	26	23	25	Clinton +24	May (1)	Solid
California	55	12	10	24	21	17	Clinton +23	July (2)	Solid
Vermont	3	10	20	37	36	26	Clinton +22	July (1)	Solid
New Jersey	14	16	7	16	17	14	Clinton +18	June (2)	Solid
New Hampshire	4	-1	1	10	6	4	Clinton +17	Jul(1PDC)	Solid
Wisconsin	10	0.2	0.4	14	7	5	Clinton +15	Aug (1)	Solid
Minnesota	10	2	3	10	8	6	Clinton +13	Apr (1)	Solid
New York	29	25	18	27	27	24	Clinton +12	July (1)	Solid
Washington	12	6	7	17	14	11	Clinton +12	June (1)	Solid
Virginia	13	-8	-8	6	3	-2	Clinton +12	Aug (1)	Solid
Oregon	7	0.4	4	16	12	8	Clinton +11	May (1)	Solid
Pennsylvania	20	4	3	10	5	6	Clinton +11	Aug (4)	Solid
Delaware	3	13	8	25	19	16	Clinton +10	July (1)	Solid
Michigan	16	5	3	16	10	9	Clinton +10	Aug (2)	Solid
New Mexico	5	0.1	-1	15	10	6	Clinton +8	May (1)	Solid
Colorado	9	-8	-5	9	5	0.2	Clinton +8	July (5)	Solid
Connecticut	7	18	10	22	18	17	Clinton +7	June (1)	Solid
Maine	4	5	9	17	15	12	Clinton +7	June (1)	Solid
Georgia	16	-12	-17	-5	-8	-10	Clinton +6	Aug (2)	Lean
Ohio	18	-4	-2	5	2	0.2	Clinton +5	Aug (2)	Lean
Florida	29	0.0	-5	3	1	-0.3	Clinton +4	Aug (2)	Lean
Iowa	6	0.3	-1	10	6	4	Clinton +4	Aug (1)	Lean
Nevada	6	-4	-3	13	7	3	Clinton +2	Aug (1)	Tossup
Arizona	11	-6	-10	-9	-11	-9	Trump +2	Aug (1)	Tossup
Kentucky	8	-15	-20	-16	-23	-18	Clinton +3	June (1)	Tossup
N. Carolina	15	-13	-12	0.3	-2	-7	Trump +2	Aug (2)	Tossup
Mississippi	6	-17	-20	-13	-12	-15	Trump +3	Mar (1)	Lean
Alaska	3	-31	-26	-22	-13	-23	Trump +5	Jan (1)	Lean
Missouri	10	-3	-7	-0.1	-10	-5	Trump +6	July (3)	Lean
S. Carolina	9	-16	-17	-9	-11	-13	none	none	Solid
Montana	3	-25	-21	-2	-14	-15	none	none	Solid
S. Dakota	3	-23	-22	-8	-18	-18	none	none	Solid
INDIANA	11	-16	-21	1	-11	-11	Trump +8	Apr (2)	Solid
Texas	38	-21	-23	-12	-16	-18	Trump +8	June (1)	Solid
Tennessee	11	-4	-14	-15	-21	-13	Trump +9	May (1)	Solid
Arkansas	6	-5	-10	-20	-24	-15	Trump +11	June (1)	Solid
Utah	6	-41	-46	-28	-48	-40	Trump +12	Aug (1)	Solid
Kansas	6	-21	-25	-15	-22	-21	Trump +14	July (2)	Solid
Louisiana	8	-8	-15	-19	-17	-15	Trump +16	May (1)	Solid
Idaho	4	-41	-38	-25	-32	-34	Trump +21	July (1)	Solid
Oklahoma	7	-22	-31	-31	-34	-29	Trump +24	July (1)	Solid
W. Virginia	5	-6	-13	-13	-27	-15	Trump +27	May (1)	Solid
Alabama	9	-15	-26	-22	-22	-21	none	none	Solid
N. Dakota	3	-28	-27	-10	-20	-21	none	none	Solid
Nebraska	5	-29	-33	-15	-23	-25	none	none	Solid
Wyoming	3	-41	-40	-32	-41	-39	none	none	Solid