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The Herald, 3 November 2016

BOTH the Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump campaigns have hit the ground hard in Arizona, Florida, Nevada and Pennsylvania, and new CNN/ORC polls across the four states paint a picture of a tight race to the finish in critical battlegrounds.

Clinton holds a 4-point edge among likely voters in the historically blue-tilting Pennsylvania, and Trump tops Clinton by five with voters in red-leaning Arizona.

Though both states tilt in the same direction as their 2012 results, the leaders’ margins are tighter than their predecessors’ final leads were in each state.

Florida appears to be as tight a contest as ever, with Clinton at 49 percent among likely voters and Trump at 47 percent.

That’s an apparent shift in Clinton’s direction since the last CNN/ORC poll there in September before the presidential debates began, but still a within-margin-of-error race.

In Nevada, the poll suggests the race has also shifted, with Trump now ahead there 49 percent to 43 percent, with five percent behind Libertarian Gary Johnson, compared with a two-point Clinton edge in mid-October.

While that shift is statistically significant, it could be reflective of timing: The mid-October poll came at a particularly bad time for Trump in most polls, following the second presidential debate and the revelation of a tape in which Trump talked about sexually aggressive behaviour toward women using vulgar language.

The new poll comes at a challenging time for Clinton in many polls, with national and some state polling narrowing amid news that the FBI has obtained additional emails that could be relevant to their investigation of the private server she used while secretary of state.

Across all four states, women are more apt than men to support Clinton, men tilt to Trump in each place.

White voters break heavily in Trump’s favour in each state, while non-whites favour Clinton by wide margins.

And voters who say they have already cast ballots in Arizona and Nevada are about evenly split, with a narrow advantage for Clinton, while she holds a wide margin among those who say they have already voted in Florida.

Trump tops Clinton by double-digits in all three states among those likely voters who say they plan to cast their ballot on November 3.

In Pennsylvania, where votes cast before election day come only from those who apply for an absentee ballot and have a reason why they can’t vote on Election Day, there were too few early voters to analyse.

In Florida and Nevada, there are sharp enthusiasm gaps between Clinton voters and Trump voters, with the Trump backers far more likely to say they’re enthusiastic about voting this year in both Florida (58 percent among Trump supporters, 48 percent among Clinton backers) and Nevada (61 percent for Trump voters, 48 percent for Clinton supporters).

In Arizona and Pennsylvania, there isn’t much of an enthusiasm gap, but also not much enthusiasm either, with fewer than half of voters saying they are extremely or very enthusiastic about voting for president this year. — CNN.

LESSONS FOR TODAY

The fight for democracy is on as the United States heads to the polls today with incumbent president Trump (74), battling it out with former vice president Joe Biden (77). These are elections that will make or unmake the US as the paragon of democratic values.

The election takes place as the world is fighting the coronavirus pandemic where the US has been hardest hit in terms of recorded cases and number of deceased. 

The 2020 poll is one of the most crucial polls where both the American people and international community would want to see whether Trump will be a one-term and/or two term president. Trump’s win or loss has major implications on the geo-political sphere.

Since Trump entered the race in 2016 against Hillary Clinton, polarisation has become worse in every aspect of US life, and is likely to continue.

In 2016, Hillary Clinton was given a false sense of hope by opinion polls that saw her leading in key battleground states.

If Biden wins, will he serve a full term, or his deputy Kamala Harris will take over, making her the first woman president and second person of colour to rule the US?