Which states do you think are purple states for the POTUS 2020 election?

Politics & Elections
1

Reading some of the comments in other threads has me a bit surprised as to which states are being considered purple states. Here’s what’s up for debate.

  1. How do you define a purple state?

  2. Which states do you think for that definition for the 2020 presidential election?

IMHO a purple state is one which has a fair chance, let’s say at least 10 to20%, of going either way. I wouldn’t count a state that is likely to be close but has little chance of going either way due to something like a highly polarized electorate. Here’s my list of states that I think will fit this definition for 2020.

First there is the upper Midwest states that gave Trump the victory in 2016. I have Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin on my list, to which I’ll add Minnesota. Iowa and Ohio are red in my book, with little likelihood of going blue.

In the western part of the country the only state that I think will be purple is Arizona. I doubt that Colorado, Nevada, and New Mexico have any significant chance at going red.

On the east coast I think North Carolina will be a reddish leaning purple. I’ll put Florida on the purple list as well, but with the way the recent senate and gubernatorial went I think it’s very reddish leaning. I think Virginia will stay firmly blue.

As far as all the other states I didn’t mention, I think they will stay the same as they were in 2020.

2

Iowa and Ohio both went for Obama. You can’t write off a state based on just one election.

3

States like that are going to depend on how appealing the Democratic candidate is to rust-belt or agricultural voters. So which states are flippable is going to depend who the candidates are. And more than 5% of the vote in each state went to minor candidates. With a better alternative than Clinton was, they could be in reach.

4

Paraphrasing FlikTheBlue’s post:
Purples:
Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Arizona, North Carolina, Florida.

Iowa and Ohio are red in my book, with little likelihood of going blue.
Colorado, [COLOR=“Purple”]Nevada, New Mexico, Virginia[/COLOR] have no significant chance at going red.
I’ve changed Nevada’s color — it’s a toss-up state.

You ignore New Hampshire, very purple, perhaps because it has only 3 EVs. Maine is also dangerously close to Red, but because they split their EV’s (1 - Blue 1st Dist, 1 - Red 2nd Dist, 2 - WTA), only 2 EVs are up for grabs.

Georgia is also turning purplish. The Dems might get Iowa or Ohio or Georgia but shouldn’t bother with them much — if they win one of these, they’re winning a landslide anyway and didn’t need them.

5

But a candidate who can’t win rust belt or agricultural voters won’t win, period. There are too many rust belt and agricultural states.

6

If Beto is the Democratic nominee, Texas goes purple.

All of the usual blue states that went Trump in 2020 will be purple, if not outright blue. Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Iowa, Florida, etc.

North Carolina and Arizona will be purple too.

7

I dislike - though I don’t want to fight the OP - the term ‘purple’ states. It makes the assumption that one shouldn’t push for all states.

At a minimum, I’d prefer Howard Dean’s 2006 fifty state strategy. Do some appearances in Arizona and Texas. Buy some ads aimed at Alaska and Arkansas. Any state where any SORT of argument can be made should get some attention. Even if it doesn’t pay off now it’ll build brand recognition for 2024 and the future.

Here’s a list of states which went red in 2016 but were within 10 points. After the state name I’ll give Hillary’s loss percentage.

Arizona (3.5%)
Florida (1.2%)
Georgia (5.1%)
Iowa (9.4%)
Michigan (0.2%)
NE-2 (2.2%)
North Carolina (3.7%)
Ohio (8.1%)
Pennsylvania (0.7%)
Texas (9.0%)
Wisconsin (0.7%)

Sure, some are long shots. But you never move the needle if you don’t try.

And wow, it really reinforces just how close it was in 2016.

23,000 votes in Wisconsin
55,000 votes in Pennsylvania
9,000 votes in Michigan

87,000 votes in three states. That’s all it takes to change the world.

8

I’m optimistic that North Carolina will turn. We have a solid, charismatic, and competent Democratic governor in Cooper. Trump is underwater:

And the blatant fraud in the ninth district isn’t doing Republicans any favors.

I refuse to make any predictions about politics until the nation decrazifies itself; but NC doesn’t look half bad.

9

I shade them like this:

Deep Red: AK ID MT ND SD NE KS OK TX AR LA MS AL KY TN SC WV 143
Pink: AZ IA MO IN GA 54
True Purple: MI WI PA OH FL NC 108
Baby blue: VA NV ME NH 27
Royal Loyal Blue: HI WA OR CO NM MN IL NY VT MA RI CT NJ DE DC MD 206

The pinks and baby blues are in play but have a slight edge for one party. One could argue IN is deep red but Obama carried it. GA nearly elected a black Democrat governor so I think the right D could win it.

10

Username / thread title combo!

11

Here’s the list of states with Cook PVI between D+5 and R+5. Everything outside that range is solidly blue or solidly red, aside from perhaps that one CD in Nebraska, of course. So the list of purple states is some subset of this list.

Oregon D+5
Maine D+3
New Mexico D+3
Colorado D+1
Michigan D+1
Minnesota D+1
Nevada D+1
Virginia D+1
New Hampshire EVEN
Pennsylvania EVEN
Wisconsin EVEN
Florida R+2
Iowa R+3
North Carolina R+3
Ohio R+3
Arizona R+5
Georgia R+5

I’d include Oregon as ‘solid blue’ so for me it drops off the list. New Mexico is getting pretty safely blue as well.

On the whole, I think 2020 is going to be a hell of a lot more like 2018 than 2016. The same forces that drove the Dems’ 40-seat pickup four months ago will still be present and motivating the voters. It’s important to remember that both sides had high turnout in 2018. The only question is, who stands to pick up more votes in 2020 on top of those who voted in 2018, and where? (OK, that’s two questions. :D)

That seems to be pretty obvious to me: older white people are reliable voters. They may not have been maxed out by 2018, but probably were a good deal closer to being maxed out than younger people and people of color were. So the Dem majority in 2020 is more likely to be bigger than smaller, compared to 2018.

Now the ‘where’ part for 2020:

Likely Dem: ME (except ME-2), CO, MN, MI, VA, NH, NV
Lean Dem: PA, WI
Tossup: AZ, IA, ME-2
Lean GOP: NC
Likely GOP: FL, GA, OH, NE-2

Definitions of Lean and Likely: my scale is by sevenths. “Lean X” is between a 4/7 and a 5/7 chance of Party X winning. “Likely X” is between a 5/7 and a 6.5/7 chance.

Why sevenths? (a) They seemed to fit the circumstances, and (b) I’ve always* liked* sevenths. They’re the first interesting repeating decimal.

Why is Iowa a tossup after it went all in for Trump in 2016? The answer is, it didn’t in 2018: Dems won the House vote in Iowa by ~52K votes.

Anyway, if you want to come back here in 20 months and see how I did, there are 11 likelies, so 8-10 of them should go for the favored party. And there are 3 leans, so 2 of them should go for the favored party.

12

I’m another big fan of the 50-state strategy. Not only does it set the stage for future gains (Texas isn’t purple yet, but it might be 4 or 8 or 12 years from now, but only if we work for it), but it also appeals to people across the country right now. Like, the Democrats won’t win Kansas in 2020… but Kansas has a lot of farmers, and so a farmer in Iowa might see the candidate visiting Kansas and concluding from that “This candidate cares about farmers”, and that might help us win Iowa.

13

Gotta go with RTFirefly over BobLibDemhere. Minnesota is traditionally a strong blue state and its electoral votes did go to Hillary in 2016; but by a surprisingly narrow margin. The days when the DFL could confidently count on the rural vote are gone; the state is now a microcosm of America’s Coast/Flyover split, with the populous but geographically narrow Twin Cities metro area being solidly Democrat and the rest of the state firmly Republican. How the vote will go in 2020 is anyone’s guess, depending on the candidates, voter disillusionment either way, and how hard the efforts are on both sides to win voter turnout.

14

I see your point, but you gotta consider that it was Hillary. Normally MN is a reliable blue presidential state. Since we have a non-Hillary vs a proven psychopath, Dems win it by 20.

15

Ohio is definitely winnable for Dems next year. Bill Clinton and Obama both carried it twice, and although Trump won it by more than 8%, his polls here have suffered lately, and the right Dem really could take it, I’d say. One more reason I regret our Sen. Sherrod Brown decided against a White House run.

16

I’m just not seeing Ohio as anything but a ‘reach’ state. The Dems were outvoted in House races by ~200,000 votes overall in Ohio in a Dem wave year.

(Yeah, I know about how well Sherrod Brown did, but what’s the likelihood that the Dem nominee will be as well-liked in Ohio as Sherrod is? And given that the Dems need to win the Senate too - which may be a harder lift than winning the White House, and definitely would be so if he had left his Senate seat to be filled by a GOP governor - it’s a damned good thing, IMHO, that Sherrod Brown is staying put.)

17

You can’t simply say that Hillary barely lost three states without also noting that Trump barely lost New Hampshire, Maine, Virginia, Nevada, Arizona, Colorado, and Minnesota. In fact, if you take the vote totals from 49 states excluding California, Donald Trump *actually barely wins the popular vote *.

By my count, that’s 10 states and 103 electoral votes that are up for grabs. The Democratic candidate not only needs to run a 50-state campaign*, it had better be a damn good 50 state campaign.
*At this point, you can’t even take California and the District of Columbia for granted!