The US Presidential election is just around the corner, and all the early signs are pointing to a Democratic/Joe Biden overhaul of the White House. Should the incumbent Head of State Donald Trump fail to be re-elected, he would become just the 11th President to miss out on a second term in office.
US Presidents are only allowed to run for a maximum of two four year terms, and of the 45 men who have held office thus far, 35 have been rewarded with a second four years in charge – something which doesn’t currently seem very likely for Trump, as he massively trails Mr Biden in the 2020 U.S election odds.
Somewhat more important than the betting market, is the national polls, and worryingly for President Trump, who will be hoping that he doesn’t become the first President since George H W Bush in 1992 to miss out on a second term, he is also far behind his Democratic rival in them too.
President Trump has been playing catch-up to Biden in the polls for months now, as he has come under increased criticism for his handling of the coronavirus pandemic, which has wreaked havoc across the states, along with his approach towards the Black Lives Matter movement.
With Election Day less than a week away, the President and Biden have ramped up their campaigns in crucial battleground states, which were pivotal to Trump’s victory four years’ ago, with the pair both focusing on Pennsylvania earlier this week.
However, the swing state polls are looking pretty bleak for President Trump. In Florida – which has an influential 29 electoral votes, and was won by the Republicans in 2016 – Biden leads by 1.7%, whilst Barack Obama’s former vice president also has a healthy lead in Pennsylvania, which is the swing state with the second most electoral votes (20).
Biden’s healthiest leads in the battleground states are in Michigan (7.4%) and Wisconsin (6.8%), whilst he also holds slightly narrower margins of 2.7% and 3.7% in North Carolina and Arizona, respectively.
As a result, President Trump is ahead in the polls in just two swing states – Ohio and Iowa. In Ohio, which boasts 18 electoral votes, Trump has a slender lead of just 1.8%, whilst he is just 0.1% ahead in the polls in Iowa.
It’s worth noting that the national polls are not always a fair reflection on how the election is going to pan out. According to the polls in 2016, Hilary Clinton was supposedly going to defeat Trump by a landslide. However, through winning the states with the largest electoral votes and misinterpreted polls, the billionaire business mogul pulled off an astonishing victory.
Trump’s victory in 30 states, compared to Mrs Clinton’s in 20, saw the former elected President through his 304 electoral votes, despite the fact Mrs Clinton received almost three million more public votes. This is something the Democrats must rectify if they want to win the election.
Biden may be front in every aspect, with even the majority of the early voting believed to have gone in his favour. But, if the Republican supporters come out on election day, as expected, you never know what way the ballot is going to go.
One thing’s for sure, it’s going to be down to the wire, and, if we learnt anything from 2016, it’s not to rule out Trump too early.
