According to a recent survey analysis conducted by TIPP Insights, the competition between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton is intense, but Trump’s growing support among black voters could potentially tilt the balance in his favor. The analysis revealed that both Trump and Clinton stand at 48% in terms of overall support.
The survey indicated significant progress for Trump among African American voters, with an increase of 8.1 percentage points in voter support. Additionally, Trump saw a 13.9 percentage point increase in support among high school-educated voters and an 8 percentage point rise among seniors aged 65 and above.
TIPP stated in their report, “Trump’s progress among minority voters could break the current deadlock.” The survey organization did not specify whether Clinton or Trump made similar gains among other minority groups such as Hispanic, Asian American, or Native American voters. However, TIPP noted that the fluctuation in support for the two candidates is most apparent among voters with varying educational backgrounds.
Among voters with a college degree, Clinton’s support increased by 6.3 percentage points, and her support among independent voters rose by 5 percentage points, according to TIPP’s data. The data also suggests that Trump may struggle to win in the popular vote count, as the Democratic Party holds significant advantages in states like New York and California, while the Republican stronghold of Texas can only “partially offset” the population advantage of those two states.
The national polling reflects this imbalance, as a large number of blue state voters tend to sway the numbers in favor of the Democratic Party, although the outcome in the Electoral College ultimately holds the most importance. In the 2020 election, although Trump lost the popular vote by approximately 4.5%, winning about an additional 45,000 votes in three key swing states could have potentially secured his victory.
“Some media outlets have overlooked this crucial fact and widely propagated the notion that Trump cannot win,” the survey organization asserted. “The reality? The outlook remains highly contentious.”
RealClearPolitics’ recent aggregation of national polls as of Thursday afternoon showed Trump with a 0.5% lead over Clinton. In comparison, at the same time in 2020, Democratic candidate Joe Biden had an 8 percentage point lead over Trump, while in 2016, Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton led Trump by 5.9 percentage points.
The aggregation by RealClearPolitics indicates that Trump holds an average lead of about 1% in seven battleground states: Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Arizona, Nevada, North Carolina, and Georgia. In 2020, Biden led Trump by an average of 4 percentage points in these states, while Clinton in 2016 had a 5 percentage point advantage.
Third-party candidates also hold a certain proportion of overall support. TIPP noted that Green Party candidate Jill Stein received a support rate of 0.9%, while independent candidate Cornell West garnered 1% support. Around 1.7% of respondents indicated that they were still undecided on who to vote for.
So far, voters seem to be responding to the call for early voting. Registered Republican voters have been turning out in record numbers at polling stations before election day to cast their votes in person, with swing states like Georgia and North Carolina seeing record early voting rates.
Statistics from the University of Florida Election Lab show that as of Thursday night 11:22 PM Eastern Time, approximately 65 million people have already cast their votes early, including over 34 million in-person early votes and nearly 31 million mail-in ballots.
In over twenty states, the number of early voters has been tallied by party affiliation. Currently, slightly more registered Democratic voters, about 12.33 million people, have voted. Meanwhile, about 11.6 million registered Republican voters have already cast their ballots.
According to election data compiled by the university, around 460,000 early voters are Republicans, outnumbering Democrats by about 1 million votes. So far, approximately 8.3 million Democrats have returned their mail-in ballots, while Republicans have only returned about 6.5 million. About 19.3 million Democrats have requested mail-in ballots, compared to about 13.6 million requests from Republicans.
As the election day draws nearer, both Trump and Clinton are planning a series of campaign events, hoping to intensify their efforts in the final stretch to garner more voter support.