WASHINGTON, United States
United States Vice President, Kamala Harris, and former president Donald Trump are hurtling toward their Nov 5 election showdown, one of the closest contests in modern American history.
And in the handful of critical
states framing the 2024 race, there is little daylight between the rivals with
barely a week before election day.
According to the US
constitution, each of the 50 states would hold its own vote for president.
Under the complex electoral college system, each state has a certain number of
“electors”, based on population. Most states have a winner-take-all system that
awards all electors to whoever wins the popular vote.
With candidates needing 270 of
the 538 electoral votes to win, elections tend to be decided in the hotly
contested “swing states” with a history of alternating between Republican and
Democratic candidates.
This year, there are seven
such battlegrounds, and every one is a toss-up within the margin of error.
Pennsylvania
Having 19 electoral college
votes, Pennsylvania was once reliably Democratic, but these days, they don’t
come much tighter than the Keystone State.
Republican Trump won the most
populous battleground, with 13 million residents, by 0.7 percentage points in
2016. Joe Biden claimed it by 1.2 percentage points in 2020.
Known for its “Rust Belt”
cities like Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania has been blighted for
decades by the steady decline of its industrial manufacturing base.
Trump and Harris have
campaigned repeatedly in the state, where the pair held their one and only
presidential debate. Trump, who survived an assassination attempt at a July
rally in Pennsylvania, is courting the rural white population and warning that
migrants are overwhelming small towns.
Harris is touting recent
infrastructure wins, and in Pittsburgh, she outlined plans to invest $100
billion in manufacturing, a key issue for state residents.
Georgia
With 16 electoral college
votes, Georgia was an election flashpoint at the end of Trump’s first term,
where Trump was indicted in an election interference case after he called state
officials urging them to “find” enough votes to overturn Biden’s narrow 2020
victory.
But in a boost for Trump, the
case is paused until after the election.
Biden was the first Democrat to win the Peach State since 1992.
North Carolina
With 16 votes, the
southeastern state has voted Democratic only once since 1980, but Harris
believes it’s back in play.
The population, now over 10
million, is expanding and growing more diverse, benefiting Democrats.
As in neighbouring Georgia,
one wild card is how the devastation from storm Helene, which recently laid
waste to towns in western North Carolina, might impact the vote.
Michigan
Trump flipped Michigan, having
15 electoral college votes, a former Democratic stronghold, on his way to
defeating Hillary Clinton in 2016.
Biden returned it to the blue
column in 2020, buoyed by unionized workers and a large Black community. But
this time, Harris risks losing the support of a 200,000-strong Arab-American
community that has denounced Biden’s handling of the Gaza crisis.
Arizona
The Grand Canyon state, with
11 electoral votes, was among 2020’s tightest races, with Biden triumphing by
just 10,457 votes.
Trump hopes frustrations over
the Biden administration’s immigration policy will swing Arizona, which shares
a border with Mexico, back in his favour. Harris visited Arizona’s border in
September vowing to crack down on migration and work on reviving last year’s
bipartisan border bill.
Wisconsin
Clinton lost Wisconsin, which
has 10 electoral college votes, after giving the state a wide berth during the
2016 campaign. Trump considers it winnable, and his party held its summer
national convention there. While Trump led early against Biden, Harris has made
the state race a nail-biter.
Nevada
Holding six votes, this Silver
State, with a population of 3.1 million, hasn’t voted Republican since 2004,
though conservatives, buoyed by Trump’s headway with Hispanic voters, are
convinced they can flip the script.
Trump held a significant lead
here against Biden. But within weeks of becoming the Democratic nominee, Harris
while promoting her economic plans to help small businesses and combat
inflation erased that advantage in the western state, whose largest city Las
Vegas is dominated by the hospitality industry.
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