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America – land of the “swing states”, home of the electorate system: Swing states are those US states in which it cannot be clearly foreseen whether the Republicans or the Democrats, i.e. one of the two large parties, will have the majority in the US election. In the US election scheduled for November 3, 2020, the Americans will vote in their states and thus determine the electorate for the so-called “Electoral College”. It was not until December that the total of 538 delegated electors would vote for the 59th US President and Vice-President.
Many states are strongholds of the two big parties, so they are “safe states”. The traditional choice here is blue (for the Democrats) or red (for the Republicans).
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For example, safe states are California for the Democrats and the southern states for the Republicans. These are not particularly in focus in the election campaign. On the other hand, the surveys in the swing states are being watched with excitement in advance. In these states, the Republicans and the Democrats have won previous US elections. In the end, the swing states can also be decisive for the election result in 2020 – and thus for whether the Democrat Joe Biden will replace the incumbent Republican President Donald Trump in the White House or whether the incumbent will sit in the Oval Office for another four years. The election campaign therefore often focuses on precisely those states that do not have a clear electoral tradition.
The competitive swing states of the 50 US states in 2020 include: Florida, Texas, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, Wisconsin and Minnesota. Polls also suggest that Georgia, North Carolina, and Arizona may be close to the polls.
Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden is currently leading the polls – including in the swing states. However, a clear lead does not mean that he will be elected president by the Electoral College 41 days after the election. The effects of the complex indirect electoral system became apparent in 2016: Hillary Clinton, as a Democratic candidate, led the polls for almost the entire election campaign, and more Americans voted for Clinton in the election. In the end, however, she lost the election to Donald Trump, as the Republicans were able to secure more electoral men and women – also by winning swing states. The background to this is the “winner takes it all” principle, according to which in 48 of the 50 federal states all electors of the state are awarded to the candidate who receives the majority of the votes. The states of Nebraska and Maine are exceptions to this principle. The electorate of these two states is determined proportionally and in part according to the congressional electoral district.
The special effect of indirect voting is that the number of votes in the Electoral College is more important than the votes of Americans at the ballot box – the so-called popular vote. The presidential election is won by whoever has at least 270 of the 538 voters behind them.
The electorate must vote for the candidate chosen by their state’s voters. In order to ensure that they are legally binding, voters will face severe penalties if they refuse to vote for candidates who have determined their state’s electorate. The Supreme Court recently ruled that these electors may be sanctioned by their states.
After the 2016 election, a total of five so-called “unfaithful electorates” turned against the Democrat Hillary Clinton, even though the majority of the respective states spoke out in favor of her. Two electorates withheld Republican Donald Trump’s vote that same year. Since 1796, 180 voters have behaved “unfaithfully”. However, unfaithful electorates have never been decisive for the outcome of a presidential election.
Florida is one of the most competitive swing states, as a total of 29 voters are sent from there to the Electoral College. The high number of voters is due to the large population of Florida. That is why Texas, with 38 voters, is also important for the outcome of the election. The traditionally republican stronghold is one of the swing states this year due to the positive polls in favor of Joe Biden. Incidentally, the most populous state of California provides the most votes for the election of the US president – with 55 electoral men and women. The Democratic Party has won a majority here since 1992. In comparison, for example, the sparsely populated states of Delaware and Montana have only three voters.
The common name “Swing States” could misleadingly assume that the population of these states tends to shift on political issues. The other designations “toss-up-state” (coin tossing state), “battleground state” (battlefield state) or “purple state” (as an allusion to a mixture of the party-affiliated colors blue and red) for these states could provide a remedy . The reason that the swing states are not party strongholds and election results cannot be predicted with certainty is due to the fact that these states have a more heterogeneous demography and the outcome of the elections is therefore much more influenced by the mobilization of the election campaign than in other states.
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Can algorithms, internet trolls and malware endanger democracy? False reports and half-truths circulate across all borders in social networks. Election propaganda works in real time – and thanks to an immense amount of data, it is increasingly targeted.-
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In the 2016 presidential election, 94 percent of the total election campaign took place in just 12 states. And two-thirds of the events were held in just six states. More than half of all states did not have a single election campaign event. A similar approach can be seen in the autumn of this Corona-stricken year. So far, 70 percent of all campaign events – whether virtual or actually on site – have been held in six states: Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Wisconsin, Florida, Michigan and Minnesota – all of them swing states. Donald Trump cast his vote before the Florida election day.
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In his “Townhall Meeting” Donald Trump tried not to be the aggressive interlocutor – also because he was far behind in surveys. Joe Biden relied on solidarity and direct contact with people again.-
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Biden like Trump also advertise for the votes of the minorities. With around 18 percent of the population nationwide, Hispanics are particularly influential in the swing states of Texas, Arizona, and Florida. The votes of African Americans and blacks, who together make up around 13 percent of the population, could also be decisive for both parties. In Texas in particular, these two minorities will have a major impact. Texas has been a Republican electoral tradition for a decade, but this year polls say Trump has little chance – making Texas a swing state in this election.
The chances for Biden arise only partially from a dissatisfaction with Trump’s politics among the Texans. Demographic change weighs more heavily: More than two million people have applied for election documents for the first time. The majority of them belong to the Afro-American or Hispanic minority. And around 1.6 million of them are younger than 35 – these young voters tend to vote more democratically. The candidacy of Kamala Harris as Democratic Vice President, alongside Joe Biden, is likely to shape the election of the minorities.
An election change can also be expected in the electorate without a higher level of education, for example in Pennsylvania: Pennsylvania’s population is strongly characterized by workers, by people without a high school diploma, by people who have often lost their jobs because classic industry is not there more there. “Donald Trump was able to get them excited four years ago,” said Simon. “There were probably two main arguments: A lot of those white voters didn’t like Hillary Clinton, men mostly – but women too. And Donald Trump told them, ‘I’ll get you jobs again.’ So he came to them. Four years later it is the case that the jobs did not turn out as he promised. On the contrary: The corona pandemic has driven millions of people into unemployment. And regardless of it, have the trade disputes that Donald Trump actively pursued here cost people work. “
This year, however, Joe Biden seems to appeal to the people of Pennsylvania and to have them co-opted – if only by the fact that he constantly mentions that he comes from Pennsylvania.
“If you want to win the election, you need Florida. The votes of the electorate in Florida,” says Dlf correspondent Doris Simon. Many people went to Florida to retire. Especially people who come from cold countries in the north of the USA. They would vote differently this year than they voted four years ago, says Simon. “Corona is the key issue in the elections for the older generation, for retirees.”
In the polls, Joe Biden is well ahead of Donald Trump in Florida. “The figures show that his message on Corona, with a plan, with a systematic approach, is apparently more entangled than Donald Trump,” said Simon.
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