Current polling, whether head-to-head with Biden or, more especially, the polls in the 7 “battleground states,” points to an Electoral College win for Trump that looks remarkably like his 2016 victory.

Trump leads Biden in the Real Clear Politics head-to-head statistics by around a point.  Given that Biden narrowly won in the Electoral College in 2020 while running up a popular vote margin of 4.5 points, if the popular vote were the only determinant, then the odds would appear strongly favorable to Trump.  Surely, even the most sanguine of Biden-supporters would not expect him to have a similar margin this November.

Hillary Clinton won the popular vote by a margin of 2.1 and lost in the Electoral College.  Given the outsize proportion of California, with its huge population and massive Democrat party alignment, it is reasonable to consider that Biden would need a popular vote win of over 2.2 points (if not 4.5 points).  Currently, he is around 3 points below that figure, or around 5.5 points below if the 2020 result would be required for 2024.

Although current portents point to a high hill for Biden to climb, his current polling of 45.8% versus Trump 46.3% is strikingly below his 5.4-point lead at the same point in 2020.  His job  approval rating of 40.2 compares, also at a similar period, poorly with Presidents Obama’s 48.2% and G.W. Bush’s 45.7%, who both were re-elected, and Trump’s 44.0%, who lost.

But we are five months out from the actual election, and anything can happen between now and November, including a “black swan” that nobody can foretell.

Taking the most conservative view of matters, the question is, what is the absolute minimum Trump can garner in the Electoral College to gain admittance once again to the White House?  The answer, of course, is that under the Constitution, a 269/269 electoral vote tie would see the Republican majority in state delegations to the House of Representatives choose him (with the Senate choosing the vice president).

The actual path to 269 very much depends on the remarkable polling in Nevada — current aggregate Trump +5.4 — indicating this previously safe blue state since 2008 going for Trump, apparently driven by the “Hispanic shift,” which is currently borne out by nationwide polling.  Current polling also shows large Trump aggregate leads in Georgia 4.8% and Arizona 4.0%.  Thus, presuming that Trump holds the states he won in 2020, picking up Georgia, Arizona, and Nevada results in Trump getting 268 Electoral College votes — one short.

But Nebraska splits its votes by congressional district.  Trump is sure to win the state’s two safe GOP congressional districts and the state overall — a total of 4 votes.

The Second Congressional District is the final vote up for grabs and could provide the 269th electoral vote.  The district is considered “even” by the Cook Political Report and was once a safe GOP seat, but it has swung on the national level since the first Obama run, seesawing between the GOP and Dems, and has gone with the national winner in every election since 2000, barring 2012.  Obama won it in 2008 by 1% but lost it to Romney in 2012 by 7.  Trump won it by 2.2% and Biden by 6.8%.

The 2024 GOP primary may prove crucial to Trump’s chances in November.  The sitting congressman, Don Bacon, a traditional conservative not associated with the “MAGA” wing of the GOP, held off a challenge by 62% to 39% from Dan Frei, very much associated with the House Freedom Caucus, who stated, “The district wants to take a more hard-line conservative approach.”  This result may prove crucial, as it nullifies the Dems’ anti-Trump messaging to a degree.

The district was redrawn after the 2020 election, and the change has been criticized as a gerrymander, as more rural areas have been added to the exclusion of some urban ones, but it still contains the urban Omaha area.  That being said, if the 2020 election had been held on the new boundaries, Biden still would have held it.  However, the odds of Biden repeating a six-point win in 2024 are debatable.  Romney won the state by 21 points, Trump by 24 points in 2016 and 19 in 2020, and it seems reasonable in the current climate that the state will return to +20 GOP margins, which would seemingly affect the 2nd District’s result as well.

Bacon defeated the sitting Dem in 2016 by 1.2 points and was re-elected in 2018, a Dem swing year, by 2 and re-elected in 2020 by 4.2, when Biden carried the district by 6, and won by 2.6 against the same Dem candidate he is facing in 2024 (Tony Vargas).  Bacon garnered over 50% of the vote in each of his last three elections.

Surprisingly, polling is sparse at this point for what could be a crucial district.  A PPP poll taken between 4/24 and 4/25 found Trump leading Biden by 3 at 46% to 43% in the head-to head and also by three in the five-way.  A Change Research poll taken last November statewide found Trump with a perfectly feasible 18-point lead, 53% to 35%, and there is every reason to believe that his lead has increased since then.

Again, given current national polling and admittedly sparse state polling, these overall results, if held in November, would ensure Trump’s election at a minimum.

Image: Gage Skidmore via Flickr, CC BY-SA 2.0.