U.S.News & World Report Tumblelog

What state polls tell us about the popular vote

What State Polls Suggest About the National Popular Vote

Mr. Obama trailed by “only” eight points, for instance, in a poll of Georgia that was released on Tuesday. Those are somewhat worse results than Mr. Obama achieved in 2008, when he lost Georgia by five percentage points. But they’re only a little bit worse, whereas the national polls are suggestive of a larger decline for Mr. Obama in the popular vote. Or take the poll of Texas, also out on Tuesday, which had Mr. Obama behind by 16 points there. He’s obviously no threat to win the state or come close to it, but that still represents only a 4-point decline for Mr. Obama from 2008, when he lost Texas by 12 points instead. High-population red states like these, Texas and Georgia, are just the sort of places where Mr. Obama would need to lose a lot of ground in order to increase the likelihood of his winning the Electoral College while losing the popular vote.