The latest Fox
News "2016 Scorecard" was released Tuesday, and reflects polling
conducted after the party conventions in July.
While the
Democratic presidential nominee’s contest with Trump remains tight in most of
the battleground states, surveys show her lead widening in New Hampshire,
Pennsylvania and Virginia.
As a result,
the Fox News Decision Team has moved the states from the “toss-up” to the “lean
Democrat” category.
“The race
isn’t over in the states we’ve shifted to leaning Democratic, but it’s now
clear that Clinton is playing from a position of strength in those states,” the
Decision Team said in a statement Tuesday, as the new scorecard was released.
“Most
worrisome for Trump are the current polling trends in Pennsylvania. No
Republican has won Pennsylvania since 1988. But it’s pretty hard to see a path
to victory for Trump that doesn’t include a win in the Keystone State.”
Trump is
fighting hard to win Rust Belt voters, including in Pennsylvania, and has
returned on the campaign trail to talking about economic issues -- and, in an
appeal to voters in that region, coal jobs.
Despite
Clinton's post-convention bounce, several polls released this week reflect a
tightening race once again.
However,
Clinton has a built-in advantage with the electoral map, considering more
Democrats than Republicans live in many of the country’s most populated states,
like California and New York, which as a result gives them more electoral
votes.
Her growing
advantage in states like Virginia only increases that edge.
According to
the Fox News ratings, if Clinton wins the states considered "solid"
or "lean" Democrat, she would get 273 electoral votes to Trump's 164.
That would put Clinton above the 270 electoral votes it takes to win the White
House.
In another
trouble sign for Trump, his drop in the polls in two historically
Republican-leaning states -- Arizona and Georgia -- has resulted in the
Decision Team moving those states from "lean GOP" into the “toss-up”
category.
Meanwhile,
other vital battleground states, including Ohio and Florida, remain close.
In Ohio, Trump
and Clinton have been essentially deadlocked since May. A Quinnipiac University
poll released Tuesday shows Clinton slightly ahead, 49-45 percent. No
Republican has won the White House without winning Ohio.
In Florida,
which the Fox News scorecard rates as a “toss-up,” Trump now trails Clinton
just 46-45 percent in Quinnipiac polling, after being behind by nearly 7 points
as recently as May.
The
RealClearPolitics polls average shows Clinton leading by 2.2 points,
essentially tied with Trump in Florida, which voted for President Obama in 2008
and 2012.
The RCP
average also has Clinton and Trump tied in battleground North Carolina.
A Bloomberg
Politics Poll released Wednesday on the national race shows Clinton leading
Trump by 6 percentage points, 50-to-44 percent, with a 3-point margin of error.
Pollsters
caution that national surveys so early in the general election, which
technically starts after the parties’ nominating conventions, remain largely
insignificant until after Labor Day and that their numbers will fluctuate until
November.
To be sure,
both candidates have had up-and-down campaigns and poll numbers -- with Clinton
continually plagued by her email scandal and voter concerns about her
trustworthiness, while Trump continues to make divisive comments that alienate
Republican lawmaker and voters.
The Clinton
campaign, in fact, sent a fundraising memo this week citing the likelihood of
poll numbers narrowing as the race heads toward Election Day, as they typically
do.
“As we’ve seen
over the past month, this race remains incredibly fluid,” campaign manager
Robby Mook wrote. “We fully expect the polls to tighten again.”
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