We read that the American presidential elections will be decided by the results of just a small number of so-called swing states: Arizona, North Carolina, Georgia, Minnesota, Nevada, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. And why?
The explanation lies in the combination of three factors:
- the Electoral College system,
- winner-take-all elections, and
- the geographic concentration of voters by party.
Europeans are used to national elections for their leaders, so it’s natural to think of the US presidential election as a national election. This is not a national election, but the sum of 50 simultaneous and independent state elections (and one more in Washington DC), with each election determining who receives the Electoral College votes allocated to each state. There are a total of 538 Electoral College votes, and 270 are needed to win the presidency.
There is nothing in the United States Constitution that describes how states should organize their elections. Everyone is free to use their own system, but 48 of the 50 states have decided to allocate their Electoral College votes in the same way, with a single, winner-takes-all ballot, and it is this choice that leads to the greatest distortion of the system. . “Winner takes all” means that even if a party wins a state by a tiny number of votes, that party receives all of that state’s Electoral College votes, and even if the losing party received just a few fewer votes than the winning party receives nothing.
Winner-take-all elections tend to lead to two-party dominance, and in the United States, only the Democratic and Republican parties count in presidential elections. Furthermore, in a two-party system, dominance gives the winning party enormous opportunities to gain power, and when one party is dominant in a given state, it is very difficult for the other party to replace it. Due to the coincidence of politics and geography, in 44 of the 50 + 1 elections for the presidency of the United States, one of the parties is dominant, with regional geographic patterns: the Republican Party dominates in most of the South and West and the Democratic Party dominates most of the West Coast and Northeast.
Looking at the history of recent elections and the current political situation in each state, we know in advance that the Republican Party will win all of the Electoral College votes in 24 states, with the Republican candidate for president having secured about 219 Electoral College votes from those states. “Red States”. We also know in advance that the Democratic Party will win the presidential elections in 20 states, with the Democratic candidate obtaining around 225 Electoral College votes from these “blue states”. There are exceptions to these rules, but they are rare. For example, when in a “landslide” election there is a landslide victory for one side, some states do not vote as expected. But this is unlikely to happen in 2024, where very fierce competition is expected. It is also true that over time, as US populations move, some states evolve from one camp to another. But in general, and for this 2024 election, it is very likely that the labeling of “red” and “blue” states will be a reliable indicator of the outcome of the presidential election in that state.
What this means is that the only uncertainty there is is who will win the approximately 94 Electoral College votes in states where no party is dominant, the swing states. This is where one of the two candidates will accumulate enough Electoral College votes to reach the magic number of 270. The map below is an example estimate of Red, Blue, and Swing States for the 2024 election, presented when Biden was the Democratic nominee , but the map won’t change much with Harris replacing Biden.
The consequence of the combination of the Electoral College system, winner-take-all elections (winner-take-all) and the coincidence of politics and geography means that an investment of time or money in a red or blue state is a waste, so both the Democratic Party and the Republican Party concentrate practically all their efforts and money on swing states. A curious phenomenon of presidential elections in the United States is that, whether you live in a red or blue state, you will never receive a visit from a presidential candidate; both campaigns will ignore it. If, however, you live in an oscillating state, you will be bombarded by emails, phone calls, visits to your home, invitations to participate in rallies, television commercials, etc.
Winner-take-all elections by state also explain how a losing candidate can receive more votes nationally than the election winner, as happened with Hillary Clinton in 2016. Winning by a very large margin in a single state has no utility in a presidential election: You get all of the state’s Electoral College votes if you win that state by at least one more vote than your opponent. Clinton received 2.9 million more votes nationally than Donald Trump in 2016, mainly due to her 4.3 million vote margin over her opponent in California. But he won the Electoral College votes 306 to 232 because he won by narrow margins in the swing states of Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Ohio and Florida (these last two are no longer considered swing or swing states as they have moved into the Republican camp ). Therefore, it is justified that, in 2024, we focus all our attention on swing states.
The author is a French-American businessman who has lived in Portugal for 15 years, author of “Rendez-Vous with America, an Explanation of the US Political System” and current president of the American Club of Lisbon. The opinions expressed in this article are the sole responsibility of the author and are in no way attributable to the American Club of Lisbon. He can be reached at PSL64@icloud.com
