A Potentially Decisive Week in the Presidential Election

2016 Overview – Trump’s poor performance in the 1st debate, Clinton’s relatively strong showing, and his terrible week that has followed appear to created what may have become a decisive moment in the 2016 election. It will probably take another week or two to fully understand the impact this week has had, but early polling suggests dramatic movement in the race. Fresh out this morning is a Politico/Morning Consult track that now has Clinton up 6. It was plus one for Trump a week ago. 7 of the 8 polls that included the debate night in their polling have Clinton up 4 points or more, and in the new Huffington Post Pollster track she is now up 5 points, outside the margin of error. Even the Friday Fox News poll had it 49/44, with Clinton winning the debate by 61/21 (mon eve update - 10 of 11 polls have it 4 or more). 

Other data points to a Democratic structural advantage emerging now. Dems lead the Congressional Generic, 45-41. Party favs/unfavs are 44/48 for the Ds, 31/58 for the Rs. Dems lead Party ID by 6, 37/31. Obama’s approval is holding near 2nd term highs, in the low to mid 50s depending on the poll. In the Huff Po data, he is now in positive territory on the economy, and we know from other data, there has been a sharp improvement in how the public sees the economy over the past few months in particular. Trump’s unsteadiness makes it unlikely for him to make gains if there is violent act of some kind before the election, and given how well the economy is doing, there just isn’t going to be a lot he can do to gain meaningful advantage here. If the new tax story starts to eat into his over performing numbers on economic stewardship, you could begin to see movement in the race towards the Democrats that could start to really impact down ballot races.

It is important to remember that Obama won by 7 and 4 points in his two campaigns. The electorate was going to be perhaps 2% points more Democratic this time, given the increase of minorities and Millennials since 2012. So a 4-6 point victory by Clinton was always the a possible outcome of this election assuming the GOP nominee could not break the demographic advantage Democrats have had of late. And we know that hasn’t happened in 2016 – in fact, the Democratic Presidential advantage may have actually increased this year. Trump is campaigning today in Arizona, a state Mitt Romney won by 9, that appears to be a true toss up today (see my recent piece on Dems expanding the map).

If the structure of the race is settling into a 4-6 point Democratic advantage, it will take a few weeks for us to see how/if this impacting the down ballot races, particularly Senate and House. Real Clear Politics has its Senate “no toss ups” map moving from 51/49 R to 50/50 this week – a sign that things have moved there a bit. Clinton’s new intense focus on Millennials and Hispanics, two groups with a lot of newer and thus more episodic voters, could have its biggest impact on close down ballot races who just don’t have the bandwith or expertise to reach these voters.

The Millennial opportunity for Democrats this cycle cannot be overstated. 20m new Millennials have entered the electorate since 2012. If even just half of them vote, and vote 2:1 Democratic (may be conservative), this is an additional 3.5m votes for Democrats. Obama’s margin of victory in 2012 was 5m votes. So this Millennial thing ain’t beanbag, and the Clinton campaign is right to be pouring energy and resources into this opportunity this cycle.

So, yes, lots of caveats - but early indications are this has been a potentially decisive week in the Presidential election. 

Update 10/3 7pm - CBS's new poll has the race going from 42/42 to 45/41 for Clinton; new CNN/ORC has the race going from 45/43 Trump to 47/42 Clinton.  Along with Morning Consult, these are swings of 7, 7 and 4 points.  Game change!