The State of the Race just before the Debate - Polling Summary Trump vs Hillary

The debate is in 2 hours. Here is the polling summary of where the race was just before the debate, so we can measure how it possibly changed during/after the debate

RCP (Real Clear Politics) average in the 4 way race has the national polling average as 43.1% Hillary - 41.5% Trump - 7.8% Johnson - 2.4% Stein - 6.0% Undecided. Thats a 1.6% national lead in the 4-way race for Hillary. If you want one number, that it. Who wins/loses, that number should now improve for which of the two debaters won, and drop for the one who lost.

The real race is not one national election, its 51 local elections, one in each state plus the District of Colombia. The estimate of how that state-by-state polling stands is RCP's electoral college map, in its 'no toss-ups' version. That gives today the map for Hillary by 292 EV votes to 246 EV votes for Trump. 270 EV votes is the point of being elected President. For contrast, Obama's victory in 2012 over Romney, a 5% national race, was 332 EV votes to 206 EV votes, so the race today is far tighter between Hillary and Trump, as the final result was for Obama vs Romney four years ago. The debate tonight may decide a lot and the race is so close, even a swing of a few points can turn a slight lead by Hillary to a similarly slight lead for Trump if he has a good night and she doesnt, or even a marginal victory by Hillary could move this slight lead into a solid lead for her

Lets also post the individual in-state polling status by RCP for the battleground states by order of who is ahead, starting from Hillary's strongest leads to Trump's strongest leads: I took all states that had the race at less than a 10% race, so if one debater has a blow-out successful victory, moves the race maybe 5 points, then these states could be still in play for the last weeks.

Connecticut          +9.1%
New Mexico          +8.5%
Oregon                 +7.3%
Virginia                 +6.0%
New Hampshire    +5.4%
Wisconsin             +5.0%
Michigan               +4.7%
Minnesota            +4.3%
Maine                   +3.8% *
Pennsylvania        +1.8%
Florida                  +0.5%
Colorado               -0.5%
North Carolina      -1.4%
Ohio                     -2.0%
Arizona                 -2.2%
Iowa                     -5.0%
Georgia                -4.5%
South Carlina       -7.0%
Texas                    -7.6%
Indiana                 -9.0%

(Note Maine splits its vote so while Hillary is ahead in the state-wide polls, Trump is likely going to win the one Congressional district and one EV vote out of Maine that is conservative).

In general, battleground state polling moves similar to how the national polls move, so if the national polls for example gave Hillary a 4% bump out of the debate then the above states should see roughly a 4% improvement for her, and say Arizona from -2.2% should move to about +1.8% in parallel to the national polling. However, each state has its own issues and some points raised in the debate may resonate in some regions of the country better than others, so of course a national poll is an average of national voters, it wouldn't correspond perfectly in every in-state situation. But thats the race today. What it looked like a few hours before the debate.

Comments

[grogxd]

It feels like Trump has taken 60-70% of the talking time. The moderation is terrible.

[grogxd]

This is interesting. I have never thought of cyber warfare deterrence.

[Wayne Borean]

My wife is in shock. She can't believe Donald J. Trump, Political Genius. She doesn't follow politics the way I do, so she is coming at this cold. But man, has Donald made an impression on her, and not a good one.

[cornelius]

@Wayne

Your wife is most likely a liberal. I thought Trump is doing surprisingly well. The only mistake I noticed so far is that he blames Clinton for the most ridiculous things. This tactic should undermine the legitimacy of the stuff that is true and which he blames Clinton for.

[Millard Filmore]

Trump could not keep his mouth shut when Hillary had the floor.

"Law and Order": (does not apply to me). God Bless America the Beautiful, Home of the Brave, with Liberty and Justice for Some.

Birther: it was settled when the appropriate Hawaii state office said Obama was born in America. Nothing else is of any importance. Trump's carrying on was a declaration that the state government is irrelevant, only his voice matters.

I think Hillary should not have ended with the remarks she made related to stamina, specifically about women's appearance. That should be left to the TV ads.

[grogxd]

I agree about Trump overperforming given what everyone expected of him, but I don't think this will help him in the 'presidential look' metric. He blew it losing his temper 2 or 3 times although he was able to control himself for the most part in addition to his ridiculous foreign policy proposals, especially about nuclear weapons.

I think this is the traditional 50/50 debate, the race will not change significantly because of it in my opinion.

[Paul]

Trump, Clinton clash over facts in debate showdown

http://edition.cnn.com/2016/09/26/politics/presidential-debate-hillary-clinton-donald-trump/

[Millard Filmore]

Is anyone here monitoring right wing boards for their reaction, both posts and commenters?

[Paul]

@Millard

It looks to me that DrudgeReport and Breibart think also that Trump performed no that good for the simple fact that they attack mostly the moderator and not the Hillary.

[grogxd]

@Millard

This is was Breitbart has in its frontpage:

•No Discussion of Clinton Foundation
•No Discussion of Immigration
•No Questions on Private Server
•’Birther Issue’ Takes Center Stage

Crowd Erupts When Trump Calls for Clinton Emails — Holt Scolds Audience

Hillary Commands Fact Checkers: ‘Get to Work!’

Don't expect any better off the rest of the alt-right trash, they feed each other

[cornelius]

Trump refused to shake moderator's hand. He is too important to do that. He can't lower himself to moderator's level.

[Paul]

Obviously, Trump lost the debate but let's see if that translates into loosing votes too.

[cornelius]

@Paul
Yes, every single analyst has declared victory for Clinton. Well, except Rudy Giuliani who declared that Trump "knocked it out of the park" (and out of reality I might add)

[cornelius]

Trump was sniffing a lot. Probably the coke was coarse. Rumor is the guy who fixes the power has already been fired.

[Paul]

@Cornelius

I am sure that in few hours Trump & DrudgeReport & Breibart & co will come with some internet polls showing that Trump won. So there is no point to bother about those.

So the question is will Trump loose votes too after this debate (because of his "don teflon" property)?

[cornelius]

Damn, I meant powder, not power. The power is in the powder.

[cornelius]

Drudge has declared Trump the winner of the first debate.
At the moment he has 81.62%.
I think we are doomed. It is going to be Trump by landslide.

http://drudgereport.com/flashnyd.htm

[Paul]

@Cornelius

DrudgeReport is in the pocket of Trump. DrudgeReport has never posted something negative about Trump. All the internet polls done by DrudgeReport has shown Trump winning. So there is no surprise in there at all. DrudgeReport & Breibart & co internet poles are irrelevant because one is able to predict with 100% accuracy their result.

I am interested in seeing some real voting poles few days after the debate.

[Millard Filmore]

Trump is getting advice about the remaining debates already. Giuliani thinks fact checking should be off limits to the moderator. It must be those pesky liberal facts.

"Giuliani: I'd skip next debates if I were Trump"

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10141581992

[Paul]

Donald Trump Claims He Lost The Debate Because His Mic Was Defective

http://www.politicususa.com/2016/09/27/donald-trump-claims-lost-debate-mic.html