This State May Be More Important Than Pennsylvania on Election Day

In a recent analysis on 2WAY’s livestream, political commentator Mark Halperin offered a stark assessment of Kamala Harris’s chances in the 2024 election. Halperin says Democratic and Republican sources are telling him that Kamala is “unlikely to win Georgia, North Carolina, Arizona.”

If Kamala can’t win any of these three, her path to 270 Electoral College votes is extremely narrow. She would need to pull off a sweep in Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin to secure victory, and that’s going be hard for her to do. Halperin noted that “basically back to where Joe Biden was on the eve of the debate.” 

Does that mean she won’t or can’t win Georgia, North Carolina, or Arizona? No. Halperin emphasized the need to watch Harris’s standing in those states, even though there’s currently little indication she’s on track to win them. All the recent polling out of those states have been good for Trump, which suggests he’s favored to win them.

So we’re back to the Great Lakes states—the so-called “blue wall.”

“Can she win the three Great Lakes states?” Halperin asked. “The focus has been on Pennsylvania.” He noted the prevailing sentiment that “the winner of Pennsylvania will win this election,” but warned against the narrow focus on just one state, cautioning that “she may well win Pennsylvania and win the election, but she could win Pennsylvania and lose the election because she doesn’t win Wisconsin.” To illustrate how pivotal Wisconsin has become, he mentioned his sources—two Republicans and one Democrat with strong knowledge of the state—who said they would be “somewhere between surprised and shocked if Kamala Harris won Wisconsin.”

While some pundits and media outlets have been saying for months now that winning Pennsylvania would virtually guarantee the presidency, Halperin emphasized a different reality: “Reorient yourself away from news framing that says it’s all about Pennsylvania.” For Harris, victory in Pennsylvania may not be enough. If she cannot secure Wisconsin, her path to the White House could collapse. Halperin’s pointed advice to voters and observers alike is clear: “Watch Wisconsin.”

“My reporting is that she's in trouble in Wisconsin,” says @MarkHalperin of Kamala Harris. “This is based on three sources — two Republicans, one Democrat — all of whom know the state quite well and all of whom told me today … they would be somewhere between surprised and… pic.twitter.com/41alRNqW8L

— 2WAY (@2waytvapp) November 2, 2024

One might ask why, when the polling averages currently show Wisconsin more blue than Pennsylvania.

3 days until Election Day! Here’s how the 2024 presidential race compares to the same point in the 2020 and 2016 elections, according to the RCP poll averages. pic.twitter.com/CSpiCFx6E4

— Matt Margolis (@mattmargolis) November 2, 2024

But polls are not always what they seem. As Patrick Ruffini of Echelon Strategies points out, Wisconsin is notoriously bad for polling further to the left than the state actually votes:

Final WI Polls 2020

AtlasIntel Biden +2
Susquehanna Biden +3
Civiqs Biden +4
Research Co Biden +8
Emerson Biden +8
Change Research Biden +8
CNN/SSRS Biden +8
SurveyMonkey Biden +10
Swayabe Biden +10
Ipsos Biden +10
NYT/Siena Biden +11
R&W Biden +12
Morning Consult Biden +13

— Patrick Ruffini (@PatrickRuffini) November 2, 2024

So it really does make sense that insiders with access to potentially more reliable private polling, as well as insights on the ground, may show that Kamala is doing far worse in Wisconsin than public polls are saying.