With hundreds of election articles pouring in these days, even for someone who is very interested in politics, it’s hard to always understand what is actually going on with the election. In this article, I set out to condense all the information and make it accessible for all students at HHS, and provide my objective prediction of election results of who is going to come out on top. 

Joe Biden is Leading In the National Presidential Polls

National polls are great indicators of who the most popular candidate across the country, but they are not particularly effective in predicting the result of the election. In 2016, Hillary Clinton was ahead of Donald Trump by nearly three million more votes, but she still lost because of the electoral college system. Winning the most popular votes doesn’t always mean the candidate will win the election; however, Joe Biden has been ahead of Donald Trump in most national polls since the beginning of 2020 with Biden at 51% and Trump at 43%.

Which States Should We Be Looking At? 

As everyone witnessed in the 2016 election, the number of votes a politician wins is less important than where they win them. There are many states that Joe Biden and Donald Trump know they are going win; for example, Donald Trump is convicted that he will win Tennessee and Joe Biden is sure he will win New York. What they are fighting for are the swing states or the “battleground states,” the few states where both candidates have a chance of winning.

Each state is given a number of votes depending on how many members in Congress there are.  There are a total of 538 votes from the electoral college, so to win, a candidate needs to reach 270. As the picture above explains, some of the “battleground states” have many more electoral college votes than others. Candidates often spend a lot more time campaigning in them.

Polls in swing states are favoring Joe Biden at the moment, but things can change very quickly. In the last election, Hillary Clinton won four out of the fourteen “battleground states,” while Donald Trump won ten. In this election, Joe Biden is leading in nine of the fourteen states, leaving Donald Trump with five. However, the numbers are really close and the charts keep changing as more people are voting and more information is recorded. 

The Presidential Debates

Donald Trump and Joe Biden participated in two live TV debates. The first debate was a disordered affair, with any possibility for civil discourse. A poll was sent out following the debate showing that 48% of the people who watched said Joe Biden won and 41% said the same for Donald Trump. About 70% of people said that the debate was annoying. 

During the second debate, mics that were muted were used. The debate was a much better representation of the country and its values than the previous one. Polls showed people thought Mr. Biden had the more impressive performance, and many news articles established that Trump had performed better. A CNN poll showed that 53% voted for Joe Biden and 39% voted for Donald Trump. 

Biden Is Favored To Win the Election

All the information recorded from the polls and other resources shows that Biden is favored to win the election. He is ahead in most of the battleground states that Hillary Clinton lost in 2016. Joe Biden is also leading in the national polls. Unless there is a big turn-out of voters on election day for Donald Trump in the battleground states, it is very likely that Joe Biden will win. But Hillary Clinton was voted most likely to win the last election, so we won’t know until the results come out on November third or even later!