Last minute expand map megathread - Spending & visits in AZ, GA, WI, NM, MI, MN

[GeorgiaModerate]

Clinton can only do triage now since she has taken real damage from this email thing. Clinton's email scandals always "live" longer than anything Trump has said or done.

It's premature to assume real damage (or lack of it) until we actually see some polls taken after the fact.  Anything else is speculation.

[GeorgiaModerate]

Just read a tweet that Clinton campaign is buying ad time in Wisconsin. Not a good sign. But I don't believe this is a snap decision, so what's behind it?

Perhaps to help boost Feingold by encouraging more Democracts to come out to vote?  The Senate race appears to be closer than it did earlier.

[GeorgiaModerate]

I wish the Clinton camp was being more aggressive in Georgia. There's so much potential there. Still, winning Arizona will be quite nice.

I think they see a better return on investment in AZ; it's more likely to flip than GA.

FWIW, HP's Meg Whitman was in town on Friday (primarily for business reasons; she was the keynote speaker at a CIO conference), but she also appeared at a "Republican Women for Hillary" gathering.

[GeorgiaModerate]

Looking at Trump and Pence's schedule  between now and Thursday

FL 7 stops
PA 4
NC 2
MI 2
WI 1

Look at this and their spending, PA is still 'plan A' to break the Clinton wall, as it always has been, but they are hunting for backup path plans like MI, WI (and CO and NM which were visited over the weekend).

Sounds very similar to the McCain/Romney strategy in the end game.

Academically similar, but this is perfect positioning.  They are winning the big 3 (OH, NC, FL) and are looking for the last 10 to 11 Electoral votes in 9 states/districts.  If he wins NV he is looking for 4 or 5 electors in 8 states/districts.  How is Clinton going to defend everywhere when she is radioactive right now? 

In order:

He's not winning OH, NC, and FL right now.  OH at this point is probably Lean R, NC and FL Tossup to Lean D.

She's not radioactive right now.  Polls have shown very little movement due to Comey and she still has a clear lead in the polls, though narrower than it was a couple of weeks ago.

[GeorgiaModerate]

Looking at Trump and Pence's schedule  between now and Thursday

FL 7 stops
PA 4
NC 2
MI 2
WI 1

Look at this and their spending, PA is still 'plan A' to break the Clinton wall, as it always has been, but they are hunting for backup path plans like MI, WI (and CO and NM which were visited over the weekend).

Sounds very similar to the McCain/Romney strategy in the end game.

Academically similar, but this is perfect positioning.  They are winning the big 3 (OH, NC, FL) and are looking for the last 10 to 11 Electoral votes in 9 states/districts.  If he wins NV he is looking for 4 or 5 electors in 8 states/districts.  How is Clinton going to defend everywhere when she is radioactive right now? 

In order:

He's not winning OH, NC, and FL right now.  OH at this point is probably Lean R, NC and FL Tossup to Lean D.

She's not radioactive right now.  Polls have shown very little movement due to Comey and she still has a clear lead in the polls, though narrower than it was a couple of weeks ago.

1) He is winning in OH, NC, and FL.  NC is the closest he's only up 2 there. 
2) She has the highest negatives of any candidate ever (she is significantly higher than trump now), she is (Publicly) under federal investigation for the 2nd time, she is guilty of many serious crimes that will result in impeachment or constitutional crisis...  what would you consider radioactive?

Let's look at real numbers and not feelings or opinions, shall we?

1) Don't cherry pick polls.  It's intellectually dishonest.  Looking at the two major poll aggregators, RCP and HuffPo, the current averages are:

OH: T+2.5, C+1 (average of the two: T+0.75)
NC: C+2.0, C+3 (average: C+2.5)
FL: T+1.0, C+2 (average: C+0.5)

They're all close, but Clinton is slightly ahead in NC, Trump in OH, and FL is a tossup (I won't quibble about a fraction of a percent).  Please explain how you translate these numbers to Trump is winning in all of them.

2) I invite you to look at Gallup's rolling samples of candidate favorability at  http://www.gallup.com/poll/189299/presidential-election-2016-key-indicators.aspx?g_source=ELECTION_2016&g_medium=topic&g_campaign=tiles#pcf-image.  In the latest sample (Oct. 25-31), Clinton is at 43/54 (-11), which is indeed pretty bad.  But Trump's favorability is FAR worse at 34/63 (-29).  So it's quite clear which candidate is more unpopular.

Actually, looking at the previous Gallup numbers explains a lot about why the race has tightened in the past couple of weeks.  Clinton's been in a narrow range for the past two weeks of -14 to -11, with one day at -9.  But Trump has improved since then; two weeks ago he was at -34, but he's been gradually trending upward and was as high as -27 a few days ago.

[GeorgiaModerate]

I don't know if this was a national ad or not, but I just saw a Clinton ad on Fox 5 in Atlanta during the World Series game.  Only the second one I've seen for her on Atlanta TV; the other was in early September.

[GeorgiaModerate]

Clinton adds a stop in Grand Rapids, MI on Monday; President Obama to Ann Arbor on Monday, also.

Liz Kreutz Verified account ‏@ABCLiz 59s59 seconds ago

Both Hillary Clinton & President Obama will campaign in Michigan on Monday. HRC in Grand Rapids; POTUS in Ann Arbor, per campaign.
0 replies 2 retweets 2 likes

Not sure I'm a fan of these moves. Grand Rapids and Ann Arbor aren't exactly the places to go if you want to fire up African-American support. Why wouldn't you want to send Obama to Detroit?

Ann Arbor for the college vote, perhaps.

[GeorgiaModerate]

Since last night Trump has added rallies in MN, MI and PA and Pence added one in MI. The WI Trump rally is still on the Sunday schedule. Right now he has five rallies booked in five states (IA, MN, WI, MI, PA) in the span of nine hours on Sunday.  

Last night Chuck Todd said that the travel schedules showed what's going on inside the campaigns. For Clinton the specific cities she is targeting shows the campaign's concern over the African American vote and they are singularly focused on that. For Trump, he compared it to Dole 1996 with no clear path to 270 and just trying everything. He also used the 'spaghetti against the wall' metaphor.

http://www.msnbc.com/brian-williams/watch/chuck-todd-campaigns-are-not-fighting-over-a-single-voter-801641539710

I think Trump's strategy is pretty reasonable. According to 538's Clinton's margin is about the same in the following states
NM +5.4% (but here we have almost no polling + polls probably miss hispanics)
MN +4.9%
VA  +4.9%
WI  +4.2%
MI  +3.8%
PA  +3.5%
CO  +3.3%
NH  +2.0%

They all are also has more or less Trump'ish demographics.

I think Trump just hopes that polling error occurs somewhere (it was BTW my theory all along). But he doesn't know where (no one does), so he is just trying all of them.

So  'spaghetti against the wall' is not just reasonable description, but it is also is reasonable strategy in Trump's case.

I agree with this.  It only makes sense for any candidate to try and maximize their winning chances.  It's like a card game where the only way you can win is if a certain opponent has (say) both the jack and queen of spades, then that's the way you have to play it.  It may be unlikely, but if it doesn't happen then you've lost anyway, so it's reasonable to assume it's true.