Transcript

Hello and welcome back to Magnolia on Mic. My name is Aidan and today we’ll be talking about my prediction for the American general election coming up on November 5th. On election night, Americans will go to the polls in order to elect the next representatives, senators, as well as the next president of the United States. For those of us still in Shanghai, polls will begin to close around seven in the morning, but I would not expect any races to be called until at least the afternoon of November 6th. If you remember back to 2020 , we did not know the results of the presidential election until several days later. While I would not expect that to happen again, I would remain open to the possibility that we will not know the winner of the presidential election until around a day or two later.

Looking first to the Senate, as is the case in about every cycle, only about one-third of senators are up for reelection. Currently, Democrats control the Senate by a ratio of 51 to 49. 28 o those Democrats and 38 of those Republicans are not up for reelection this year. Without looking at the polling too intensely for each race, I believe that Republicans have a clear advantage when it comes to winning the Senate because they are assured so many more seats than Democrats. And if Democrats want to hold the Senate, they’ll have to win tough races in reliable red states such as Montana, Ohio, and West Virginia. I do think that Republicans will flip the Senate this year and that the final breakdown of the Senate will be approximately 51 Republicans and 49 Democrats.

Looking next to the House of Representatives, all 435 voting members of the House will be up for reelection this year. Currently, the Republicans hold the majority of House seats by a margin of 220 to 212, with three currently vacant seats. Despite the fact that the House of Representatives has 435 seats up for grabs, fewer than 50 are likely to be competitive. This is because of several reasons, chief of which is geographic differences. In general, large cities tend to vote for Democratic candidates, while rural areas tend to vote for Republicans. So districts largely composed of one or the other tend to vote in that direction. While I cannot confidently predict a specific margin of victory due to the fact that I think elections will be very close, I can confidently say that we are likely to see the party that wins the presidency will also be in control of the House of Representatives. This is because for over 30 years, every time a new president has been elected, that person’s party has also controlled the House of Representatives.

That leads to our final and most important race to look for on election night, the race for the presidency between Democrat Kamala Harris and Republican Donald Trump. Currently, seven states are considered to be swing states, meaning only seven states will realistically decide the election . Those seven states are Nevada, Arizona, North Carolina, Wisconsin, Michigan, Georgia, and Pennsylvania. Not counting these states, Kamala Harris is expected to have a slight electoral college advantage, as she can expect a relatively safe 226 electoral votes of the required 270 to win the election, compared to Trump’s expected 219 safer electoral votes.

Looking first at North Carolina. North Carolina can be seen as the most conservative of the swing states. North Carolina not only voted for Trump in 2016 and in 2020, it is the only state of the seven current swing states to vote for Donald Trump in 2020. Additionally, North Carolina has only voted for a Democratic candidate twice in the past 50 years. Despite this, there's no reason to believe that a Harris victory is impossible. This is the first election since Roe v. Wade, which was overturned, which has proved to be an energizing issue for Democrats across the United States. Additionally, the Trump endorsed Republican candidate for governor, Mark Robinson, is deeply unpopular, and his presence on the ballot could encourage high turnout among Democrats in North Carolina. Overall, while I do think Donald Trump will win North Carolina's 16 electoral college votes due to its history for voting for Trump, like all swing states, it could very well go the other way.

Moving on to Georgia, Georgia can also be seen as one of more historically conservative swing states. While in recent years, the state has been extremely close, voting for Biden by only 0.3% of the vote, its electoral history tells a different story. Before 2020, the last Democratic presidential candidate to win the state was Bill Clinton in 1992, almost 30 years prior. Georgia has also not voted for the Democratic candidate twice in a row since former Georgia governor Jimmy Carter won this state back to back in 1976 and 1980. While I do think Georgia will be close once again, I do think it will flip for Donald Trump and Georgia will award its 16 electoral votes narrowly for Donald Trump.

Third, we have Nevada, which was the only swing state to vote for the Democratic candidate in both 2016 and 2020. Despite this, Nevada is looking like a tight race that will likely be determined by an extremely slim margin. The key issue that I believe will decide this race this year is immigration. Immigration has been one of the most hotly contested issues since Donald Trump's initial 2016 run for president, and Trump's hardline stance on immigration has proven divisive in the past, particularly among Latino Americans who, in general, tend to be one of the most pro-immigration demographics in the United States. In 2016 and 2020, Democrats were able to mobilize Nevada's high Latino population, but it seems unlikely to me that they will be able to do so again. Kamala Harris has repeatedly emphasized the fact that she believes in a much stricter border policy compared to past Democratic candidates. While this pivot may help Harris win over other demographics, it's likely to hurt her ability to encourage Latino voters in states like Nevada to vote for Democrats, which is why I believe that it, along with its six electoral votes, will be won by Donald Trump.

Up fourth is Arizona, which has a long and rich Republican history. Since 1952, more than 70 years ago, Arizona voted for the Republican candidate all but two times. Once in 1996 by Bill Clinton and in 2020 for Joe Biden. However, Biden only won the state by 0.4% of the vote. Arizona in its electoral history has produced two presidential candidates endorsed by a major party. Barry Goldwater and John McCain, both of whom were Republicans. Despite this, McCain and Donald Trump had a bitter personal rivalry up until McCain's death in 2018. Since then, there have been five statewide elections in Arizona, three Senate races, including one to fill McCain's vacant seat, a governor's race, and the 2020 presidential election. The Democratic candidate won in all five. The key difference between this race and the previous five, however, is the issue of immigration. Just as in Nevada, I believe that Kamala Harris's more conservative shift on immigration will cost her in the state of Arizona. This, as well as the state's Republican leanings, lead me to believe that Donald Trump will win its 11 electoral votes.

The next state, Wisconsin, has voted for Democrats all but one time in the past 30 years, the exception being for Donald Trump in 2016. Donald Trump in particular tends to do well among men working blue collar jobs, which peeled away some of the labor unions support that had helped keep Wisconsin blue for so long. Trump then lost in Wisconsin in 2020 in large part because Joe Biden was very popular among voters in labor unions. Kamala Harris doesn't necessarily have the same union support that Biden did in 2020. However, associating herself with the Biden administration's large scale support for unions, such as during the United Auto Workers strike last year, or the dock worker strike this year certainly cannot hurt her in state of Wisconsin. This, along with the fact that since August, Harris has been beating Trump in the polls, leads me to believe that Kamala Harris will win Wisconsin's 10 electoral votes.

Our next state, Michigan, is in many ways the Democratic party's to lose. Michigan's large-scale union presence, as well as uniquely high Arab-American population, a demographic that traditionally votes overwhelmingly Democratic, make Michigan out to be a somewhat reliable blue state. Looking at Michigan's electoral history, we can see that Michigan has only voted for the Republican candidate once in the past 30 years for Trump in 2016 by just over 0.2%. This year, however, the Biden administration's ongoing support for Israel, despite humanitarian objections due to Israel's actions in Gaza, have severely hurt Arab Americans' willingness to vote for Democrats. It is also important to note, however, that Trump is also not popular among Arab Americans and has criticized the Biden administration for not supporting Israel enough. Taking this into account, I do believe that Michigan will be an extremely close state this year, but it seems that Kamala Harris has the slight edge and I do believe that she will narrowly win Michigan as well as its 15 electoral votes.

At this point, with Vice President Harris adding Wisconsin and Michigan, and Donald Trump adding North Carolina, Georgia, Nevada, and Arizona, our predicted Electoral College tally stands at 251 for Harris and 268 for Trump, • a virtual tie as there's only one state left, Pennsylvania.

Pennsylvania seems to me to be by far the most important swing state. Pennsylvania has the most Electoral College votes of any swing state at 19. Spending reports from earlier this year showed that not only was the campaign spending in Pennsylvania the highest of any state, it was also over double the next closest state. Despite naming Minnesota Governor Tim Walz as her running mate, Kamala Harris announced that decision in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Donald Trump was also shot at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania. Out of the over 200 campaign stops this year by both candidates, according to the Associated Press, almost a quarter of them were made to one state, Pennsylvania. Biden managed to flip Pennsylvania in 2020 due to his appeal to manufacturing workers, union members, and possibly by the fact that he was born right in Scranton, Pennsylvania. Pennsylvania's 2022 Senate election confirmed this trend when Democrat John Fetterman won the state due to his appeal among those working in manufacturing as well as unions. Also in 2022, current Democratic Governor Josh Shapiro won in no small part due to his vocal support for abortion rights, an issue neither he nor Kamala Harris have shied away from. Additionally, Pennsylvania has only voted for the Republican candidate once since 1992 in 2016 for Donald Trump. To me, this shows that while it can easily flip for either party, Pennsylvania generally leans Democratic, and therefore I believe that Kamala Harris will win the 19 electoral votes from Pennsylvania and will win the Electoral College by a margin of 270 to 268 and will become the 47th President of the United States.

This means that overall, I predict that Kamala Harris and the Democratic Party will walk away from election night with control over the House of Representatives, as well as the presidency, while Republicans will take control of the Senate. This would mark the first time in American history that both chambers of Congress have flipped in opposite directions.

I would keep in mind that this is only a prediction, and the only thing I believe we can be certain about is that the election will be extremely close. Please be sure to vote if you are able, and stay tuned for election results on the evening of November 5th in the United States, the morning of November 6th for those of us in Shanghai. And thank you all for listening to this episode of Magnolia on Mic.