The Biden-Harris campaign made clear once again what everyone else knows.
The “Blue Wall” states of Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin are critical to the campaign and the “clearest pathway” to victory.
In a memo shared with supporters, Jen O’Malley Dillon, campaign chair, wrote that the only thing that has changed since the June 27 debate is the “urgency and discipline with which we need to pursue” their goals.
“While there is no question there is increased anxiety following the debate, we are not seeing this translate into a drastic shift in vote share,” she wrote. “Our internal data and public polling show the same thing: This remains a margin-of-error race in key battleground states.”
O’Malley Dillon maintained that while there are multiple pathways to 270 electoral votes, winning the three “Blue Wall” states is the clearest pathway to victory. She also noted that the campaign does not feel that the sunbelt states of Arizona and Nevada are out of play.
“The movement we have seen, while real, is not a sea-change in the state of the race,” she said. “There is also no indication that other Democratic candidates would outperform the President against (Donald) Trump. Hypothetical polling of alternative nominees will always be unreliable, and surveys do not take into account the negative media environment that any Democratic nominee will encounter. The only Democratic candidate for whom this is already baked in is President Biden.”
An ABC News/Washington Post/Ipsos poll that was released on Thursday indicated that a two-thirds majority of respondents believe that Biden should step aside as the Democratic nominee.
Even with that sentiment, the national poll results were within the margin of error with Trump leading Biden, 47-46%, while among registered voters the race was deadlocked at 46-46%.
“No one is denying that the debate was a setback,” said O’Malley Dillon. “But the President and this team have made it through setbacks before. We are clear eyed about what we need to do to win. And we will win by moving forward, unified as a party.”