Arizona’s arid landscape will be the backdrop of a hotly contested presidential race this November as the state shapes up to become the 2020 cycle’s Wisconsin.
Political pundits have fixated on the Democratic Party’s need to rebuild its so-called “blue wall,” bolstered by states such as Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin until 2016. But President Trump’s persistent popularity in Wisconsin, at least according to early polling against presumptive 2020 Democratic nominee Joe Biden, has Democrats looking to Arizona as part of a possible path back to the White House.
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Arizona — home to 11 Electoral College votes, one more than Wisconsin — has broadened the map for Democrats this year. Biden, the former two-term vice president and 36-year Delaware senator, leads Trump by an average of 4.4 percentage points by RealClearPolitics’s count. Trump beat Democratic rival Hillary Clinton in 2016 by 3.5 points, 48.08% to her 44.58%.
Democratic Senate candidate Mark Kelly, husband of former Rep. Gabby Giffords, also has a 8.8 percentage advantage on Republican incumbent Sen. Martha McSally in what’s anticipated to be one of the most high-profile matchups this fall.
Bill Dauster, a Democratic Senate, White House, and campaign veteran, said Arizona was “definitely in play.”
“Arizona is demographically interesting as a swing state, where the percentage of white non-college voters is declining, making it progressively harder for Republicans to hold,” Dauster told the Washington Examiner.
There are roughly 1.3 million Republicans registered to vote in Arizona, as opposed to 1.2 million Democrats, according to U.S. Census and Arizona Secretary of State Elections Division data. Yet a growing, younger Hispanic population that’s becoming increasingly politically engaged in the Trump era could close that gap if more register and then turn out. That’s because Hispanic communities in Arizona are twice as likely to identify with Democrats.
For Smart Politics’s Eric Ostermeier, the 2018 elections were a red flag for Republicans that Arizona is one of the states where Trump will be vulnerable in November. That cycle, three Democratic women replaced GOP members occupying statewide office. The women were Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, Secretary of State Katie Hobbs, and Superintendent of Public Instruction Kathy Hoffman. Ann Kirkpatrick colored Arizona’s Tuscon-dominated 2nd Congressional District blue as well.
Ostermeier added that three Democrats in Wisconsin, a state with a comparable population size to Arizona, beat sitting Republicans during the midterms: Gov. Tony Evers, Attorney General Josh Kaul, and Treasurer Sarah Godlewski.
“One key difference, however, is that Wisconsin has been a tested battleground state for a few generations,” Ostermeier said.
Wisconsin’s presidential race has been decided by single digits in 11 of the 13 contests since 1968, and by less than 5 points in eight of those matchups, he explained. In contrast, the winner of Arizona has been determined by a single-digit margin in only six of the past 13 head-to-heads and by less than five just three times since 1968.
“Wisconsin’s competitive electoral history makes it even more curious that Hillary Clinton chose to ignore the state during her 2016 campaign rallies,” Ostermeier added. “Given the developments at the ballot box in 2018, do not expect the 2020 Trump campaign to make a similar mistake in the Grand Canyon State this year.”
Trump flew to Arizona Tuesday to visit a Honeywell facility in Phoenix that’s producing N95 respirator masks. The trip was widely interpreted as an attempt to project confidence as the administration’s coronavirus pandemic response transitions to focus more on the worsening economic crisis rather than the public health one.
The president, itching to leave the confines of the White House and resume campaigning amid sliding poll numbers, was last in the southwestern state two months ago before the historically large 2020 Democratic primary field whittled down to Biden.
During his arrival in Arizona on Tuesday afternoon, Trump was quickly blasted on social media for opting not to wear a mask or gloves and for shaking hands. His move, in defiance of federal government guidelines, comes days after Vice President Mike Pence sparked a public furor for the same decision.
Earlier Tuesday, Biden ripped Trump from his property in Delaware, where he has been obeying a stay-at-home order since March. In a statement, he hit the incumbent for refusing to reopen enrollment under Obamacare to expand healthcare insurance coverage. Biden slammed Trump, too, for not invoking “the full weight” of the Defense Production Act to fast-track the manufacturing of more personal protective and testing equipment.
“President Trump will try to paper over his administration’s failed response to the COVID-19 pandemic when he travels today to Arizona — but nothing can cover up how he failed to prepare our country for this pandemic and his slow response,” Biden said. “Grandstanding isn’t going to help Arizonans get the resources they need to move forward. What we need is action.”
There have been 8,919 confirmed COVID-19 cases and 362 related deaths in the state.
