Sabato's Crystal Ball: Biden Leads, Wisconsin Can Decide It

While Democrats currently hold a slight edge for the White House in 2024, according to Sabato's Crystal Ball, neither party is currently projected to reach the 270 Electoral College votes needed to win.

But, analysis suggests Wisconsin can ultimately decide the next presidential election winner.

In the first edition of the 2024 Electoral College projection, assuming polling leaders President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump are the respective nominees, states likely to lean Democrat or Republican are given the electors, leaving Democrats at 260 and Republicans at 235.

The remaining 43 electoral votes — which the GOP needs to win 82% of (35) — are toss-ups with Georgia (16), Arizona (11), Wisconsin (10), and Nevada (6).

If Biden just wins Wisconsin's 10 votes, it would be enough to reach 270 to clinch the presidential election. It really puts a big onus on that state — assuming all the other states hold as the projections forecast.

Wisconsin has been a blue wall state, but one Trump did crack in 2016. Only Trump (2016), Ronald Reagan (1984 and 1980), and Richard Nixon (1972 and 1968) have won that state for the Republican Party versus the Democrat in more than 60 years.

Wisconsin might take over the status as the bellwether state Ohio once was before Trump broke that trend by winning that state in 2020, but Biden secured the Electoral College votes to become president.

Notably, Wisconsin is infamously the home state of anti-Trump former House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., who is vowing to lead the never-Trump faction of the GOP and sits on the board of Fox News, a network Trump told Newsmax this week is "hostile" to him.

In the 2020 presidential election, Fox News' call of the battleground state of Arizona — a move that Newsmax and nearly all other media outlets held off on — was a landmark moment that political pundits still debate today.

There are 191 Electoral College votes "safe" in the Democrats' column, led by large blue states California (54), New York (28), and Illinois (19) among 14 states on the West Coast and in the Northeast/New England coast.

Republicans have 122 electors safe for Trump across 19 states, but those do not include the large red states Texas (40), Florida (30), and Ohio (17). Coincidentally, upstart Democrat efforts there have those states "likely" instead of "safe," losing one of those would be a death knell for a Republican nominee.

When the projections factor the "likely" states with the "safe" ones, Biden leads Trump 221-218.

Here are the states that "lean" Democrat, giving the GOP an opportunity to move to a toss-up:

Pennsylvania (19)
Michigan (15)
Virginia (13)
Minnesota (10)
New Mexico (5)
New Hampshire (4)

Those are going to qualify as key battlegrounds, along with the four "toss-up" states.

There are just two states that "lean" Republican, North Carolina (16) and Maine-2 (1 elector as the state splits its 2 electors). Democrats are likely to focus their time and money before 2024 on North Carolina's 16 electors.

"We suspect the rating that might spur the most disagreement is starting Pennsylvania as Leans Democratic, as opposed to a toss-up," the analysis read.

"If you believe we're giving an unreasonable benefit of the doubt to Democrats in Pennsylvania, consider that we may be doing the same to Republicans in North Carolina, a state that was Trump's closest victory in 2020."

Notably, Sabato's Crystal Ball issued a mea culpa on North Carolina in 2020, the only state it missed in its projection of a Biden victory.

"In our 2020 ratings — when we ultimately missed just one state, North Carolina — we started Michigan out as Leans Democratic, a decision that paid off, as Biden won the state by nearly 3 points after it surprisingly backed Trump in 2016. It remains Leans Democratic here, along with New Hampshire, which has long been considered a swing state but seems to have settled left of center.

"The GOP position on abortion, in particular, seems like a considerable problem in these states (one could apply this argument to Pennsylvania too, among other places)."

The projection concludes there is a "narrow battlefield" — and Wisconsin notably can reelect Biden as president with the help of Ryan and Fox News — a point not lost on CNBC's interview with Ryan this week.

"We have previously noted that only seven states were decided by less than three points in 2020: Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin," the Sabato Crystal Ball concluded. "This represents the real battlefield: Particularly if the race is a Biden vs. Trump redux, we would be surprised if any other state flipped from 2020 outside of this group.

"Even then, we're not even sure that all of these seven states are truly in doubt. After all, we're starting three of the seven in the Leans category (Michigan, North Carolina, and Pennsylvania).

"This all underscores the reality that despite the nation being locked in a highly competitive era of presidential elections, the lion's share of the individual states are not competitive at all."