With two days before American votes are counted and the country’s new president is elected, the momentum is in Donald Trump’s favour but Hillary Clinton is maintaining her lead– if only by a slim margin.
Still, the Democratic nominee of U.S. president is favoured to win.
“In the latest polls, Clinton is ahead by 1.4 per cent, and has been leading on out average every day since the conventions,” said Emily Goodin, managing editor at Real Clear Politics.
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“Historically, polls have told us that whoever is leading on election day tends to be the winner.
“But as we know, this has not been your normal, traditional election.”
There are a few aspects that make this election campaign unlike any other in American history; the unparalleled unpopularity of both candidates is just one.
“Going into this election, the high un-favourability ratings are unprecedented in modern polling,” said Goodin, whose site analyses aggregated data from across the country.
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Usually, a presidential candidate rates a negative one or a plus one – a rating Goodin qualifies as a wash. In this campaign, however, she has seen Clinton pulling a negative-13 and Trump a negative-20 rating.
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“We’ve literally never seen this before in an election,” she said.
Of course, polls can sometimes be wrong and voters’ minds can change once they’re actually in the booth.
The final NBC-Wall Street Journal poll, released Sunday, showed Clinton holding a four-point lead over Trump, polling 44 per cent to 40 per cent respectively.
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In mid-October, Clinton was leading by 11 points over Trump, Reuters reported. That was before the FBI head dropped a bombshell on the campaign trail, issuing a letter to Congress saying he no longer considered the investigation into Clinton’s emails closed.
But early voting results seem to be favouring Clinton, said Luiza Savage, a political reporter at Politico.
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“In places like Nevada, the local press are already saying she may already have it locked up. Likewise in Florida,” she said on Sunday.
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“But if we take a step back, what we are looking for on election day is really about the electoral college vote.”
To win the White House, either Trump or Clinton will need 270 electoral college votes.
A lot of states are already a lock for either the Republicans or the Democrats.
But a handful of “swing states,” like Florida, Ohio and Pennsylvania, remain undecided; either Trump or Clinton will need them to claim the presidency.
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In order to reach the 270 threshold, Trump is going to have to win some big states, Savage said.
“The path for Trump is very difficult. It’s not impossible, but it’s very difficult,” she said.
Two states pollsters and pundits are watching in the final days are North Carolina and Florida. According to Goodin’s number crunching, Clinton can lose one of those, but Trump can’t lose either.
With a file from Reuters
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