In almost every presidential battleground state, polling suggests something close to a dead heat between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump. In these states, there are key geographic voting blocs that could determine the outcome.
The best way to tell how a state will vote is to build from the precinct level up, to dig into neighborhood data and to look at the differences in demographics and voting patterns across those precincts. Using this approach, I assembled more than 100 political microcommunities in the battleground states.
Think of them as pieces of a puzzle representing distinct political and social trends that can help us understand the 2024 election. For Ms. Harris and Mr. Trump, each could be a crucial building block in a winning swing-state coalition.
I selected four states that offer a regional and demographic variety of the precinct-cluster puzzle pieces. Within each, there are opportunities for both candidates.
Pennsylvania
The Keystone State is a cornerstone of the Democrats’ so-called blue wall. According to Nate Silver’s 2024 forecast, the candidate who wins here wins the election 90 percent of the time.
Pennsylvania is a state of contrasts, from the Philadelphia megalopolis to old industrial cities and large swaths of Appalachia. Of all the battlegrounds, urban-rural polarization is starkest in Pennsylvania.
The polarization calculus favored Mr. Trump in 2016, as mostly rural blue-collar white voters moved right faster than suburban professionals moved left and minority Democratic turnout in Philadelphia proper dropped. But the math flipped to favor Joe Biden in 2020, as he made substantial gains in Philadelphia’s suburbs and did better even in blue-collar areas in the eastern half of the state.
Wisconsin
Since 2000, four of the six presidential elections in Wisconsin have been decided by one percentage point or less. In 2020 it was the country’s tipping-point state — and there is no reason to believe it won’t be just as pivotal this November.
Of all the battleground states, Wisconsin has had the most idiosyncratic political geography: Rural areas have voted Democratic well into the 21st century, and the deep-red WOW suburbs of Milwaukee — Waukesha, Ozaukee and Washington Counties — contribute to Republican margins.
In 2016, with Mr. Trump in the race, these areas began to march to national trends: Rural areas trended Republican, while Milwaukee’s well-off, close-in suburbs zoomed left.
Still, loyalties remain potent in Wisconsin, from Democratic-leaning, ancestrally Scandinavian voters in the state’s rural west to middle-class suburban Republicans outside Milwaukee. Whichever candidate can realign these remaining holdouts faster will have the edge in the Badger State.
North Carolina
When Ms. Harris became the Democratic nominee, North Carolina rose once again to top-tier battleground status.
Robust Black turnout and support is a necessary condition for any Democratic win in a Southern state like North Carolina but must be combined with strong support in majority-white suburbs. That is what happened in 2008, but it has not been repeated in the past three presidential elections.
Arizona
Battlegrounds to the east feature a mostly urban-rural divide, but in Arizona the divides are mostly in the dominant Phoenix metro region, which casts six in 10 of the state’s votes.
For decades, the state was a Republican stronghold. But in recent years, as urban and suburban areas trended away from the G.O.P. under Mr. Trump, Democrats have had some success in the state. In 2020, for example, Mark Kelly won a Senate seat, and Mr. Biden carried the state by 0.3 percent.
On top of that, Mr. Trump made scant progress with the state’s Latino vote, in contrast to his larger gains in Florida and Texas.
Across a large suburban Phoenix landscape, fully half the state’s vote is cast in majority-white and middle-class precincts that are politically closely divided, my analysis shows. Win these areas, and you probably win the state.
On Election Night
We will need time to parse precinct data to know which candidate won each of the puzzle pieces identified here.
For election night, county-level numbers will be most helpful. Of the four states here, North Carolina will be the first to close its polls, at 7:30 p.m. Eastern time.
Take a look at Nash County, containing part of Rocky Mount, and next-door Wilson County, with the city of Wilson at the center. Mr. Trump lost Nash County by just 0.2 points in 2020 and Wilson County by three points. Both counties are politically split between rural white and Black voters, making them a test for Mr. Trump’s populist coalition. A victory for him in Nash County and a tightening of the margin in Wilson County would most likely put him on track to win the state.
Pennsylvania polls close at 8 p.m. Eastern time. Two key counties encompassing smaller industrial cities, Northampton and Erie, are must-wins for either candidate. Mr. Trump lost both by around a point in 2020, mirroring the statewide margin. Northampton features a mix of Latinos in Bethlehem and a growing number of suburbanites, while Erie combines the smaller-city working class with rural white residents.
If Pennsylvania goes to Ms. Harris, Mr. Trump’s last stand may come in Wisconsin (assuming he wins in North Carolina and Georgia), where polls close at 9 p.m. Eastern time. Look at three northeastern counties: Brown County, home of Green Bay, where Mr. Trump needs to win by at least nine points; Outagamie County, home of Appleton, by 11 points; and Winnebago County, home of Oshkosh, by five points.
In Arizona, there is no understating the importance of Maricopa County, home of the Phoenix metro area, which casts six in 10 of the state’s votes. Mr. Biden won here by two points, a threshold Ms. Harris needs to clear to have the upper hand statewide.
Each of these pivotal counties combines two or more of the distinct voting blocs — rural or urban or by race and ethnicity. In a polarized country, it’s the combination of these in proximity that makes a place a battleground.
Regional and demographic geographies were created with Redistricter, a mapping tool used primarily for political analysis. Demographic and turnout estimates are from Echelon Insights. 2020 presidential precinct results are from the Voting and Elections Science Team.
Patrick Ruffini, a Republican pollster, is the author of “Party of the People: Inside the Multiracial Populist Coalition Remaking the G.O.P.” and the newsletter The Intersection.