Presidential Contest Centers on Seven States
Two months before the national elections, winning the White House has come to be centered on contests in seven states. These states stretch from the East to the West coast and are essentially situated on the northern region of the country. Among them they command 89 Electoral College delegates.
In order to win the White House a candidate needs to acquire 270 delegates. Electoral College delegates are won by winning the majority of the votes in a state. Each of the states has Electoral College delegates equivalent to the Representatives and Senators from that state in the US Congress.
Going into the convention, at the tail-end of the summer, Barack Obama has 186 Electoral College delegates and Mitt Romney 159. Most of the delegates are categorized as those based in solid, leaning to one party, or the swing states.
At this point Obama is ahead based only on the solid states and voting in the general election will determine the winner.
Up for grabs are the swing or competitive states and this is where much of the campaign will be focused into the last days of the election. The seven swing states are Colorado, Florida, Iowa, Nevada, New Hampshire, Ohio and Virginia. These states do not stay either in the Democratic or Republican camp but change from election to election.
None of those states carry a particularly large Muslim population except perhaps for Florida. But the number of Muslims in it is only 6 percent and it is ranked in the seventh place if the states are broken down demographically. If Muslims are well organized, highly motivated to cast their ballots, and have a high turnout rate they can make a difference.
Some of the swing states voted for Barack Obama during the last Presidential election, in 2008, and prior to that, in 2004, for George Bush. These have behaved in that manner more often than any other similar group of states. Each candidate will try to win as many states as possible, but availability of the resources will generally make the difference.
For each of the two candidates concentrating on the seven states is the most expeditious use of the limited resources. During the next few weeks both candidates will spend an inordinate large amounts of time campaigning in the swing states. They will also concentrate on political advertising in those states.
For Obama it is of no use to campaign in South Dakota because it has traditionally favored solidly Republican candidates. By campaigning in South Dakota Obama would be wasting his resources, that is money, which is hard to come by for the Democrats, and moreover, it has only three Electoral College delegates.
On the other hand it makes sense for him to campaign in North Carolina since it voted for him in 2008. However, it has in the past voted for Republicans. Though, it has 15 Electoral College delegates, quite a bit more than South Dakota.
That is one of the reasons why polling is done continuously. Taking public sentiment costs money. But to assess public opinion on an ongoing basis is very important in the conduct of an election.
None of the seven states has a large Muslim population except perhaps for Florida and Michigan. Though 6 percent of Michigan’s population is Muslim it has a lot fewer Electoral College delegates compared to Florida. Both Florida and Michigan’s Muslim population is only 6 percent but Florida has 28 Electoral College delegates and Michigan half as much or 15 only.
