Battleground in the Tar Heel State: Biden and Trump Vie for Turn-Out in NC
President Donald Trump speaks with supporters in Gastonia, NC on October 21, 2020. Source.
While it may not be as attention grabbing as the tight race in Florida, with its history of ballots invalidated by hanging chads, or as much press as the polls in “Rust Belt” states that flipped for Trump last election cycle, North Carolina and its 15 electoral votes stand out as one of the most important battleground states of this election. Currently, according to the average polling numbers calculated by RealClearPolitics, Vice President Joe Biden leads President Donald Trump by 1.5 percentage points, and according to FiveThirtyEight’s forecast of the election Biden has a two in three chance of carrying the state. Their model gives North Carolina a 6% chance of being the deciding state in the election, the fourth highest of any state. Given all of this, it is no wonder that Biden and Trump are paying such close attention to the state and visiting often.
On the Democratic side this past week, Senator Kamala Harris visited Asheville and Charlotte for small, socially distanced rallies, and Biden visited Durham for a drive-in rally. First and foremost, they both emphasized the great importance of North Carolina to the electoral success of the campaign. They also criticized the Trump administration’s handling of the ongoing health crisis, its attempts to roll back the Affordable Care Act, its handling of the economy, its denial of systemic racial injustice, and the nomination of Judge Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court so close to the election. Biden was particularly critical of Trump’s failure to fully disclose the threat posed by COVID-19 to the American people, saying that Trump “cares more about his Park Avenue perspective of the world—the stock market—than he does about [regular Americans].” In addition, the candidates spoke of their plan to “build back better” in the wake of the current recession, tackling racial inequity and systematic racism, implementing healthcare reform, and working towards another era of bipartisanship in American politics.
On the Republican side, both Vice President Mike Pence and President Trump have been very active in North Carolina with rallies that have typically been much larger and less socially distanced than those of their Democratic counterparts. In recent weeks, Pence has visited Selma, Morrisville, and Kinston, and Trump has visited Greenville, Gastonia, and Lumberton. As with Harris and Biden, both emphasized the importance of North Carolina to the election, but Pence and Trump’s speeches diverged more than those of Harris and Biden. In Selma, Pence emphasized that the election is a choice between a path of “socialism and decline” and a path towards “more freedom and more opportunity for every American” under a Trump administration. Pence has rattled off a long list of what he sees as the Trump administration’s successes in tax reform, reducing regulations, supporting law enforcement, rebuilding the military, and fighting terrorism, while blaming the Obama-Biden administration for a number of woes. He also discussed the nomination of Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court and the prospect of court packing.
Trump, on the other hand, spent a considerable amount of time attacking Biden, saying that “if Biden wins, China wins,” and that, “Joe Biden has betrayed the workers of North Carolina through one act of economic treachery after another,” for example. Most scathingly, he told a crowd that “Biden is a servant of the wealthy donors and globalists and special interests who got rich bleeding America dry.” Trump also floated the idea that Biden was involved in “his son’s corrupt business dealings,” referencing claims that Biden and his son Hunter participated in corruption and cover-ups in Ukraine and China, which have been largely discredited. In terms of policy, he praised the success of the White House’s coronavirus task force, attacked states for refusing to reopen, and bragged about his impact on the Supreme Court.
While research done by Professors Holbrook and McClurg indicates that the impact of candidate visits on voter turnout is vanishingly small—if it exists at all—it is apparent that both campaigns are seeking to motivate their bases through these visits. Biden and Harris are appealing to voters fed up with Trump and hopeful for change. Pence is appealing to more policy oriented Republicans, while Trump appeals to anti-establishment Republicans, who are more open to the President’s anti-corruption message. As the race comes down the home stretch, expect both campaigns to continue to pay close attention to North Carolina.