… The clearest road for Mr. Trump is to hold one of the three states he snatched from Democrats in 2016 — Pennsylvania, Michigan or Wisconsin — as well as the rest of his winning electoral map, including Arizona and Florida, where Mr. Biden is now competitive. Polls indicate that is a daunting task, but not an impossible one, particularly if he succeeds again in driving up support among working-class voters, including in more rural areas he dominated in 2016, while holding down Mr. Biden’s support among nonwhite voters.
Still, interviews with 21 Republican and Democratic strategists, many of whom have worked for other presidential campaigns over the past 30 years, suggest that Mr. Trump will need some 11th-hour disruptions in the race. That might include a bad stumble by Mr. Biden in the debate on Thursday or on the trail; court rulings or Republican tactics that suppress the Democratic vote; and a G.O.P. ground game that turns out voters who may not have been counted by pollsters.
And Mr. Trump will need to bring discipline to the campaign trail that has so far eluded him, the strategists say. CONT.
Adam Nagourney, New York Times
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