Sunday Swing State Polls Analysis: OH, FL, VA, NH, National

We have a few new swing state polls in today (and yesterday) and the numbers continue to be positive for Obama as we approach the final full week of the election. The numbers are below, followed by my analysis.

* FLORIDA: — Obama 49%, Romney 48% — Obama +2% since 1 week ago (Public Policy)
* OHIO: Obama 51%, Romney 47% — Obama +3% since 1 week ago (Public Policy)
* OHIO: Obama 49%, Romney 49% — Romney +5% since 6 weeks ago (Univ. of Cincinnati)
* VIRGINIA: Obama 51%, Romney 47% — Romney +4% since 6 weeks ago (Public Policy)
* NEW HAMPSHIRE: Obama 49%, Romney 47% — Obama +3% since 1 week ago (Public Policy)

* NATIONAL: Obama 51%, Romney 44% — Obama +1% since yesterday (RAND)
* NATIONAL: Obama 49%, Romney 46% — Obama +2% since yesterday (Reuters)
* NATIONAL: Obama 48%, Romney 47% — Obama +1% since yesterday (Gallup RV)
* NATIONAL: Obama 45%, Romney 44% — Romney +1% since yesterday (IBD/TIPP)
* NATIONAL: Romney 49%, Obama 48% — Romney +1% since yesterday (Public Policy)
* NATIONAL: Romney 49%, Obama 48% — No change since yesterday (ABC/Washington Post)
* NATIONAL: Romney 50%, Obama 47% — No change since yesterday (Rasmussen)
* NATIONAL: Romney 50%, Obama 46% — Romney +1% since yesterday (Gallup LV)

AVERAGE NATIONAL TRACKERS LEAD: Obama +.375%

Public Policy found Obama gaining in their new Ohio, Florida, and New Hampshire polls, with him now leading in all three states. His lead in Ohio expanded to 4%. The Washington Post poll showing Obama up 4% in Virginia lines up with last week’s Public Policy poll of Virginia which also had him up 4%. And the University of Cincinnati poll of Ohio is pretty much discredited already since most of it was done prior to the final debate. The state polls are all mostly showing the same trends since the final debate — a shift back to Obama. We have seen this in pretty much every swing state, particularly in states like Virginia, Florida, New Hampshire, and Colorado. And Obama continues to not let go of his grip on Ohio.

Today’s news that Romney’s head pollster is publicly admitting that he is “skeptical” of Romney’s chances in Nevada seem to further cement that state in the lean Obama category and out of the swing state category. That means he is Ohio and Wisconsin away from topping 270 electoral votes. Romney has not had a single poll of Ohio show him with a lead in three weeks, and hasn’t had a single poll of Wisconsin show him with a lead since August. Obama also has polling average leads in Iowa, Virginia, Colorado, and New Hampshire. The only two swing states Romney still has polling average leads in are Florida and North Carolina.

The caveat remains that Obama’s leads are narrow. But the reality is that every day that goes by makes it harder and harder for Romney to overcome even a narrow deficit in many of these states. History has shown us that wiping out a 2%+ lead in any state in just 10 days is very rare — Romney is currently behind by at least 2% in the polling averages of five swing states (Ohio, Wisconsin, Iowa, New Hampshire, and Nevada).

National polls, meanwhile, continue to show a virtual tie. It’s hard to say what is causing the discrepancy between stable national polls which seem to never budge from a virtual tie and swing state polls which have clearly shown a shift to Obama since the final debate. My working theory is that the Obama campaign has effectively neutralized the enthusiasm gap in swing states and is turning out sporadic voters during early voting in those states, and thus the state polls are picking up on that, while national polls apply the same “likely voter” model to the entire country and therefore filter out many voters that state polls are now picking up. This would explain why national polls continue to show a large gap between registered voter and likely voter models, while that gap is shrunk considerably in most state polls.

All that aside though, Obama continues to hold a very favorable position in the electoral college as we enter the final full week of campaigning. The behavior of the two campaigns — which begins to act like it needs to make up ground and which acts like it’s happy where things are — will tell us a lot this week on how accurate the polling data we are seeing is. One example — Romney’s new auto-bailout ad in Ohio which is being criticized for being misleading — seems to indicate the campaign’s need to get more urgent with their messaging as time to make up ground begins to run out.