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Swing states are the states that decide the choice in the United States.
In the past few decades you have voted for the Republican and the Democratic candidate.
It is in these states that the decision is made who will become the US President.
Arizona is actually not a classic swing state, as the state has almost always voted Republican in the past few decades.
Survey institutes still see Arizona as a swing state in this election.
We look at why that is:
Protests in Phoenix, Arizona, in 2010: People demonstrated against the city's sheriff and against the state's republican deportation policy, which is primarily directed against Mexican immigrants.
Protester:
"Not a single one! No more mother should be separated from her children."
The hard hand in Maricopa County: Sheriff Joe Arpaio.
For 24 years he presented himself as the strong man in the Wild West.
He had prisoners and undocumented immigrants housed in tent camps in the scorching heat, advocating “Law and Order.” By 2016, he was voted out of office.
Also this year, the 88-year-old Trump supporter tried to be elected sheriff - and failed.
Republicans' strict immigration policies - is it losing popularity?
One important change in Arizona indicates this: The number of voters with a Latin American background is increasing.
It is estimated that for the first time in the US, Latino will form the largest ethnic minority in a presidential election.
Their share rises to 13.3 percent, thereby even overtaking the group of black voters in the USA.
In Arizona, too, the number of eligible citizens with a Latin American background is increasing: since the 2016 presidential election, their share has increased by 2 percent to a total of 24 percent.
Arizona ranks fourth among all states.
The proportions are higher in New Mexico, California and Texas alone.
Many Latinos have loved ones who have suffered from Republican immigration policies.
Or they are affected themselves.
And: The majority of them tend to vote democratically - as in the midterm elections in 2018: There, 69 percent of the nationwide voted for the Democratic candidates - in Arizona it was 75 percent.
Young people with a Latino background in particular are becoming a major electorate in Arizona.
Around 100,000 of them have turned 18 since the midterm elections and will be able to vote for the first time this year.
We spoke to a first-time voter from Phoenix and asked her: How does it feel to be elected for the first time?
Priscila Romero, student:
"Finally, I can vote as the first voter and then also in such an important election that is about so much. I'm really looking forward to it! But I'm also happy because I represent many families like mine I am a first-time voter, which also means: My parents cannot vote. That means, I represent them and stand up for their needs. "
How and why did your parents come to the USA?
Priscila Romero, student:
"They crossed the border in 1999. It was a 15-day walk from Mexico across the border to this point. They had help from a so-called" coyote ". That is someone who helps them get across the border and who knows How to get in. It has been a tragic and traumatizing journey for my parents, who were frequently robbed, attacked and harassed by the border patrol.
Which political issues are particularly important to you and your family?
Priscila Romero, student:
"The topic of health care is particularly important. People without valid papers have hardly any access to medical care in the US. And that is precisely at this time when Covid-19 hit our community particularly hard. My parents both dealt with the Coronavirus infected. My dad had to go to the hospital. But he was so scared because of his residency status that he refused to go to the hospital. We had to convince him to get the therapy he needed.
Another thing Priscila Romero is concerned about is voter turnout in her community.
Because although these voters have the potential to be a decisive group, it is not yet clear whether they will actually use it.
Many different initiatives are working in Arizona to increase the turnout of People of Color.
We contacted one of them and asked what the challenges are.
And she told us about a US phenomenon: "Voter Suppression" - that's what they say in the US when certain groups, especially minorities, are prevented from voting.
Maico Olivares, CASE Action Fund initiative:
"If you really wanted more people to vote, you'd build more polling stations and make it a lot easier for people to vote. The very fact that you have to overcome so many hurdles just to register to vote is crazy . "
How do you reach out to young people in particular?
Maico Olivares, CASE Action Fund initiative:
"There are a lot of young people who have been very disaffected since the 2016 election. Some say to themselves: 'Hillary Clinton had the most votes, but Donald Trump still won. That shows how broken our electoral system is.' Even after a 30-minute conversation, I cannot persuade some of them to register for the election, but there are those whose opinion I could very well change after a conversation.
And what do people tell you who immigrated to Arizona?
Maico Olivares, CASE Action Fund initiative:
"I spoke to a woman, a refugee from Somalia. She told me how after 19 years in the US, the day after Trump became president, she was verbally abused on the way to the supermarket: The person rolled down the car window and shouted: 'Fuck you, Mohammed! Go back where you came from!' She said she had never experienced racial discrimination in any of her time in the US, until that moment, 16 years after she arrived. "
As we just heard, racism and hatred of migrants are also a problem in Arizona.
We asked US expert Christian Lammert what role Trump and his politics play in this.
Christian Lammert, political scientist, FU Berlin:
"I believe that the racist attacks that we see in Arizona can be justified from two perspectives: One is that immigration policy has massively divided the state of Arizona over the past ten years. One thing is that it has become a kind of thing The politicization of Hispanics in the state led to more people registering for elections. And on the other hand, of course, we now have the rhetoric of this Trump administration, which is extremely against immigration from Mexico It is still discussed, and all of this is used a bit for political mobilization, and that leads to racist attacks on the streets.
The Republicans are, of course, well aware that these demographic shifts and processes of change are taking place.
How do you counter this now?
"The Republicans and the Trump campaign are actually a bit helpless at the moment as to how they can cope with these changes in Arizona and perhaps take advantage of them again."
Conservative Republicans or Latino first-time voters - we will find out in November who will decide the election in Arizona.
We can now see what else is important in the state:
Arizona is the most hotly contested state on the southern border of the United States, eleven votes in Electoral College are here.
For Trump, the number one issue here is his border wall, one of his big election promises.
Donald Trump, US President:
"Mexico will pay for the wall!"
The same claim as four years ago.
Mexico has not paid anything so far.
And what about the construction of the wall anyway?
A matter of definition.
Trump can hardly show any NEW border installations, he only covered around eight kilometers in four years.
However, around 500 kilometers of existing systems have been reinforced.
There is no budget for more.
Trump's new attempt: ask the cross-border commuters to pay.
Donald Trump, US President:
"We'll have them pay a small amount at the border, we have customs houses there!"
The Mexicans in the border region react to such plans from amusement to annoyance.
"Trump is crazy! Sometimes he says one thing, then something completely different. I don't think Mexico will pay the whole price for this wall."
"Now he's trying again, almost desperately, to get the same votes on this topic as last time."
Like last time, Trump is also raving in this election campaign when it comes to the insurmountability of his autographed prestige project.
Donald Trump, US President:
"Maybe you can get up with an extremely long ladder, but that's very high ..."
Inaccessible, perhaps.
But that doesn't mean you can't get to the other side - at least that's what this extremely slim magician claims ...
A look at the current polls for Arizona shows: Every vote counts.
According to the survey institute Real Clear Politics, Joe Biden leads Donald Trump - albeit by a shaky gap: at the end of July the challenger was 4 percentage points ahead of Trump, at the end of August with 2 points, and again at the beginning of September with 5 points.
Most recently, 49 percent of the electorate in Arizona said they wanted to vote for Biden, 44 percent would vote for Trump.
In other swing states, such as Michigan, Biden's lead has been greatly reduced.
There it was 8 percentage points ahead at the end of July.
Now there are only 2.6 points.
Biden leads the polls across the country: 49.6 percent would vote for the Democrats, 42.4 percent for the President.
Next time we're looking at a state where the race will also be close.
And Trump urgently needs him to win the election: It's about Pennsylvania, in the northeastern United States.
So - until the next episode.