Signs a possible significant Biden advantage

(CNN) -

A new Minnesota ABC News / Washington Post poll finds Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden holding a 57% to 41% advantage over President Donald Trump among potential voters.

Two other Minnesota polls published in recent weeks by CBS News / YouGov and New York Times / Siena College have Biden up nine points.

What's the point:

Trump's campaign has made a significant investment to turn Minnesota red, after Trump lost it by 1.5 points in 2016. Polls show his efforts aren't working.

They are part of a larger sign that suggests Trump still has a long way to go to win not just in Minnesota, but on the electoral map as a whole.

If his campaign was really competitive at this point, he would probably be closer in Minnesota.

One day Trump may get there, and he definitely has a shot at winning when the campaign is more than a month away.

However, it should also be noted that even though people like me generally focus on how Trump can close the gap with Biden and bring new states into play, there is another side to this equation.

There is also the clear possibility that Biden will defeat Trump.

It's something I've noticed before, and David Byler of the Washington Post pointed it out a few weeks ago.

If you look at the polls right now, there is a pretty clear picture.

Biden has a five- to eight-point lead in several states that Trump won four years ago: Arizona, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.

Those plus the states Hillary Clinton won lead Biden to about 290 electoral votes.

If you add the other states where Biden has at least a nominal advantage in the averages (Florida and North Carolina), Biden is above 330 electoral votes.

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That's not entirely exceptional, but look at polls in places like Georgia, Iowa, Ohio, and Texas.

We're not really talking about those places right now, even though one or both of the campaigns have pretty big ad bucks planned down the road in all four.

Surveys there have been limited, but fairly consistent.

Biden is quite competitive.

If I were to make an estimate of the surveys that are available in those states, Biden is down maybe a point or two at the most.

In other words, Biden is much closer to leading in Georgia, Iowa, Ohio and Texas than Trump in Arizona, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, let alone Minnesota.

In fact, it's very possible that it's in Georgia, Iowa, Ohio, or Texas, and we just don't know because there isn't enough new data.

For example, Clinton only lost in Georgia by five points in 2016, and Biden is doing about five points better in national polls than she is in the final vote.

So it would make sense for Biden to be pretty close to Trump right now.

Biden's victories in any of those states could boost his Electoral College tally to about 340 electoral votes or more, depending on which states Biden wins.

Victories in all four would lead him to more than 400 electoral votes.

Models like those produced by FiveThirtyEight show just how possible it is for Biden to pull Trump out of the water.

The model actually anticipates a better chance of Trump closing his deficit than Biden expanding it.

Still, Biden is more likely (about 45%) to win 340 electoral votes than Trump is to win the election (about 25%).

Biden's chance of getting 400 electoral votes is about the same as Trump's.

Of course, the ramifications of a Biden beating versus a small Biden victory are nowhere near the same as a small Biden victory versus a small Trump victory.

It's easy to see why the focus of a potential mistake is on Trump profiting from it.

In 2012, however, we saw the leading candidate (Barack Obama) win almost every nearby state.

In fact, there is no reason to think that any voting error at the end of the campaign will not benefit the candidate already ahead.

That has happened many times.

Be it Obama in 2012 or the most infamous Ronald Reagan in 1980.

The thing to keep in mind is that it is possible for a candidate to lead the board because voting errors are correlated between states.

That's exactly what happened in 2016, when Trump won most of the nearby states.

This year we just don't know how it will play out.

Just keep in mind that the potential change in this career could benefit both Biden and Trump.

Before we say goodbye:

the main theme of the week is the end credits of Murphy Brown.

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