By Kevin Breuninger - CNBC
Texas, a Republican stronghold for more than four decades, now appears to be in a tight race between President Donald Trump and former Vice President Joe Biden,
just six days before the election.
Election analysis website Cook Political Report, whose team of independent experts produces widely followed and respected election rankings and analysis, reclassified Texas Wednesday from "Lean to Vote Republican" to "Contested State."
Our sister network NBC News' own map of the pendulum or contested states labeled Texas like this a day earlier.
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"Texas is a state that Biden doesn't need to win, but it's clear that it's more competitive now than ever,"
wrote Cook analyst Amy Walter.
The Lone Star State has voted for the Republican nominee in every presidential election since 1976. It has 38 electoral votes, the second most vote-casting state after California.
Democrats have long aspired to win in Texas
.
Former Democratic presidential hopeful Beto O'Rourke, for example, raised staggering sums of money when he ran for a Senate seat in 2018 against incumbent Republican Senator Ted Cruz.
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Though that attempt ultimately failed, Democrats managed to wrest a district in the House of Representatives from Republicans in the 2018 midterm elections, and now the party is seeking more seats in 2020.
Early voting sets a record, with more than 62 million ballots received
Oct. 26, 202002: 48
The early voting numbers in that state should be a boost for Democrats: More than 7.8 million people have already cast their vote, about 87% of the total turnout in 2016, according to the US Elections Project. (
US Elections Project
).
More votes
have been cast
in Texas than in any other state
so far, according to available data.
That is partly due to a significant increase in voter registration from 2016,
something that Democratic Party officials believe favors them
.
Anti-Trump sentiment in the Democratic and indecisive regions of the state could be driving participation among key demographic groups, such as Hispanics, Asians, and the graduate or college-educated population, who are more likely to choose Biden.
The average number of polls from the Real Clear Politics (RCP) survey analysis website in the state shows that Trump maintains a narrow 2.4-point lead over Biden.
That gap has narrowed a few points in recent days.
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Nationally,
Biden currently holds a 7.1 percentage point lead over Trump in polls
, based on the RCP average.
And at the right time, the Biden campaign announces that the candidate's running mate, Sen. Kamala Harris, is scheduled to campaign in Texas on Friday.
