How Virginia shaped Biden's decision to drop out
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The possibility President Biden could lose Virginia was part of what drove his decision to end his re-election campaign, Reuters reported.
Why it matters: Internal polling commissioned by the campaign last week and shown to the president on Saturday indicated his support was "collapsing" in Virginia, in addition to New Mexico and all six swing states, sources told Politico.
- The polls were the first the campaign had conducted of swing states and Virginia voters in more than two months.
The big picture: Virginia has swung Democratic in every presidential election since 2008.
- That year, former President Obama won the state by 6 points, making the once solidly red state blue for the first time since Lyndon Johnson won in 1964.
- In 2020, Biden took the state by 10 points with the state's major population centers in metro Richmond, Northern Virginia and Hampton Roads handing him a clear victory.
Zoom in: The details of the Biden campaign polls weren't shared, but possibly mirrored what two statewide polls indicated last week: Biden was losing traction in Virginia.
- He was down 3 points in a VCU-Wilder School poll, while an Emerson College/The Hill survey had him down by 2 points.
- A potential loss would've been a stunning upset for the president who managed to flip seven reliably Republican localities in the state in 2020, including Chesterfield.
Meanwhile, polling from earlier in July indicates the state is far more likely to stay blue with Vice President Kamala Harris, who's shaping up to be the likely Democratic nominee.
- A New York Times/Siena College poll had Harris up by 4 points in a matchup against former President Trump in Virginia.
- And an average of five polls had Harris up by nearly 3 points, per The Hill.
Plus, while some prominent Democrats are waiting on the convention to back a new presidential nominee, every high-profile Democrat in Virginia quickly followed Biden and threw their support behind Harris, Virginia Mercury reported.
- Those include Sens. Mark Warner and Tim Kaine, all six Democrats in the state's U.S. House delegation, Virginia's full Legislative Black Caucus and Senate Democratic Caucus, and the chair of the state Democratic party.
What they're saying: "[Harris] has the potential to make the case on Democratic issues such as reproductive rights more vigorously and should energize Democratic leaning voters to become more engaged in the campaign," Virginia political analyst Bob Holsworth told the RTD.
What we're watching: How the election and polling data plays out in Virginia from now through the election.