WASHINGTON (TIP): Hillary Clinton has built a formidable lead over Donald Trump in terms of opinion poll’s percentage points, but, poll numbers are swinging in Battleground states as Nevada and Florida change status back to “battleground” from “lean Democratic” and now maintain their traditional toss-up status.

Leaving the battleground states undecided for now, CNN’s electoral outlook has Clinton at 272 electoral votes from states either solidly or leaning in her direction. Trump has a total of 179 electoral votes from the states either solidly or leaning in his direction. 87 electoral votes currently up for grabs in the battleground states will decide this head to head race regardless of what Opinion Polls suggest – remember opinion polls generally tend to have a sample size of about 1,000 people or more and can track movement and general opinion well.

But the US election is won and lost in swing states and decided by the electoral college system.

This means that polls in states that look like they could vote for either candidate play an integral role in election projections.

As on October 27, most polls here in the US and in UK speak of Clinton’s lead, and a comfortable one, over Trump.

The Upshot gives Hillary Clinton, the Democratic nominee for president, a 92 percent chance of winning, compared to Republican candidate Donald Trump’s 8 percent. While Trump could still win, The Upshot says: “Mrs. Clinton’s chance of losing is about the same as the probability that an N.F.L. kicker misses a 31-yard field goal.” According to The Upshot, the chance of Clinton winning the election has increased steadily since the beginning of the month: On October 1, Clinton had a 76 percent chance of winning compared to Trump’s 24 percent.

On October 26th night, FiveThirtyEight ‘s Nate Silver wrote that Trump has “probably narrowed his deficit against Clinton,” but by too little to see any major shift. FiveThirtyEight ‘s election forecast on October 27 predicted that, nationally, Clinton will take 84.4 percent of the vote to Trump’s 15.6 percent. Meanwhile, 46 percent of voters in a YouGov poll published October 27 said they intend to vote for Clinton, while 41 percent said they will cast their vote for Trump.

Real Clear Politics had Clinton leading Trump by 5.4 points on Thursday, a slight dip from the same time a week ago, when she was up by 6.1 points. The average from Thursday’s polls had Clinton with 48.6 percent support and Trump with 42.7 percent.

Outlier of The Day: Evan McMullin! According to a SurveyMonkey poll from Utah published on October 27, 29 percent of voters say they will choose McMullin, a conservative independent candidate, the same percentage who say they intend to vote for Clinton. Trump is ahead in Utah by a narrow margin, at 32 percent. McMullin, who is Mormon, has polled highly in the state, where he’s seen as a viable alternative to the brashness and unpredictability of Trump.

Solid Republican:

Alabama (9), Alaska (3), Arkansas (6), Idaho (4), Indiana (11), Kansas (6), Kentucky (8), Louisiana (8), Mississippi (6), Missouri (10), Montana (3), Nebraska (4), North Dakota (3), Oklahoma (7), South Carolina (9), South Dakota (3), Tennessee (11), Texas (38), West Virginia (5), Wyoming (3) (157 total)

Leans Republican:Georgia (16), Iowa (6), (22 total)

 

Battleground states:

Arizona (11), Florida (29), Nevada (6), Ohio (18), Maine 2nd Congressional District (1) Nebraska 2nd Congressional District (1), North Carolina (15), Utah (6) (87 total)

Leans Democratic:

Colorado (9), Michigan (16), New Hampshire (4), Pennsylvania (20), Virginia (13), Wisconsin (10), (72 total)

Solid Democratic:

California (55), Connecticut (7), Delaware (3), DC (3), Hawaii (4), Illinois (20), Maine (3), Maryland (10), Massachusetts (11), New Jersey (14), New York (29), Oregon (7), Rhode Island (4), Vermont (3), Washington (12), Minnesota (10), New Mexico (5) (200 total)