‘Could Make All The Difference’: MSNBC’s Kornacki On the ‘X Factor’ That Might Flip North Carolina For Harris

NBC News National Political Correspondent Steve Kornacki joined MSNBC on Wednesday to break down the latest shift in the presidential race between Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump – the tightening of the polls in North Carolina.

Anchor Jose Diaz-Balart introduced the segment, noting, “Vice President Harris and Donald Trump are running an extremely tight race in the key battleground state of North Carolina.”

“Democrats haven’t been able to win the state in a presidential election since 2008, but Vice President Harris has been making gains, with the Cook Political Report, shifting the state from lean Republican to toss up. NBC’s Steve Kornacki joins us now from the big board to help us all understand what this change is, Steve,” Diaz-Balart added before introducing Kornacki.

“Yeah, it’s interesting here because there was a lot of skepticism. I think Democrats have talked earlier about making North Carolina a battleground. Now, the other battleground states we always talk about all had voted for Joe Biden in 2020. This is one that went for Donald Trump. So I think that’s where some of the skepticism went, came from, because Trump had improved his polling performance nationally. So the sense was the action would be in those states that had been Democratic in 2020 that Trump was trying to flip. Here’s one that Democrats are trying to flip,” Kornacki began, adding:

And as you see that rating and the polling we’ve seen suggests this really is that close. So what’s going on here? Well, first of all, keep in mind the state did tighten in 2020. Back in 2016, Donald Trump won North Carolina by about 175,000 votes. That margin fell to 75,000, down 100,000 votes in 2020. See the result here.

Now, what goes into it? What are the ingredients in North Carolina that went into this close race and that would go into determining the outcome this fall? Well, it kind of mirrors what we talk about all the time nationally. One thing we see Democratic support is getting increasingly concentrated geographically into metropolitan areas, suburbs with high concentrations of college diplomas.

Kornacki then used the map to look at various counties in the state and their recent voting trends. He noted that metropolitan counties were growing in population and giving Democrats increasing margins of victory, but also noted that the GOP was winning by bigger margins in rural areas.

“Take a look at this. When we go back to 2008, Obama was competitive in a place like this. He didn’t win it, but he only lost this county by eight points. Then you go to 2020 and Democrats are losing it by more than 25 points. So in smaller counties, more sort of diffuse geographically there Republicans have made gains and it’s sort of almost canceled each other out there,” Kornacki explained before highlighting the potential “X factor” that could tip the state for Harris:

And I think if there’s sort of an X factor here this fall to keep an eye on in North Carolina, it’s going to be in this part of the state. You see a lot of blue there. These are, forget Raleigh there, but over here to the east these are smaller counties. These are rural counties. And they have large African-American populations. And just to give you an example here, this is what Democrats are hoping.

Maybe the Harris switch is going to help them with this – one of the largest black populations in the state. And just take a look. If you go back to 2008, when Obama won, Obama was able to hit 65% in a county like this. Biden was five points off that. That’s not huge, but there’s a bunch of counties like that. And if the Democrats can get back to that 65ish level there, that could make all the difference.

Watch the clip above via MSNBC.

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