Presidential Polls Florida: Romney Keeps Advantage Over Obama
The 2012 presidential race is reaching its final days, and as the campaign gets down to the wire, the spotlight rests most intensely on a group of key swing states that could potentially decide the outcome of the entire election.
According to The Huffington Post's Electoral College map projection, which is based on an analysis of various nationwide and state by state polling data, the five states still in the toss up pile as of Wednesday are Colorado, Florida, New Hampshire, Ohio and Virginia.
Those states represent a total of 73 electoral votes — a hefty sum considering each candidate needs a total of 270 electoral votes to successfully win the election. Those votes would be incredibly valuable to either candidate, based on The Huffington Post's current projection, which has President Barack Obama at 259 electoral votes and Mitt Romney at 206 votes.
By far the most valuable state that is still too close to call is Florida, which offers a whopping 29 electoral votes to whichever candidates carries the state on Nov. 6.
According to The Huffington Post's data analysis, the current advantage in the Sunshine State goes to Romney. The GOP nominee is currently polling at 49 percent in Florida, while Obama lags behind by two percentage points at 47 percent.
Data from national polling firm Rasmussen supports those standings.
That poll also has Romney in the lead with support from 50 percent of registered voters surveyed in Florida, while Obama has support from 48 percent. Of the remaining respondents included in the poll, 1 percent were still undecided about how they will cast their ballots on Nov. 6.
Florida has been one of the tightest races of this year's election, with the candidates staying in close proximity of one another in the polls for weeks.
"Last week, Romney held his biggest lead — 51 percent to 46 percent — of the year so far in Florida," the Rasmussen report said. "The week before, Romney held a slightly narrower 51 percent to 47 percent advantage. Prior to that time, the candidates have been within two points of each other in Florida in every survey since April."
