Biden campaign chair: Florida not a battleground but 'bullish' on North Carolina

WASHINGTON ― The chair of President Joe Biden's reelection campaign said she does not consider Florida a battleground state in the 2024 election but is "bullish" on winning a different state that Donald Trump carried the last election − North Carolina.

The Biden campaign aggressively talked up Florida being in play for Biden after the state's Supreme Court in March upheld Florida's strict abortion laws and also cleared the way for a referendum guaranteeing the right to an abortion to go before Florida voters on the November ballot.

But in an interview with Puck News published Monday, Jen O'Malley Dillon, the campaign's chair, said, "No," when asked directly whether she sees Florida as a battleground state.

Florida, with 30 electoral votes up for grabs, last voted Democratic in a presidential election in 2012, when President Barack Obama edged Republican Mitt Romney by less than 1 percentage point. It's shifted red in the two elections since. Trump, the former president, carried Florida over Hillary Clinton 48.6%-47.4% in 2016, and he expanded the margin of victory to 3.3 percentage points over Biden in 2020.

In a statement to USA TODAY, the Biden campaign insisted the president can carry Florida in November and touted recent campaign investments in the state − including television ads running this week − even if the Sunshine State isn't among top battlegrounds.

The Biden campaign, which has 28 staffers working in Florida after making an additional 20 hires this month, will have 13 offices across Florida by the end of the week. Biden visited Tampa, Fla. in April to discuss access to abortion and Vice President Kamala Harris gave remarks in Jacksonville, Fla. in May.

“Florida is in play for President Biden and Democrats up and down the ballot," Dan Kanninen, the Biden campaign's battleground states director, said in a statement. "The president has a strong story to tell on the issues that matter most to Floridians, which is why our campaign continues to scale up our presence and investments into the state.”

More: Is Florida now in play for Biden? 3 takeaways for 2024 from court's abortion rulings

Nikki Fried, chairwoman of the Florida Democratic Party, echoed that sentiment in a statement: "Florida Democrats are doing the real work required to take back Florida," she said, citing the party's organizational efforts in the state.

"We’re not naïve about the challenges ahead, but we’re building the foundation of Democratic success, not just for this cycle, but for the years and decades to come. Don’t count Florida out," she said.

The most heavily contested states of the 2024 campaign are six swing states that Biden won in 2020: the so-called "Blue wall" states of Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin, as well as Georgia, Arizona and Nevada.

The Biden campaign has circled North Carolina, which Biden lost by 1.3 percentage points to Trump in 2020, as a prime possible pick-up − and invested heavily there − while the Trump campaign has talked about flipping two Biden states to expand the map: Virginia and Minnesota.

"We have multiple paths to victory," O'Malley Dillon told Puck News, referring to the 270 electoral votes to secure victory, later emphasizing the Tar Heel State in her interview. "I am bullish on North Carolina, and I don’t f--- around in saying that, because I was bullish on Arizona (four years ago) and that’s because we looked at it very closely."

More: The next Georgia? Biden campaign targets North Carolina to reshape 2024 electoral map

Biden flipped historically red Arizona into the Democratic column in 2020, becoming the first Democrat to win the state since Bill Clinton in 1996.

Why so bullish on North Carolina?

North Carolina, which last voted Democratic in 2008 and has 16 electoral votes, is attractive for Biden and Democrats for several reasons.

Biden 2020 loss to Trump in North Carolina was the smallest margin of all the states he lost. And North Carolina's booming suburbs with college-educated voters around Charlotte and Raleigh's "Research Triangle," combined with its sizable Black population, is a similar formula that put Georgia, once a reliably red state, in play for Democrats.

"We lost it by just 1.3 percentage points in 2020 and we did not play there, number one. Number two, obviously, there’s some element of demographics, but I don’t believe that’s enough," O'Malley said of North Carolina.

O'Malley Dillon, who was campaign manager during Biden's 2020 run, above all pointed to "extreme laws" that have passed the Republican-controlled North Carolina, including new abortion restrictions, and a "beyond-extreme candidate running for governor," referring to Mark Robinson, North Carolina's Republican nominee for governor.

Democrats believe the state's new abortion law, which bans most abortions after 12 weeks of pregnancy, will help energize their base. And they believe Biden can benefit from the candidacy of Robinson, a firebrand Republican lieutenant governor with a trail of controversial statements. Robinson is running against Josh Stein, North Carolina's Democratic attorney general, in the race to replace outgoing Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper.

"If you put all those pieces together … we really see that (North Carolina) is in play," O'Malley Dillon said.

Trump currently leads Biden in North Carolina by 5.8 percentage points, according to the Real Clear Politics average of polls. Trump leads Biden in Florida by 7.6 percentage points, according to polling averages.

Reach Joey Garrison on X @joeygarrison.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Biden campaign chair 'bullish' on North Carolina, less on Florida