election:

This chart shows why the Obama Campaign says it will win Ohio.

On Friday, Obama’s field director released numbers showing that Obama now has a decisive lead among the ballots that have already been cast in Ohio:

About 24% of projected Ohio votes have already been cast.

Ohioans who live in counties that Obama won in 2008 have already cast 866,798 ballots, compared with just 448,635 votes cast from Republican counties.

[So now] Romney needs to win at least 53% of the remaining votes to catch up.

Republicans counter with two points:

1) Just because a county went for Obama last time, that doesn’t mean the majority of its voters still back him today;

2) Romney’s supporters tend to turn out more on Election Day than during the early vote.

The first point is logical, but undermined by polls of people who already voted in Ohio, which show Obama leading among those voters by 20 to 30 points. 

The second point is the question that could decide the entire election — can Romney mobilize a surge on Election Day to come back in Ohio? Because right now, all indications suggest that he is behind.

By Ari Melber

The Obama campaign has been pushing early voting as the cornerstone of their get-out-the-vote effort for months and months, and with good reason — in a state with a history of staggering lines and wait times to vote on Election Day, especially in lower-income and black neighborhoods, getting your voters squared away early comes at a premium.