By Zachary Gorchow
Executive Editor and Publisher
Posted: November 1, 2016 2:34 PM

Democrat Hillary Clinton remains the favorite to carry Michigan in the presidential race, but the uptick Republican Donald Trump is seeing nationally and in Michigan signals that his campaign has recovered from the “Access Hollywood” video that hinted at a possible collapse and potential Democratic wave.

Nationally, this is now the sixth time this year that Mr. Trump has rebounded from a steep fall in the RealClearPolitics average of polls. The cycle goes like this. Mr. Trump commits a major gaffe (like the attack on the judge hearing the case against Trump University or the Khan family) or gets hit with a devastating revelation (like the “Access Hollywood” video where he talks about grabbing women “by the p---y”) and his support falls, usually because the segment of Republicans that is squeamish about him pulls its support.

But each time that has occurred, Ms. Clinton then falters, whether from the repeated problems with her use of a private email server while she was secretary of state, the drumbeat of embarrassing hacked emails sent and received by her campaign chair John Podesta that Wikileaks is releasing or problematic news like the rate increases in insurance plans under the health insurance exchange. Eventually, many of those wayward Republicans start coming home and the race tightens.

The bulk of the polls suggest the race is in another tightening phase and the problem or Ms. Clinton and the Democrats is time is running out for another Trump fiasco to recalibrate the race again.

That doesn’t mean Ms. Clinton will lose. She’s still the favorite with her advantage in the Electoral College though Democratic dreams from two weeks ago of a runaway where she wins north of 350 electoral votes likely are out of reach now. And in Michigan, along those same lines, Democratic dreams of Ms. Clinton carrying the state by more than 10 points also look like a long-shot.

There isn’t much recent polling data to go by in Michigan. The last poll that used live telephone interviews (and therefore included calls to cell phones) was done by EPIC/MRA for the Detroit Free Press and several television stations between October 22-25 and showed Ms. Clinton ahead 41 percent to 34 percent, as opposed to the 43-32 lead Ms. Clinton enjoyed in the wake of the first debate and the “Access Hollywood” video.

But Michigan’s trend lines, while better for Ms. Clinton than she runs nationally, have followed the national pattern, so it’s reasonable to conclude the race has tightened up here, though to be clear, a five- to seven-point lead for Ms. Clinton is still a solid lead. The final RealClearPolitics average in 2012 had President Barack Obama up four points on Republican Mitt Romney, and Mr. Obama won by 9.5 percentage points, for example.

There’s considerable uncertainty given the uniqueness of this presidential election about what effect the result between Ms. Clinton and Mr. Trump in Michigan will have down the ballot. One thing that Democrats had hoped for and Republicans dreaded appears unlikely compared to three weeks ago: Mr. Trump’s campaign is not in a state of collapse that would dispirit Republican voters and prompt them to stay home in the kind of mass numbers that would severely damage Republicans running in competitive U.S. House and Michigan House races.

That puts the dynamic of the race back to where it was before the “Access Hollywood” video, a five-ish point lead for Ms. Clinton in the state, with significant geographical variances (Ms. Clinton strong in Wayne and Oakland counties as well as counties with a public university or significant urban center and Mr. Trump strong in Macomb County, northern Michigan and other areas that are mostly white and with a relatively lower percentage of voters with a bachelor’s degree.

Of the most critical Michigan House races, seven have Clinton-friendly demographics, seven have Trump-friendly demographics and one is a wash.

A Trump collapse would have jeopardized Republicans in the Trump-friendly areas with his advantage lessened. Now he should still be a plus in these areas. A collapse also would have enhanced the Democrats’ chances of seizing some GOP-leaning seats in Clinton territory. She’ll still help there, but the height of the wave is in doubt.

There’s something else that comes back into play with Mr. Trump having stabilized: a return to the discussion in September about candidate vs. candidate dynamics having greater importance and more ticket-splitting than usual as voters isolate the presidential race from the rest of the ticket given the widespread unpopularity of both nominees.

That leaves these critical questions for Michigan House candidates:

• Do new voters motivated to participate by Mr. Trump vote the rest of the ballot after the presidential race, and if they do, do they go straight Republican or make candidate-by-candidate decisions?

• Do Republican voters with bachelor’s degrees who eschew Mr. Trump and instead skip the presidential race or vote for another candidate return to their Republican roots for the rest of the ballot?

The answers to those questions will go a long way to answering which party controls the House in the 2017-18 term.