Biden to beam into Florida, the largest 2020 battleground

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Biden takes lead over Trump in national poll

Wall Street Journal associate editor John Bussey breaks down the numbers and what they could mean for the presidential election.

Joe Biden is heading out on the campaign trail – virtually.

The former vice president will hold two virtual campaign events on Thursday in Florida, the largest of the roughly dozen general election battleground states.

Biden’s campaign announced on Tuesday that the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee will hold a virtual roundtable on Thursday afternoon in Jacksonville with a pair of Democrats: Rep. Al Lawson and Florida Senate Minority Leader Audrey Gibson. That will be followed a few hours later with a virtual rally in Tampa.

FOX NEWS POLL SHOWS BIDEN WITH SLIGHT EDGE IN FLORIDA

Deputy national press secretary Matt Hill tweeted that Biden’s “getting back on the campaign trail in key states — VIRTUALLY!”

Due to social distancing restrictions to prevent the spread of the coronavirus pandemic, traditional in-person campaigning -- such are rallies, town halls, and fundraisers -- are currently out of the picture.

The events appear to be Biden’s first -- since becoming the all but certain nominee and moving to a general election battle against President Trump -- to specifically target a swing state.

For a quarter-century, Florida’s been the nation’s most populous general election battleground state. Barack Obama captured the state by razor-thin margins in 2008 and 2012, with Trump narrowly winning the state’s 29 electoral votes four years ago.

General election polls from Fox News and Quinnipiac University that were conducted in Florida in mid-April showed Biden with a slight single-digit edge over President Trump.

OBAMA CAMPAIGN VETERANS URGE BIDEN TO STEP UP DIGITAL GAME

The announcement by the Biden campaign came a day after two of the political masterminds behind Barack Obama’s historic 2008 presidential election victory urged Biden to beef up his digital game and be more aggressive in taking the fight to Trump amid the unique 2020 political circumstances transformed by the coronavirus pandemic.

David Axelrod – who was the senior strategist for Obama’s 2008 campaign and 2012 reelection – and 2008 campaign manager David Plouffe in an opinion piece in the New York Times also urged the candidate to break out of the “Biden in the basement” setting from his TV studio in the basement of his Delaware home.