Before you go into any flights of fancy, understand that the Democrats will get a majority, but a reduced majority, of blacks, Mexicans, Central Americans, and Puerto Ricans. It’s their normal minority haul minus a decent amount. And there’s the story.

Democrat majorities with minorities could shrink from 90 percent for the blacks and 70 percent for the Latins to 70 percent for the blacks and 60 percent for the Latins. If Trump, as some polls show, has made that much of an inroad with blacks, Mexicans, Central Americans, and Puerto Ricans (Americans of Cuban and South American heritage vote Republican), then that could significantly hurt Democrats in battleground states and down ballot races.

Most battleground states have sizable minority populations. If Covid-19 had never happened, or had been managed better by the White House, those totals above could be plus another 10 percent for Trump. The historically low unemployment rates in those communities before Covid-19 could have spelled real danger for Democrats. Instead, there will be trouble for them, but not of the do or die variety in the states themselves.

A key battleground is Pennsylvania. There are many blacks voters in Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, a smaller number scattered throughout the state. Latins are all over the state, in especially big numbers in the eastern part of Pennsylvania. Trump, even after the first debate, has made strides here. Blacks and Latins like his kind of bravado and braggadocio, as they are socially conservative cultures, that effete Anglo-Saxon elites disdain. That’s why you generally see more white faces at Black Lives Matter rallies than dark ones. Most blacks know better than to lend their time and energy to what is essentially a white operation with black foremen. Gee, when did Democrats use that socioeconomic construct before?

Florida is another battleground, heavy with both blacks and Latins, where the minority vote will count. But this time most of the Latins are of the Cuban and South American type who vote Republican. So much so that the last time Nancy Pelosi tried to get a meal in the Cuban Heartland of Little Havana, she was harrased within an inch of her non-existent dignity by a group of obscenity screaming Cubans who chased her into the back door of a restaurant and waited for her to return. Pelosi had to sneak out another way. Good times.

Florida blacks will stay generally loyal to the Democrats, as the consistent racial tension between blacks and Latins ensures blacks will vote whichever way Cubans don’t.

There are other battleground states with decent sized minority voter totals. Georgia, North Carolina, and Michigan for three. It’s Biden playing minority defense there and Trump the pirate trying to wrest the treasure away. If he can do it, it could give him a general 5-7 percent bump in battleground states. Enough, with a sharp debate performance on Thursday and no noticeable screw ups, to put him over the top in the Electoral College before the courts get involved.