Can Hillary Clinton win in Indiana?

INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) — Donald Trump is in a dead heat with Hillary Clinton here in Indiana. That’s according to internal poll numbers released by Democrats in this state.

It’s information that you should take with a grain of salt, which is usually the case with internal poll numbers from any campaign.

That said, Indiana Democrats believe that Hillary Clinton can win our state’s 11 electoral votes in November.

Donald Trump is the favorite here both because this is a Republican state and because he won the Indiana primary easily.

Hillary Clinton lost to Bernie Sanders in the May primary and has done little campaigning here.

Yet a poll conducted for the John Gregg for governor campaign shows the two tied at 44 percent in a survey that has a four percent margin of error.

Democrats are distributing it widely.

“If our effort to get people out to vote this year continues I think we’ll do very well,” said State Democratic Chairman John Zody, “and I think that means that Secretary Clinton can win Indiana.”

Yet there’s a new independent poll that showed Trump with a solid lead here. The Monmouth University Poll pegs the race in Indiana at 47 for Trump and 36 for Clinton.

“This thing will be like a roller coaster,” said Republican Mike McDaniel on the most recent episode of Indiana Week in Review. “It will go up and down a hundred times between now and Novermber 8th.”

McDaniel predicted a Trump win here. Democrat Ann DeLaney disagreed.

“And you wait and see,” she said. “He has made so many mistakes.”

But the selection of Governor Mike Pence as his running mate gives Trump an edge.

“Mike Pence may help him with Indiana,” said John Ketzenberger of the Indiana Fiscal Policy Institute. “And may help him preserve the vote that he might otherwise be giving away.”

Lesley Weidenbener of the Indianapolis Business Journal spelled out the bottom line.

“If Trump is losing in Indiana he’s losing everywhere,” she said.

In a year of surprises, a Clinton victory in Indiana would rank among the biggest. While Barack Obama won Indiana in 2008 it was the first Democratic win in a race for president here since 1964.

Anytime a Democrat wins Indiana it’s big news and also a sign of a bigger trend nationally.