CNN political analyst Bill Schneider. Photo: Third Way.

CNN senior political analyst Bill Schneider and Nate Silver, author of the New York Times “FiveThirtyEight” election forecasting blog, say Jews may be a decisive voting group in the upcoming presidential election, particularly in swing states such as Florida.

While the analysts agree that most American Jews will likely vote for President Barack Obama—78 percent did so in 2008—they said in interviews with the Boston Globe that Mitt Romney still has the chance of making a dent in Obama’s Jewish advantage in swing states.

Regarding the role of Israel in the election, they noted that American Jews are not necessarily single-issue voters and could instead vote based on the economy as their core issue.

Schneider believes that Jewish support for Obama in Florida could go down to around 60 percent before the election. A recent American Jewish Committee survey had Obama earning 69 percent of the Jewish vote in that state. According to Silver, Romney’s strong statements in support of Israel are not geared “to win the Jewish vote.”

“It’s actually more about winning over Christian conservatives,” he said.