Harris vs. Trump: Who is leading in the presidential polls?

There are still less than two weeks until the vice president Kamala Harris goes head to head Donald Trumpas Americans cast their votes in the 2024 election.

Overall, the race has only gotten tighter; Some new polls show Trump with a narrow lead. The outcome of the election is everyone’s business.

In the seven swing states, none of the candidates has a lead of more than a few points. And in Texas and Florida, new polls show Trump leading by less than 10 points; But in a red state, a key Republican senator is threatened by a Democratic candidate.

Several voter registration deadlines have passed, but in some states it’s not too late to register to vote.

How will Harris and Trump fare in November?

The latest average of national polls compiled by FiveThirtyEight shows Harris with a 1.7-point lead over Trump. On average, Harris was slightly ahead of Trump, but that gap has narrowed significantly in the last month.

With just 12 days to go, the polls tell different stories; Some have Trump ahead by +3, others have Harris ahead by +4, or somewhere in between.

Here’s an analysis from the Independent’s data correspondent on why we should treat the polls with caution.

Shockingly, Trump is ahead by +2 points in the latest HarrisX poll for the first time since late July.

The overnight poll of 1,512 voters on Oct. 21 found that 51 percent of voters say they support Donald Trump, with 49 percent in favor of Kamala Harris when including voters leaning one way or the other.

Unlike previous polls that suggest Harris has a double-digit lead among younger generations, this poll suggests young voters are divided between both candidates.

Women and Americans from non-white backgrounds show the strongest support for Harris, while white and male voters make up Trump’s main base.

The gender gap between both candidates, with more men supporting Trump and women supporting Harris, does not appear to be as drastic in this poll.

Battleground states

A separate one Washington Post/Schar School mega poll (of 5,000 registered voters) has Harris just 1 point ahead of Trump.

According to the poll, conducted in the first two weeks of October, Harris has 49 percent of the vote and Trump has 48 percent.

This close race is also reflected in the swing states.

In the seven key states, none of the candidates are leading potential voters beyond the margin of error, even at this late stage of the race.

The two candidates are tied in Nevada, with Trump leading in Arizona and North Carolina and Harris leading in Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.

In battleground states, the poll found that 37 percent of registered voters will “definitely” support Harris and 37 percent will support Trump.

Meanwhile, 10 percent of swing state voters say they are “likely” to support Trump or Harris; This means that one in five of these votes has not yet been cast.

Meanwhile, an Emerson College poll found that nearly one in five voters (17 percent) say they have decided who they want to vote for in the last month.

These voters were more likely to choose to vote for Harris (60 percent) than for Trump (36 percent). Still, Harris’ national lead hasn’t increased, but rather decreased.

Key issues for swing voters

The economy is consistently at the top of the list of most important issues for voters this election.

The Washington Post A poll of swing-state voters also found that health care and threats to democracy topped the list of factors in choosing the next president.

Although Trump has pushed for an overhaul of Obamacare, with attempts unsuccessful during his presidency, he failed to present an alternative health care policy at the presidential debate in September.

Immigration is a crucial factor in this election and in exclusive polls for it The Independent shows that candidates’ immigration policies matter deeply to Latino voters.

Interestingly, climate change is low on the priority list for swing state voters this year.

Climate change was barely on the agenda in this election, with Harris and Walz largely silent on the issue and Trump-Vance actively pursuing climate denial.

With the recent devastating hurricanes, climate change has once again come to the fore; although Trump incorrectly stated in a speech on October 1 that “the planet has actually gotten a little cooler lately.”

Red states

New polls from Emerson College confirm Trump is leading in the red states of Texas and Florida.

Trump’s 7 or 8 point lead is weaker than predicted at the beginning of the year; Still, the poll shows that women support Trump (49 percent) more in Florida than Harris (47 percent), a success for the Republican campaign, which has lost votes from women across the country.

While it’s very likely that both states will remain in the red, the Senate race is a different question.

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In Texas, where former presidential candidate Ted Cruz is defending his Senate seat, Democrat Colin Allred is just one point behind, creating a virtual tiebreaker.

According to an internal memo discussed below, this gave Republicans cause for concern.

Independent voters in Texas prefer Allred (47 percent) to Cruz (42 percent). In the presidential race, they lean more toward Trump than Harris by a two-point margin.

In Florida, incumbent Republican Sen. Rick Scott is just four points ahead of Democrat Debbie Mucarsel-Powell, with 8 percent of voters still undecided.

GOP problems in the Senate race

According to an internal polling report, Republicans are now worried about the Senate elections received from Politico.

The memo shows that Republicans’ own polls show their candidates trailing Democrats in seven of nine key Senate seats, data largely confirmed by public polls. These seats are in Arizona, Maryland, Michigan, Nevada, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.

“We still have that a lot of work what we must do to maximize our gains in this crucial Senate election […] We have to too guard our flanks” writes the memo’s author, Steven Law, head of the Senate Leadership Fund.

The memo also warns that strongholds like Nebraska and Texas could be at risk from independent and Democratic candidates.

“We are putting everything we can into this fight – so there is no looking back with regret,” the memo ends.

Vance wins the vice presidential debate and increases his popularity

The debate between Ohio Senator Vance and Minnesota Governor Walz turned expectations on their head; Betting markets and preliminary polls are eyeing Walz as the presumed winner.

Not only did Vance “win” the debate, but his performance also appears to have done wonders for his public perception, which had been suffering for months.

Our pre-debate analysis showed Walz leading Trump, Vance and even Harris in popularity.

According to YouGov’s latest poll, the debate gave Vance a boost in popularity.

This puts Vance in a neutral position, while voters overall had a negative opinion of him of -11 percent before the debate.

Most interestingly, Vance improved his favorability with Democrats by an astounding +19 points. However, overall in this group it is still a net negative value of -52 percent.

Walz also received a more modest 3-point increase, reaching 15 percent approval in the YouGov poll.

Even though Walz’s performance didn’t win the debate, he is still the most popular candidate, and after the debate he even increased his favorability among independent voters.

However, he lost the approval of 7 percent of voters in his own party and still achieved a net positive position of 72 percent among Democrats.

Snap polls following the debate show that viewers were divided on both candidates, with Vance ahead by several points.

A CBS/YouGov poll found that 42 percent of viewers considered Vance the winner of the debate, compared to 41 percent for Walz.

However, it appeared that Walz was more in touch with average Americans and more likely to share voters’ vision for America.

Who will vote?

A YouGov/economist The poll has Harris leading by three points among registered voters at 47 percent and Trump at 44 percent. The poll shows Harris with a large 25-point lead among young voters aged 29 and younger.

However, according to the same survey, younger generations are also the least likely to vote: 13 percent of 18- to 29-year-olds surveyed say they “maybe” will vote, while 3 percent will not vote or are still unsure.

That’s 16 percent undecided or not voting, more than any other age group and higher than the average of 9 percent. Only 65 percent of the 18 to 29 year olds surveyed said they would definitely vote in November.

This compares to 77 percent of those aged 30 to 44, 85 percent of those aged 45 to 64 and 94 percent of those aged 65+.

Although the numbers may seem bleak and reflect a degree of reluctance among younger voters, the overall picture is significantly more engaged than in 2020.

The same YouGov/economist A poll at this point in the 2020 presidential election found that nearly a third of young people (27 percent) had not decided to vote in November, with 10 percent voting “maybe” and 17 percent “definitely/probably” not voting.