Former President Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris find themselves in a neck-and-neck race across major swing states as their campaigns enter the final weeks before Election Day, according to a new CNN poll.
The Wednesday poll found Harris holding slight leads in Michigan and Wisconsin, while Trump holds a lead in Arizona. Meanwhile, Georgia, Nevada and Pennsylvania were toss-ups.
Harris holds a 50-44% lead over Trump in Wisconsin, and a 48-43% lead in Michigan. Trump has a 49-44% lead over Harris in Arizona. For the toss-up states, Georgia and Nevada had Harris at 48% to Trump’s 47%, and in Pennsylvania they were both tied at 47%.
CNN conducted its poll of likely voters from Aug. 23-29, after the conclusion of the Democratic National Convention in Chicago. The poll advertises a margin of error of 4.9%.
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Pollsters within the Trump campaign say they are happy with the former president’s current performance in national surveys. They point out that the former president has a history of outperforming public opinion polls.
“At this point in the race in 2016, Donald Trump was down to Hillary Clinton by an average of 5.9 points. At this point in the race in 2020, it was 6.9 to Joe Biden,” senior adviser Corey Lewandowski noted this weekend in an interview on “Fox News Sunday.”
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Nevertheless, Harris’ entry into the race has undeniably galvanized Democratic voters, who had desperately low levels of enthusiasm when President Biden was running for re-election.
Other polling shows more encouraging signs for Trump, however, with him outperforming his 2020 support among Hispanics.
In a Reuters/Ipsos poll conducted Aug. 21-28, Hispanic voters give Trump a 42% to 37% advantage over Harris regarding immigration policy. Among the broader electorate, 46% preferred Trump on immigration over the 36% who preferred Harris.
Hispanics, described as a diverse and fast-growing section of the electorate in the United States, prefer Harris’ approach over that of Trump by 18 points for health care and 23 points for climate change, according to the poll. On the economy, the survey found registered voters overall prefer Trump’s platform over that of Harris by 45% to 36%.
Meanwhile, Nate Silver, a prominent election forecaster, demoted Harris’ chances of victory on Tuesday. He cited Harris’ comparatively poor performance in Pennsylvania, the swing state that controls the most Electoral College votes.
Silver also noted that Harris didn’t benefit from a DNC bounce as much as election models had predicted.
