- Two weeks from Election Day, polls in battleground states show the race remains tight.
- A newly released Washington Post-Schar School poll showed Harris leading 49%-48% in swing states.
- Harris and Trump aim to win in the Sun Belt, but there are challenges for both candidates.
With two weeks to go before Election Day, the contest between Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump remains incredibly close in seven swing states — with no clear poll leader in any state.
It’s a recurring theme in a race where both candidates are looking to galvanize voters in their respective coalitions while also winning the crossover support that could secure them victory.
Harris is aiming to increase her standing with black, Latino and young voters, while also appealing to independents and moderate Republicans to support her candidacy. Meanwhile, Trump continues to rally conservatives as he works to narrow the Democratic Party’s long-held advantage among black and Latino voters.
The economy remains the dominant issue in the race.
Harris has repeatedly spoken about her middle-class upbringing and how she would focus on cost of living and affordable housing issues as president. But Trump remains more trusted on economic issues, which has fueled his candidacy all year.
Here’s a look at how both candidates are currently faring in key battleground states as Election Day approaches.
General view
A newly released Washington Post-Schar School poll — which was conducted from Sept. 30 to Oct. 15 — showed Harris ahead of Trump by a margin among likely voters (49% to 48%) statewide. of movement. The states surveyed included Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin.
Among the states, Harris performed strongest against Trump in Georgia (51% to 47%) and Wisconsin (50% to 47%), while Trump had his largest advantages over Harris in Arizona (49% to 46%) and North Carolina (50% to 47%).
The remaining states are even tighter: Harris led by two points (49% to 47%) in Pennsylvania and Michigan, while the two candidates were tied (48% to 48%) in Nevada.
Despite the millions of dollars being pumped into each state, which for voters comes mostly in the form of advertising, the nature of the race hasn’t changed. While Harris held a slightly larger lead in September in some swing states and in national polls, her campaign has indicated they always expected a close race.
“We built an operation that can win close races in the field, expecting this,” Harris State Director Dan Kanninen recently told NBC News. “And really, one in seven has as good a chance as any to be the tipping point state.”
A “Blue Wall” battle.
For Harris, winning Michigan, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Nebraska’s 2nd Congressional District — along with the contingent of solidly Democratic states that are almost certain to support the vice president — offers her the clearest path to secured 270 electoral votes.
Former GOP congresswoman Liz Cheney has joined Harris on the campaign trail. Melina Mara/The Washington Post via Getty Images
In such a scenario, she would not need to win Arizona, Georgia, Nevada or North Carolina to secure victory. However, Harris is not following a single electoral strategy and is working hard to win states across the board.
But the fact remains that the “blue wall” states of Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin are states that Democrats really want to hold this year. The three states have voted for the same presidential candidate together since 1992.
Harris has in recent weeks campaigned with former Republican congresswoman Liz Cheney, whose resistance to Trump’s election claims and work on the Jan. 6, 2021 committee have endeared her to many independents and voters who remain on the fence about the former president. That’s why Cheney has already joined Harris on the campaign trail in Michigan and Wisconsin, where the pair have highlighted issues related to preserving democracy.
The vice president’s two- and three-point leads in Michigan and Wisconsin, respectively, are within the margin of error. And both campaigns know this race is likely to be decided by the slimmest of margins, with each reachable voter wielding tremendous power in a region where the economy and abortion rights will also play critical roles in the race.
Warning signs in the sun belt
Trump is looking to take back Arizona and Georgia, which he says he won in 2016 but lost to now-President Joe Biden in 2020. And he’s campaigning to keep North Carolina in his column and potentially become the first Republican presidential nominee. winning Nevada since George W. Bush won it in 2004.
Trump is focusing on economic issues as he works to bring Nevada back into the GOP fold. Brandon Bell/Getty Images
The former president has repeatedly sought to connect Harris with Biden, whose unpopularity is tied in part to the negative feelings many voters have about issues like inflation and housing affordability.
While Trump appeared to be riding a stretch of Sun Belt swing states based on polls in the months before Biden dropped out of the presidential race, Harris has reversed Biden’s slide and made the region’s battlegrounds a contest of really.
But warning signs remain for both candidates.
Even with Biden’s electoral gains in 2020, states like Arizona and Georgia have long been Republican strongholds, and a more conventional Republican like former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley likely wouldn’t fight Republicans. moderate as Trump has been throughout his campaign. . It’s one reason why the suburbs of Phoenix and Atlanta remain vote-rich battlegrounds; Harris has sought to challenge the type of moderate voters who have in the past supported Republican presidential candidates such as Bush and 2012 GOP presidential nominee Mitt Romney.
The latest Atlanta Journal-Constitution poll of the presidential race in Georgia showed Trump leading 47% to 43% among likely voters, with eight percent of respondents still undecided. It’s a positive sign for Trump, who has campaigned extensively across the state.
In the poll, Harris is winning the support of approximately 74% of black voters, a strong figure. But it’s far less than the 88% support Biden received from black voters in Georgia four years ago. And the poll also showed that nearly 18% of black voters remained undecided, in a state where black voters may make up roughly 30% of the electorate or more.
Also, despite Trump’s lead in the poll, he only had a two-point lead among voters age 65 and older, a group that has generally been strong for him. Harris’ competitiveness with Trump among older voters is a reminder that Georgia may have been a conservative stronghold in the past, but is now very competitive.