Can Kamala Harris beat Donald Trump? Latest poll updates

Here’s what the latest polls say about the 2024 presidential election, from The Independent’s data correspondent

vIn less than 34 days, Vice President Kamala Harris will go head-to-head with Donald Trump as Americans cast their votes in the 2024 election.

Following last night’s vice presidential debate, viewers were not won over by either candidate’s performance – though JD Vance exceeded expectations, scraping ahead of Tim Walz.

Pre-debate, the polls showed that Vance’s popularity has hit record lows, while Walz was more popular than all current VP and presidential candidates; but last night’s face-off may well bolster Vance’s poor public perception.

Just 1 percent of voters have said the debate changed their mind about how they will vote. So how will Harris and Trump fare in November?

Harris has a 2.7-point lead over Trump in the latest average of national polls, collated by FiveThirtyEight. On average, Harris has been marginally ahead of Trump in national polls for several weeks.

Last night’s debate between Ohio senator Vance and Minnesota Governor Walz turned expectations on its head; with betting markets and pre-polls eyeing Walz as the presumed winner.

Yet snap polls following the debate show that viewers were split on both candidates; and in fact, Vance came out a few points ahead.

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

However, Walz did emerge as more in touch with the average American, and more likely to share voters’ vision for America.

For the full post-debate polling analysis, click here.

While exclusive polling for The Independent suggested that the VP debate could make a mark on the presidential race, just 1 percent of last night’s viewers said that their voting choices had changed.

Favorability

Our analysis before the debate found that Walz leads Trump, Vance, and even Harris in terms of favorability.

Walz has an overall +3.7 favorability score, according to an average of polls from FiveThirtyEight.

This has decreased since he was chosen as VP in August, but his favorability has remained net positive overall.

Meanwhile, Vance has an average -11 favorability score, which has continued to plummet from -3.3 when he was first selected in July.

It is certainly possible that the debate could provide a boost to Vance’s otherwise poor public perception.

While Trump also has a negative -9.6 favorability score, Harris has broken through to a positive score for the first time in over three years, according to FiveThirtyEight averages.

Her favorability is currently at just +1.1, breaking even from mid-September.

September’s debate may have been Harris’s chance to turn around her public perception and ultimately foster a more favorable opinion of herself and her campaign.

Key issues for voters

The most important issue impacting how people will vote in this election continues to be the economy, regardless of political affiliation.

A poll from Redfield & Wilton Strategies, of 2,500 US adults up to September 26, shows that abortion is considered the second most important issue, for 37 percent of voters, followed by immigration at 34 percent.

For Trump voters, however, these priorities are flipped.

Over half (57 percent) of Trump voters view immigration as one of the biggest issues, in the midst of border security tensions and recent debunked claims from Trump and Republicans about Haitian migrants.

Interestingly, healthcare and abortion are tied as the next most important issues for Trump voters – at 23 percent each.

Though Trump has advocated for overhauling Obamacare, with unsuccessful attempts during his presidency, he was unable to outline an alternative healthcare policy at the September presidential debate.

Meanwhile, abortion is front and center for Harris voters (55 percent); with Harris herself critical of abortion bans, following the overturning of Roe v Wade.

Healthcare is also a top priority for Harris voters (40 percent), followed by housing (23 percent).

Battleground states

Recent polls from the swing states by Bloomberg/Morning Consult have Harris ahead by +3 points on average, ranging from neck-and-neck with Trump to a +7 point lead.

The poll of over 6,000 registered voters in the swing states was conducted from September 19-25, with margins of error ranging from 1 to 4 percent in each state.

In Pennsylvania, which hosted the first Harris-Trump presidential debate, Harris has seen her lead increase from +4 points to +5 points since August.

The state had previously been leaning towards Trump when President Joe Biden was on the Democratic ticket.

In Nevada, Harris has the strongest 7-point lead over Trump, with 52 percent of the vote to 45 percent.

In Georgia, the two candidates are tied at 49 percent each, while Harris’s 5-point lead in Wisconsin has shrunk to 3 points ahead of Trump.

Harris is also 3 points ahead in Michigan and Arizona, and 2 points ahead in North Carolina.

While the economy remains the top issue for swing state voters, the perceived “competency gap” is shrinking: 45 percent of swing state voters think Harris can better handle the economy, slightly behind Trump at 49 percent.

It is worth noting that separate New York Times polls earlier this month showed a lead for Trump in Arizona, North Carolina, and Georgia. This variation indicates that the swing states are still open to change before November.

Independents

A separate Morning Consult poll, of 11,000 likely voters nationwide from September 20-22, shows Harris with a 5-point lead overall.

The tracker poll has Harris leading among the elusive independent voters – by +4 points overall – at 46 percent to Trump’s 42 percent.

However, this margin is unchanged from the same poll in mid-August, when Harris had 42 percent of the independent vote and Trump had 38 percent (a 4-point lead).

What has changed is that the number of independent voters who are undecided, or voting for a third candidate, has dropped from one in five (20 percent) to one in 10 (12 percent).

It is important to note that these undecided voters are independents who are likely to vote. Meaning that once they make their choice, this is likely to swing the odds in either candidate’s favor.

Interestingly, 6 percent of independents are still planning to vote for a third-party candidate, even now that Robert F Kennedy Jr has endorsed Trump.

With Cornel West, Jill Stein, and Chase Oliver still in play, it remains to be seen how many independent votes they will attract on election day.

Who will vote?

A YouGov/Economist poll has Harris with a three-point lead among registered voters, at 47 percent and Trump at 44 percent. The poll shows a wide 25-point margin for Harris among young voters, aged 29 and under.

However, according to the same poll, the younger generations are also the least committed to voting, with 13 percent of the 18-29-year-olds surveyed saying they will “maybe” vote, while 3 percent will not vote or are still unsure.

This amounts to 16 percent who are on the fence or not voting, higher than any other age group, and higher than the average of 9 percent. Just 65 percent of the 18 to 29-year-olds polled said they would definitely vote in November.

This is in comparison to 77 percent of 30 to 44-year-olds, 85 percent of 45 to 64-year-olds, and 94 percent of the 65+ age group.

Though the numbers may seem dismal, and do represent a degree of hesitancy among younger voters, the overall picture is significantly more engaged than in 2020.

The same YouGov/Economist poll at this stage in the 2020 presidential election showed that nearly a third of young people (27 percent) were not committed to voting in November, with 10 percent “maybe” voting and 17 percent “definitely/probably” not voting.

Arizona: key issues

In Arizona – a historically Republican state that has 11 electoral college votes and flipped for Biden in 2020 – polls have shown inconsistent leads for both Harris and Trump.

The Trump campaign has made frequent stops in the state over the summer.

In a state that borders Mexico, some one in five (19 percent) of Arizona voters say that immigration is the most important issue affecting their vote, according to the same poll.

This is second to the economy, which is the number one issue impacting voters statewide and nationwide.

The majority (51 percent) of Arizona voters believe that Trump is better equipped to handle the top issues, which has flipped since August when Harris was slightly more trusted.

This indicates that, despite the overall enthusiasm for Harris’s debate performance, Arizona voters may favor Trump and his approach to key issues. As a generally Republican state, this is unsurprising.

Demographics

A separate poll from The New York Times and Siena College in September has Trump and Harris in a national deadlock, each at 47 percent of the vote among likely voters.

This is a slight shift from the same poll in early September, which had Trump at +2 points ahead of Harris in a surprise result.

The new poll, taken after the September debate and with 2,437 likely voters, had 67 percent of respondents saying that Harris performed well in the debate, compared to 40 percent who thought the same about Trump.

Harris retains a strong lead among women (12 points ahead), while Trump enjoys a 14-point lead among men.

In particular, Harris has improved her vote share among under-34s following the debate, with a 7 percent increase to 58 percent of the vote and a 21-point lead over Trump.

Meanwhile, her lead within the 30-44 age bracket has shrunk, with Trump just 4 points behind; though Trump’s margin in the 45-64 age bracket has also decreased to just 2 points.

Make sense of the US election with The Independent’s experts in our exclusive virtual event ‘Harris vs. Trump: who will make history?’ Reserve your space here.

Among white, college-educated voters, the early September poll showed a 12-point preference for Harris. Following the debate, this group has seen the most substantial jump, with a 25-point lead for Harris at 61 percent of the vote.

Interestingly, a pre-debate poll from The New York Times showed that nearly a third of voters (28 percent) felt they needed to learn more about Harris, compared to 9 percent who would say the same about Trump.

But the debate was helpful for Harris in that regard, as half of voters (50 percent) feel that they “learned a lot” about her during the debate, with just a third saying the same about Trump, according to The New York Times poll.

CNN’s snap poll following the first Trump-Harris debate showed that Harris managed to turn the tide with some voters. 

In the wake of the debate, more voters now believe Harris better understands the issues of people like them (44 percent) compared to Trump (40 percent). Before the debate, the opposite was true.

Make sense of the US election with The Independent’s experts in our exclusive virtual event ‘Harris vs. Trump: who will make history?’ Reserve your space here.