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These are the winners of the latest presidential polls between Trump and Harris


These are the winners of the latest presidential polls between Trump and Harris

Top line

Former President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris are virtually neck and neck in the latest NPR/PBS News/Marist poll, which shows Harris with a one-percent lead as her surge in the polls appears to be fading ahead of the first Harris-Trump debate.

Key data

Harris leads Trump 49 percent to 48 percent in the Sept. 3-5 NPR/PBS/Marist poll of registered voters. That’s a tighter race than when Harris was three points ahead of Trump in August. But she still leads him by three points among those who say they definitely plan to vote, 51 percent to 48 percent.

In a Times/Siena poll conducted Sept. 3-6, Trump led Harris among likely voters by 48 percent to 47 percent, the same margin as the former president’s one-point lead six weeks ago. It’s one of Trump’s first major polling leads since Fox News put him ahead 50 percent to 49 percent in early August (the Times/Siena poll had a margin of error of 2.8 percentage points).

In an Emerson College poll of likely voters from September 3-4, Harris was ahead by two percentage points (47% to 49%), down slightly from her four-point lead in Emerson’s August poll. In an Economist/YouGov poll from September 1-3, Harris was ahead of Trump by two percentage points, consistent with the previous week’s results (she was ahead of Trump by three percentage points in an August 17-20 poll, and two percentage points ahead of Trump in an Economist/YouGov poll from August 11-13).

According to an Ipsos/ABC News poll conducted August 23-27, Harris leads 50 percent to 46 percent among registered voters and 52 percent to 46 percent among likely voters. That lead is virtually unchanged from Harris’s lead of four percentage points among registered voters and five percentage points among likely voters two weeks earlier (margin of error two percentage points).

According to an August 25-29 Outward Intelligence poll of 2,191 likely voters, the vice president was ahead by more than five percentage points in both two-point (52.6% to 47.4%) and five-point comparisons with third-party candidates (49.5% to 44%).

In a Wall Street Journal poll released on August 29, Harris led Trump 47% to 45% when third-party candidates were included, and 48% to 47% head-to-head. This was the first time Trump has trailed in a Journal poll in over a year – a reversal from Trump’s head-to-head lead of 49% to 47% a month ago (the poll surveyed registered voters August 24-28, with a margin of error of 2.5 points).

Harris had a 49-47 percent lead in Quinnipiac’s first poll of likely voters, within the poll’s 2.4 percentage point margin of error, while Trump and Harris tied 45-45 percent among independents (the poll – conducted Aug. 23-27 – allowed respondents to choose third-party candidates, and in a neck-and-neck race, Harris’ lead shrank to 49-48 percent).

In a Suffolk/USA Today poll conducted Aug. 25-28, the vice president led Trump among likely voters by five percentage points — 48% to 43%. That’s a huge shift from Trump’s 41% to 38% lead over President Joe Biden, which came shortly after Biden’s poor performance at the June debate (the latest poll’s margin of error is 3.1 points).

An Ipsos/Reuters poll of registered voters released on August 29 showed Harris ahead 45 percent to 41 percent, exceeding the poll’s two-point margin of error and extending Harris’s one-point lead in late July (another Ipsos poll without Reuters in early August showed Harris ahead by five points).

A handful of other polls show Harris’ lead has remained virtually unchanged since the Democratic convention, with a Yahoo News/YouGov poll putting her just one percentage point ahead of Trump (for comparison, the lead was tied shortly after the Republican convention when Biden was still in the race).

In a Morning Consult poll of registered voters conducted Aug. 23-25, Harris leads Trump by a wider margin — 48% to 44%. Those results mirror the group’s Aug. 16-18 poll, which it conducted ahead of the Democratic National Convention that concluded last week in Chicago.

Polls have broadly shown that Democratic approval ratings have shifted since Harris entered the race in July: In the run-up to the convention vote, Harris had a 51 percent to 48 percent lead among likely voters, according to CBS and YouGov.

Large number

1.1 That’s how many points Harris is ahead of Trump, according to the latest RealClearPolitics poll average. The weighted average from FiveThirtyEight shows Harris ahead by 2.8 points.

Contra

Trump led Harris in at least eight other polls after Biden dropped out of the race, but most show Harris cutting into Trump’s lead and her approval ratings rising slightly since announcing her candidacy. In a HarrisX/Forbes online poll released on June 26, Trump was two percentage points ahead of Harris (47% to 45%).

Surprising fact

According to a Monmouth University poll released on August 14, enthusiasm among Democrats has nearly doubled since Harris entered the race, from 46 percent in June to 85 percent today. Among Republicans, however, enthusiasm has stagnated at 71 percent.

How does Harris fare against Trump in the swing states?

Harris leads Trump by two percentage points overall in the seven swing states likely to decide the election, according to a Bloomberg/Morning Consult poll conducted Aug. 23-27: Michigan, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Nevada, Arizona, North Carolina and Georgia. Harris leads Trump in six of the seven states and is tied in Arizona.

Contra

Trump campaign pollster Tony Fabrizio predicted a “short-term” boost in the polls for Harris as her entry into the race is expected to inject new momentum into the Democrats. In a memo released shortly after the release of a Reuters/Ipsos poll, he referred to the expected boost as a “Harris honeymoon.”

Important background

Biden dropped out of the race on July 21 after weeks of resisting calls from within his own party to abandon his re-election campaign following his disastrous performance at the June 27 debate. Biden immediately endorsed Harris, and she announced plans to seek the nomination. The party has quickly rallied around her, with 99% of Democratic delegates voting for her official nomination in a virtual roll call before the convention. Harris nominated Minnesota Governor Tim Walz as her running mate, weeks after Trump announced Ohio Senator JD Vance as his running mate at the start of the Republican National Convention on July 18. Democrats held their convention in Chicago from August 19 to 22.

More information

Trump’s lead over Biden and Harris has jumped after the RNC, according to a HarrisX/Forbes poll (Forbes)

This is how Kamala Harris fares in polls against Trump – while Biden drops out and supports Harris (Forbes)

Harris’ lead over Trump remains unchanged after DNC, first poll shows (Forbes)

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