Trump is better in the polls now than he was against Clinton or Biden
WASHINGTON — If the polls are any guide — and there are many questions about them — Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump is better off now than he was at this point in 2020 and his winning White House campaign in 2016.
Yes, Trump is trailing Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris in most polls. But the biggest caveat is that he is trailing the current vice president by a smaller margin than he faced in his first general election — both saw him score higher with actual voters than those who responded to polls.
To be sure, Republicans are counting on what some pollsters have called the "hidden Trump vote," though pollsters also say there's no certainty that this group still exists. During a rally Wednesday in Reading, Pennsylvania, Trump claimed to have a poll showing him ahead by three percentage points in the Keystone State, "which probably means ten percentage points."
The Trump campaign, which lost the 2016 popular vote to Democrat Hillary Clinton by just over two percentage points but won enough states to win the Electoral College, also follows the theory that the closer the national polls are in 2024, the better his chances of winning more electoral votes.
Throughout this cycle, pollsters have largely changed their methodologies to account for Trump's "hidden" voters — people who plan to vote for him but don't want to say so publicly or other supporters who are hard to find through traditional polling methods like phone calls. Different groups of voters are also showing more signs of increased turnout due to new issues, from anti-abortion laws to the rising cost of living.
"There are fundamentals that are in question that no one can answer until Election Day," said pollster Frank Luntz.
National polls are also less important than individual state polls, which are largely tied. Most polls are within the margin of error in the seven key swing states: Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Georgia, Arizona, Nevada, and North Carolina.
"The only thing you can say for sure is that all seven swing states are close," said Republican pollster Whit Ayers. "They're all really tied."
As of Friday, the Real Clear Politics national average of recent polls gave Harris a 1.8-point lead over Trump.
Four years ago, Democratic nominee Joe Biden was 10.3 percentage points ahead of then-President Trump in the RCP national average; Biden won the popular vote and electoral votes by a much smaller margin. 2016 Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton led the national RCP average by 6%.
Both elections were very close.
In 2016, Clinton won the popular vote over Trump 48.2% to 46.1% (the rest of the vote was split between third-party candidates, notably Libertarian Party nominee Gary Johnson and Green Party nominee Jill Stein). However, Trump won the Electoral College by a margin of 304–227 (plus seven "faithless electors" who voted for other candidates).
U.S. President-elect Donald Trump (center) kisses his wife, Melania, as he is greeted by former presidents and their wives upon his arrival on January 20, 2017, at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C. for his inauguration. (L to R) President Jimmy Carter and his wife Rosalynn, President Bill Clinton and his wife, former Secretary of State and presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, U.S. First Lady Michelle Obama, and Dr. Jill Biden, wife of U.S. Vice President Joe Biden.
U.S. President-elect Donald Trump (C) kisses his wife, Melania, as he is greeted by former presidents and their spouses upon his arrival on January 20, 2017, at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, DC, for his inauguration. (L to R) President Jimmy Carter and his wife Rosalynn, President Bill Clinton and his wife, former Secretary of State and presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, US First Lady Michelle Obama, and Dr. Jill Biden, wife of U.S. Vice President Joe Biden.
Four years later, Biden won the popular vote over Trump by a larger margin, 51.3% to 46.9%. He also won the Electoral College votes by 306 to 232.
Simon Rosenberg, a Democratic strategist who studies the data, said pollsters have corrected previous methodological errors. He also noted that Republican candidates for the U.S. House of Representatives and Senate have not performed well in the 2022 midterm elections and that Trump has performed poorly in the polls in this year's Republican presidential primaries.
"The election is close," Rosenberg said. "Everything is within the margin of error … but we're likely to win because we have a significant financial and ground advantage."
Ultimately, no one knows whether this election will be more like 2016 or 2020 — or even something entirely different.
"I think it's somewhere in between," Luntz said. "That's why it's so close to call." Harris and the Democrats will likely have about the same amount of support.
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