Harris is doing fine. She's sitting on 49% of the vote in RCP's moving average atm and that's including undecided voters, which obviously won't be a factor once the votes are tallied. Gauging which way independents are leaning is the key to grasping which way most of the few remaining undecided voters will likely go in the end because they're definitely concentrated in that group and right now it looks about even with them or slightly Harris-leaning. Thus we reach the conclusion that if the election were tomorrow, Harris's vote share would likely exceed 50%, landing in territory comparable to Biden's 51.3% of the vote four years ago; an impressive feat considering how deeply unpopular Biden's presidency has been. (Seriously, Biden's currently about 14 points underwater in job approval. His personal favorability numbers are also worse than Trump's.) The reason it's close is because Trump hasn't lost any votes since 2020, it would appear. He got 46.8% of the vote then and is currently sitting on 46.9% in the RCP moving average of polls today, and that's before you factor in the remaining undecided voters who may go his way. In the end, he'd probably get around 48% of the vote if the election were tomorrow, which would be his best showing to date. The dif would be made up by fringe third party candidates.
What I'm trying to communicate here is that this election isn't really about Trump. That's not what's making the difference. He's not losing this election so much as Kamala is winning it. Harris's support has steadily increased in tandem with her personal favorability numbers. In other words, the more people hear from Kamala Harris, the more they tend to like her as a person and that's her edge: likability. "Likability" is also partially about issues, not just your background and communication style, and by embracing a populist economic message left of Biden's and a raft of sane, relatively centrist positions on the social issues arguably skewing right of Biden's (e.g. comprehensive immigration reform leading with a border security emphasis, an all-of-the-above energy policy, liberal (i.e. two-state solution) Zionism, etc.), she's been proving herself an in-touch and well-balanced, well-reasoned person who genuinely listens to and cares about regular people, and it's helping her start to catch up to Trump on his best-polling issues.
Last edited by Jaicee - 9 hours ago
