New polling is suggesting that the boost Vice President Kamala Harris experienced following President Joe Biden’s withdrawal from the 2024 race may be waning. That includes a recent survey from the Napolitan Institute, released on Friday, which shows former President Donald Trump regaining his lead, similar to the advantage he held over Biden before Democrats shifted their support to Harris.
“In the race for the White House, Donald Trump leads Kamala Harris 46% to 45%. When leaners are included, the Napolitan News survey of 3,000 Likely Voters shows Trump ahead 49% to 47%. A week ago, the candidates were tied at 49% among Likely Voters,” the polling organization noted in a report on its findings.
“These numbers suggest that the initial Harris bounce is over. However, the core dynamics of the race remain unchanged. Love him or hate him, voters know what they think of Donald Trump. At this point in time, Kamala Harris remains largely unknown. That means events like the upcoming Democratic convention and presidential debates could have a bigger impact than usual.” The organization noted that while the presidential race remains too close to call, past elections have shown that Trump has often outperformed his polling numbers.
Trump voters are slightly more likely to vote than Harris supporters. So, the former president does a bit better with a lower turnout. What’s especially amazing about this close race is that it’s quite plausible to envision either party winning a trifecta: control of the Presidency, the Senate, and the House. The most important race to determine Senate control is in Montana. The latest Napolitan News survey there shows Democrat Jon Tester with a narrow lead but the state’s political gravity is likely to boost Republican Tim Sheehy.
A report by Just the News cited the new polling data to explain that voters are “catapulting Trump to lead and ending Harris surge.” The report noted Harris was leading Trump 44% to 43% in the same survey just a week ago, and held a five-point lead at the beginning of the month. “These numbers suggest that the initial Harris bounce is over,” pollster Scott Rasmussen of the Napolitan Institute told Just the News. In a recent national head-to-head survey by Rasmussen Reports, Trump is leading Harris by three percentage points.
A noted GOP political strategist and Fox News contributor pointed out during a Tuesday segment that Vice President Kamala Harris is nowhere close to polling as well as Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden against former President Donald Trump. Karl Rove cautioned that the optimism surrounding Harris’s campaign might be misplaced after pointing out she is currently polling worse than Biden did at this point in 2020 and Clinton did in 2016.
Rove’s remarks followed anchor Bret Baier’s repeat of one Democratic strategist’s warning that Harris’s current strategy of falling silent on policy and avoiding the media is “borne of conceit and foolhardiness.” He asked: “What do you make of that?” Rove responded: “She [Harris] needs to be more specific. Let’s not be critical of her by saying she has to have a Democrat Congress and a Democrat Senate in order to get these things done. Because the same can be said for Donald Trump; he has to have a Republican Senate and a Republican House to get everything done. But people want to know where you’re coming from, and they want to know enough about the specifics to get their hands around it.”
“But the other point about polling, I want to, if possible, let’s talk about that a little bit, because I think let’s put this in perspective. On this day in 2020, Joe Biden was up 7.1% above Donald Trump in the RealClearPolitics average,” Rove continued. “And at this point in 2016, Hillary Clinton was up 6.3. And as you remember, the election came down to a handful of votes in a handful of states. And today, in the RealClearPolitics average, Harris is up over Trump by 1.5 in the RCP average and 3.5 in the 538.com.”
“So this, you know, she’s ahead in both averages, but she’s nowhere near ahead by the numbers that both Biden and Clinton were in,” he continued. “And as we know, Clinton lost and Biden won by 42,000 votes in three states. To complicate it further, these are national numbers we’re talking about, and we’ve got a number of polls, 8 to 10 polls that make up these averages, but how is she doing and how is he doing in the battleground states, the 6 or 7 battleground states? We have nowhere near, we have a few polls in several states, but we certainly don’t have 6 or 7 or 8 polls that would give us an average and therefore give us a better idea of where they actually are.”
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