Analysis of the 2024 Election: Harris vs. Trump

In less than 35 days, Vice President Kamala Harris will go head-to-head with Donald Trump as Americans cast their votes in the 2024 election. Vice presidential candidates Tim Walz and JD Vance will debate each other tonight at 9pm ET – a pivotal moment for the running mates to showcase their own political skills. The polls show that Vance’s popularity remains at record lows, while Walz is more popular than all current VP and presidential candidates; and bets are favoring the Minnesota Governor as tonight’s winner.

The candidates are preparing for an intense final stretch of the campaign, with the needle ready to swing either way. So how will Harris and Trump fare in November?

Harris has a 2.6-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. Exclusive polling for The Independent suggests that the VP debate could make a mark on the presidential race, with two thirds of Democrats saying that the choice of running mate is significant.

Meanwhile, ahead of tonight’s debate, 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. 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.

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.

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.

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).

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.

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.

Overall, the race between Harris and Trump is heating up as the election draws near. With debates, polls, and key issues at play, the outcome of the 2024 election remains uncertain.