Vice President Kamala Harris narrowly leads former President Donald Trump nationally in the latest polling, but it may not be enough.
Two weeks out from Election Day, Trump holds a lead over Harris in all seven of the closest swing states, according to the Real Clear Politics, which averages recent polls in those states.
In 2020, Biden won Arizona with its 11 electoral votes, Nevada with its 6 electoral votes, Georgia with its 16 electoral votes, Pennsylvania with its 19 electoral votes, Michigan with its 15 electoral votes and Wisconsin with its 10 electoral votes.
Trump beat Biden in North Carolina in 2020, nabbing 16 electoral votes
This time around, Trump is leading in all seven states, though his lead is less than two points in each state, leaving them all in the “toss-up” category.
If Trump wins all seven of those states, he will easily win the presidential election two short weeks from now. However, Trump’s lead is small in each state with a flurry of campaign stops and each state with its own respective issues.
Trump leads Harris by an average of 1.8 points in Arizona, where Hispanic voters make up about a third of the state.
A USA Today/Suffolk University poll released Monday reports that Trump leads Harris with Hispanics, 49% to 38%.
Those numbers would help Trump in Nevada as well, where RCP has Trump up by 0.8% and Hispanics are nearly a third of the population.
As The Center Square previously reported, Biden received 58% support from Hispanic voters when he beat Trump in 2020.
Border issues have also become front-of-mind in the southwestern state, which has seen a flood of migrants enter the state as have other states since Vice President Kamala Harris took office.
Harris has done her best to distance herself from her work on immigration for the Biden administration, but questions about her as a “border czar” persist, showing that she has not fully broken the connection to her candidacy and the current border crisis.
Trump’s focus on the border crisis and gains with Hispanics have so far given him an edge in The Grand Canyon State.
In Pennsylvania, Harris’ fracking stance has come under scrutiny. In 2019, she called for banning fracking, but she has since reversed her position. Now, PoliticoPro is reporting that a top Harris climate staffer has said Harris will not support expanding fracking.
“Kamala Harris continues to lie and twist herself into a pretzel about her positions on energy because she needs states like Pennsylvania in order to win the White House and her record of failure won’t cut it,” Daniel Turner, founder and executive director of the energy workers’ advocacy group, Power The Future, told The Center Square.
Harris has also struggled with Black voters, according to recent polling, and underperforming with that demographic could be fatal for her campaign in Georgia, Michigan, North Carolina (about 20% Black) and Pennsylvania (about 12% Black).
While Harris leads Trump with Black voters 78%-17%, her support comes in well under recent Democratic presidential candidates.
In fact, Democrats have traditionally relied on 90-95% support among Black voters, from former President Barack Obama to President Joe Biden. Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton even lost with more than 90% support from Black voters.
Now, the candidates have a flurry of campaign stops in these key states, hoping to win over the key counties that could give just enough electoral votes.
Harris has continued to call Trump “unstable,” hammering that messaging online and in interviews.
“The final stretch is always about momentum, and Donald Trump starts the countdown to Election Day with the wind at his back,” Colin Reed, a Republican strategist, former campaign manager for U.S. Sen. Scott Brown, R-Mass., and co-founder of South and Hill Strategies, told The Center Square. “It’s getting late in the game for Vice President Harris to answer the question a lot of voters are craving, which is a better understanding of her rationale for running and her vision for America.
“Trump, for better or worse, is a known quantity, and that factor, plus his lead on the intangible issues (economy, foreign affairs, immigration) and the desire for a change in direction from the status quo gives him a slight advantage down the final stretch,” Reed continued.
In a sign of the tenor and modern state of American politics, both candidates have also taken shots at the size of the others’ rallies.
“I have a rally, I have 100,000 people,” Trump told rallygoers in North Carolina Monday. “They have a rally. They have 200 people.”
On Friday, pro-life protesters interrupted Harris’ Wisconsin rally speech when she began discussing abortion.
“Oh you guys are at the wrong rally. I think you meant to go to the smaller one down the street,” Harris said.
