(The Center Square) – With only 12 days until Election Day, former President Donald Trump is only growing his polling lead in North Carolina.
This comes as more than 2 million voters – greater than 25% of the state’s 7.7 million registered voters – have already cast their ballots.
The last five polls in the state have all had Trump leading over Vice President Kamala Harris. The race remains a toss-up, neither able to clear the margin of error.
Trump’s Project 538’s polling average has increased from 0.7% to 1.2% in the past week. That figure does not include a margin of error.
This is a significant improvement from Trump’s polling in both of the past elections, even though both four and eight years ago he outperformed the polls and won the state twice.
For example, in 2020, Biden was polling 1.8% ahead of Trump going into Election Day and lost by 1.3%. The Democrat never trailed in the polling in the final months.
Republicans remain confident of their chances, even as Democrats vie to win the state for the first time since Barack Obama won it in 2008 and only the second time since 1964.
The Hill predicts Trump has a 66% chance of winning and labels it leaning Republican.
According to the most recent poll of North Carolina by Emerson College, Trump leads Harris 50% to 48%. The poll’s margin of error is 3.1% and was conducted Monday and Tuesday.
“There is a clear gender divide, with men favoring Trump more strongly than women for Harris,” said Spencer Kimball, executive director of Emerson College Polling.
Other recent polls found Trump leading by similar percentages.
Early voting in the state will continue through Saturday, Nov. 2, even as the state continues to work to recover from the historic damage caused by Hurricane Helene.
As of 8 a.m. Thursday morning, 1.9 million in-person early votes had been received. That’s an increase of 6.6% over 2020.
“Factoring in increases in registered voters between 2020 and 2024, in-person early voting is up 0.4% over 2020,” said a statement from the North Carolina State Board of Elections.
Over 100,000 absentee ballots and 16,000 overseas and military ballots have also been received, bringing total turnout to 2,015,754 just one week after early voting began.
