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Will Poll 'Hype' and 'Joy' Affect the Election?

Rebecca Downs
Rebecca Downs  |  August 14, 2024 10:15 AM

When it comes to the matchup between Vice President Kamala Harris and former and potentially future President Donald Trump, Harris looks to have the edge. She only just recently replaced President Joe Biden as the Democratic nominee, and the DNC hasn't even taken place yet. It's not just that she's in something of a honeymoon period, though that could be the case. There's considerable "hype" around her campaign, as we're seeing in these polls. What does that all mean?

When it comes to the idea of this "hype" around Harris' campaign, Paul Bedard used such a phrase in his headline, "Media’s pro-Harris hype affecting polls hard." 

As he begins his piece:

Media hype of Vice President Kamala Harris since she entered the presidential race is now showing evidence of shifting the polls, and the election, in her favor.

The reason is simple: The mostly left-leaning press are focusing on the vice president’s “joyful” campaign and sharpening their attacks on former President Donald Trump.

Consider: Voters say they are being overwhelmed with Harris honeymoon coverage.

In Tuesday’s Morning Consult polling note, voters said they have heard something positive about Harris far more than of Trump. The gap is in double digits, 47%-33%.

Here is the analysis: “Harris’s media honeymoon rolls on. For the third week running since launching her presidential campaign, voters remained more likely to say they heard something positive (47%) than negative (33%) about Harris by a double-digit margin. Her net buzz rating (the share of voters who heard something positive minus the share who heard something negative) bests Trump’s rating from last week by a whopping 33 points.”

This is chilling, and yet it's having an effect. As of early Wednesday morning, RealClearPolling has Harris up by +1.1 at the national level. While Trump leads Harris by +0.9 in the battleground states, this is less of an edge than he had against Biden in such states.

Harris enjoys even more of a lead according to 538, as she has a lead of +2.7 per August 13's numbers.

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On Tuesday, Nate Silver emphasized how Harris was "*still* gaining on Trump on our national polling average," putting her ahead nationally by +3.1. 

His forecast on August 9 gave her a 53.8 percent chance of winning the Electoral College. 

Cook Political Report also recently changed their forecasts in key battleground states to more so favor Harris.

This is quite different from what we've seen previously, before Harris had replaced Biden or in the early days of her doing so. 

What happened? She's not Biden. An analysis from Nate Cohn about The New York Times/Siena College poll, which was yet another one to show Harris leading in key battleground states, spoke to how it's actually quite the compliment to refer to her as a "generic Democrat." There's also that honeymoon period, which the press looks to be allowing to carry on by not pushing back on how Harris has suddenly changed her mind on several issues, or at least claims she has. That finding from the Morning Consult poll mentioned by Bedard lends credence to such concerns. 

In June of last year, a poll from NBC News showed that Harris was the most unpopular vice president since they began asking that question. That's not ancient history. Even more recently, a Quinnipiac University poll from last month showed that Harris had particularly low favorable ratings. 

Cygnal's Brent Buchanan has been warning abouy the polls out there, as we covered in the other VIP pieces when addressing why one should be skeptical about polls, namely this recent one from The New York Times/Siena College and another one from the Financial Times/University of Michigan. 

"Look at how many polls coming out are from Democrat-leaning outfits. It's 2-3x than before the Democrats swapped out their elected nominee for Kamala Harris. There's definitely a concerted push to make it look like Kamala has taken a lead," Buchanan said in his statement to Townhall. 

As Matt covered earlier on Wednesday, CNN's Harry Enten warned against getting too excited about these polls showing an edge for Harris. Trump could still win this.

The Trump-Vance campaign looks to have its work cut out for them, though that doesn't mean the campaign and its surrogates can't rise to the challenge.

If Harris and her running mate, Gov. Tim Walz (D-MN), really do have "joy," they're going about it the wrong way. Harris feels a need to avoid the press, and Walz is the one who first started using "weird" as an insult to refer to his Republican counterpart, Sen. JD Vance (R-OH). To his credit, Vance has been expertly hitting back, which includes calling to mind how far-left Walz's record is.

When it comes to that sense of "joy," Byron York, also with the Washington Examiner, put in perspective how far from reality such a narrative is. 

York concluded his most recent column by writing:

So, when two-thirds of Americans feel the country is on the wrong track, what theme do Harris and running mate Tim Walz adopt for their presidential campaign? Joy. The Washington Post reported that the two Democrats have "seized on a joyful message." A New York Times analysis of their "joyful campaign" included the headline: "Harris Used to Worry About Laughing. Now Joy Is Fueling Her Campaign." MSNBC declared that Harris and Walz "campaign with joy."

Obviously, Harris and Walz are happy. Why shouldn't they be? Harris quickly, almost instantly, secured the Democratic nomination after party leaders pushed the aged and infirm Biden aside. Walz has a chance for a bigger job than he ever imagined. That can make a politician joyous.

But what about everybody else? For those families making trade-offs to meet their most basic needs -- can joy pay their electric bill? The water bill? The rent? Insurance on the house? Kamala Harris will spend the coming weeks trying to persuade those voters to reward her for the dismal circumstances her time in office has brought. She will have many advocates, in the Democratic Party and in the media, cheering her on. But for millions of American voters, the bills are still the bills, and there's nothing joyous about that.

York mentioned a report from The Washington Post. "Harris and Walz seize on joyful message in contrast to darker Trump themes," declared an August 8 headline from the outlet. Even more recently, they put out a headline on August 12 from the Associated Press, "Harris is pushing joy. Trump paints a darker picture. Will mismatched moods matter?" PBS also shared a headline from the Associated Press on August 12, "Harris is campaigning on joy, Trump says dark mood matches the country."

There's also that ridiculous headline from The New York Times on August 9, "Harris Used to Worry About Laughing. Now Joy Is Fueling Her Campaign."

Although this one is focused on Walz, USA Today on August 10 had a particularly ridiculous headline, "Walzing on sunshine: How Tim Walz's upbeat demeanor got him on the Kamala Harris ticket."

On Tuesday, The Seattle Medium shared a piece from DC-based Julianne Malveaux, "Kamala Harris – Grace And Joy."

When it comes to that "joy," Fox News' Mary Katharine Ham mocked the Harris-Walz campaign for their particularly unhinged reaction over the conversation that Trump had with Elon Musk over X on Monday night, after some delays.

In the midst of how ridiculous the mainstream media has been about Harris, POLITICO may be the worst. 

An August 11 post highlighted how "it's Kamala Harris offering a transformative candidacy," despite how she's the sitting vice president.

Then there was one from August 9 claiming "Harris promises to go tough on border security," providing cover for the Biden-Harris administration, which has been a catastrophic failure on securing the southern border. Not only is Harris currently in office, she was also designated the border czar, though the mainstream media tries to lie about that as well.

Both posts were thoroughly ratioed. 

In many ways the POLITICO Playbook edition from Saturday sounded as if it was written with help from the Harris-Walz campaign. More recently, POLITICO Toplines claimed on Tuesday how "Kamala Harris is defying the laws of the political universe."

Then there's the example from TIME Magazine, in strong contrast to their cover on Trump, with Harris even declining to comment for such a glowing profile puff piece.

Musk weighed in with a quoted repost on the media bias between those two covers.

Worse than declining comment for TIME, Fox News' Peter Doocy has pointed out that not only has  indicated we'll have to "wait a little bit longer" to hear Harris' thoughts on current events. More recently, as Nick Arama at our sister site of RedState highlighted, Doocy also shared that Harris has been ditching her press pool. 

That's not to say one should give into gloom, doom, and despair about the election. If Republicans want to win, they still have close to three months. Kurt has been given plenty of good pep talks in his columns and podcasts. Jeff Charles, also of RedState, pointed out that "Harris Leads Trump in Some Recent Polls, but the Honeymoon Phase Won't Last Forever."

There's 83 days until November 5.