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How Is the Presidential Race Going in Michigan?

Rebecca Downs
Rebecca Downs  |  September 04, 2024 10:00 AM

With President Joe Biden dropping out of the presidential race just over six weeks now, the election chances between his replacement, Vice President Kamala Harris and former and potentially future President Donald Trump looks to have tightened. This especially includes Michigan, one of the key swing states. Trump managed to pull off a win there in 2016, being the first Republican to do so since 1988. He lost to Biden in 2020, but has a chance to win it again. Poll averages currently show Harris with a slight lead there. That edge may not be here to stay, though.

As of early Wednesday morning, 538 shows Harris with a lead of +2.1 over Trump in the Wolverine State. RealClearPolling has Harris leading by similar margins, +1.9. 

Both forecasters include a Trafalgar/Insider Advantage polling in their averages, which looked to several swing states and showed Trump leading Harris in five swing states and tied in two others. His leads are within the margin of error of plus or minus 2.9 percentage points.

According to such a poll, Trump and Harris are pretty much tied in Michigan, with 1,089 likely voters, Trump enjoying 47 percent support and Harris with 46.6 percent support. 

While Trafalgar is a Republican poll, this isn't the only one that shows promise for the Trump-Vance campaign and trouble for the Harris-Walz one. 

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Included in 538's averages is a poll from the Glengariff Group, sponsored by The Detroit News, WDIV-TV, a local outlet in Detroit.

Unlike late July, when Harris led by +1, with 42 percent to Trump's 41 percent, this time it's Trump who has the edge, 44.7-43.5 percent. Such a poll was conducted August 26-28 with 600 likely voters and had a margin of error of plus or minus 4 percent. 

The poll shifts to be slightly in Harris' favor when definite voters are polled, which includes 91 percent of respondents, further solidifying how close and competitive this election looks to be, and one decided in the swing states.

When looking to just those definite voters, Harris leads with 45.7 percent support to Trump's 44.1 percent support.

Such a poll also shows that Trump and Harris have similar favorable ratings. Trump is viewed favorably by 42.3 percent of voters and unfavorably by 51.3 percent of voters, which the poll's write-up notes is "statistically unchanged from July 2024 when he was viewed favorably by 39.8% and unfavorably by 52.4%."

While Harris' favorable numbers went up, her unfavorable numbers also slightly went up. While 43.3 percent of voters in Michigan view her favorably, up from 37.1 percent, 49.7 percent view her unfavorably, up from 47.8 percent. 

The poll also asks voters about which candidate they think would be better on certain issues, and which one they think more so represents certain qualities.

Of the four issues voters were asked about--the economy, securing the border/immigration, foreign affairs, and democracy--Trump enjoys leads on the first three issues, especially on the first two:

  • On the economy, 51.5 percent believe Trump will better handle this top issue, compared to the 38.9 percent who say so about Harris.
  • On immigration, 55.5 percent believe Trump will better handle this issue, while 36.6 percent say so about Harris.
  • On foreign affairs, 48.7 percent say Trump will better handle the issue, compared to the 44.3 percent who say so about Harris.
  • Harris leads when it comes to who voters believe will "do a better job of strengthening American democracy," with 47.1 percent saying so compared to the 42.7 percent who say so about Trump.

Although it's problematic that 44.1 percent believe Harris is the one who "represents change," given that she's the sitting vice president and Trump hasn't been in office for three and a half years, that not much more than the 43.2 percent who say Trump does. 

"Any way you look at this race, it's a tossup," pollster Richard Czuba, founder of the Lansing-based Glengariff Group, is quoted as saying in another write-up. 

Forecast Nate Silver shared results from such a poll, with a warning for Harris. "Setting the convention bounce stuff aside, there just hasn't been much positive state polling data entering the system for Harris lately," he noted.

It's also worth reminding that that "bounce" barely amounted to anything, as we addressed with last Wednesday's VIP when covering a national poll. 

Silver's forecast also shows tightened chances in Michigan, with Harris at an edge of +1.9, 48.1 percent to Trump's 46.2 percent. This is a change of +1.3 in favor of Trump in the last week and +0.5 from the last month. 

Michigan not only has a "Toss-Up" race for the top of the ticket, but for down-ballot races as well. With Democratic Sen. Debbie Stabenow retiring, there's an open seat with Democratic Rep. Elissa Slotkin and former Republican Rep. Mike Rogers going up against each other. As we've been saying, the presidential candidate who wins in November might also benefit the Senate candidate. 

Slotkin consistently has more of a lead in the polls, for an average of +4.7 according to RealClearPolling.

There's other Michigan news besides the polls. The Future Coalition PAC is putting out ads in zip codes with Muslim and Arab populations highlighting what support Harris has dared to show Israel following the October 7 attack against our ally in the Middle East. 

But, as others have pointed out, and as we covered for the 2022 elections, Democrats were all too happy to go with similar tactics, including and especially with Michigan and boosting John Gibbs as the Republican nominee. Although Gibbs beat now former Rep. Peter Meijer in the primary, he went on to lose to current Democratic Rep. Hillary Scholten in the general election. 

Democrats also meddled in New Hampshire's U.S. Senate race for that year, boosting Don Bolduc who won the primary but went on to lose to Democratic Sen. Maggie Hassan in the general election.

They tried such tactics in several races in Colorado as well, but those particularly brazen tactics failed to work for the 2022 primaries.