Wednesday marks one month since President Joe Biden withdrew from the 2024 presidential race and announced the ending of his reelection bid in a letter shared to his X account. He endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris as his replacement in a separate post not long after. Since then, Harris has enjoyed some momentum that comes with any honeymoon period. Even if that period may be continuing with the DNC this week, polls and forecasts show the state of the race may already be shifting.
As of Tuesday night, Harris has a lead of +1.5 over former and potentially future President Donald Trump, according to averages from RealClearPolling. If she has momentum though, that's not quite where Harris wants to be, especially when her lead is within the margin of error.
With Biden still in the race, it was common to see Trump holding a lead in the polls, forecasts, and predictions, though it still looked to be a close and competitive election. We then saw a shift in favor of Harris. Now, we may be seeing a shift back in the other direction, if this holds, especially since Trump and Harris are tied at 49 percent each when it comes to new forecasts released on Monday.
One forecast shows Harris narrowly winning Wisconsin, 51-49 percent, while having a healthy win in Michigan, 57-43 percent. Trump has better odds of winning in other swing states, though: Pennsylvania and Nevada by 52-48 percent; Arizona by 55-45 percent; Georgia by 64-36 percent; and North Carolina by 67-33 percent.
Trump would just barely win the Electoral College with the required 270 votes in a very narrow race with Harris winning 268 votes.
#Latest @TheEconomist Forecast
— InteractivePolls (@IAPolls2022) August 19, 2024
Electoral Votes
🟥 Donald Trump: 270 🏆
🟦 Kamala Harris: 268
——
Swing States (chance of winning)
Pennsylvania - 🔴 Trump 52-48%
Nevada - 🔴 Trump 52-48%
Arizona - 🔴 Trump 55-45%
Georgia - 🔴 Trump 64-36%
North Carolina - 🔴 Trump 67-33%… https://t.co/EbLAE1rYHA pic.twitter.com/oROye88EEf
Those chances for Trump are a lot lower than they were just days before.
Before Tuesday, Trump and Harris looked to be at best tied. Then, news came in that Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., who was a Democratic primary challenger to Biden turned Independent, might drop out and endorse Trump. Those comments came from Nicole Shanahan, RFK Jr.'s own running mate.
As of Tuesday evening, Polymarket has it at a 76 percent chance that RFK Jr drops out before November, with those numbers hovering in the 70s throughout the day. At one point, the chances were slightly higher at 78 percent, though they were also at 73 percent hours earlier.
— Polymarket (@Polymarket) August 20, 2024
Trump has also told CNN that he'd "certainly... be open to" putting RFK Jr. in his administration.
"I like him, and I respect him," Trump said in an interview with Kristen Holmes during a campaign stop in Michigan. "He’s a brilliant guy. He’s a very smart guy. I’ve known him for a very long time," he also said. "I didn’t know he was thinking about getting out, but if he is thinking about getting out, certainly I’d be open to it."
Polymarket thus also has Trump's chances improving against Harris, with a mention of RFK Jr. potentially dropping out. He went from tying with to even leading Harris on Tuesday.
He's hovered at 50 or 51 percent, while Harris has gone down to 48 percent.
Trump is back even with Kamala amidst rumors that RFK Jr. will drop out. pic.twitter.com/S84wLSEEQg
— Polymarket (@Polymarket) August 20, 2024
Trump already has a 3% lead over Kamala's odds. pic.twitter.com/n0H3dYeHsA
— Polymarket (@Polymarket) August 20, 2024
Bringing this back to Harris, any lead for her is not so much that she is the superior candidate to Trump. If she was, her lead would likely be much higher. She has been slow to announce any policy proposals, and those ideas which haven't been copied from Trump or his running mate, Sen. JD Vance (R-OH), have been criticized. Even the mainstream media, like CNN and the Washington Post, have taken issue with Harris' policy proposals.
Harris has also ignored the media, refusing to grant interviews or hold press conferences. It doesn't mean that she ought to be allowed to get away with not explaining herself, though as Guy has covered, campaign surrogates do expect the media to do the explaining for the Harris-Walz ticket.
That Harris is the sitting vice president is another key detail, considering how much she may like to distance herself from the Biden-Harris administration.
When it comes to that supposed momentum we saw for Harris, we saw an influx of polls released that not only showed her leading Trump, but also dubious polls claiming she led him on issues where he has had otherwise strong leads, like the economy.
In previewing his own Cygnal poll released late last week, which shows Harris only narrowly leading Trump at the national level — again a place where she doesn't want to be as it's just not good enough — there were plenty of polls to be wary of. As we covered with last week's VIP:
When it comes to another perspective of why there is reason to be skeptical of such a poll, Cygnal's Brent Buchanan made it the focus of his Monday email of daily takes, as he pointed out how "the wildly wrong polls are starting to creep into this election."
Citing a headline about the poll from the Financial Review, Buchanan said it was "Just wrong."
"In a poll we have coming out this week, Trump holds trust on economy/jobs 49-44 and on inflation/cost of living 49-42. If Harris actually held trust on these issues, she’d be up by 6-7 points, and she’ll never be there," he offered, teasing the release of a Cygnal poll.
In a statement for Townhall, Buchanan doubled down even further, including why it is that Harris looks to be leading in so many polls. "Look at how many polls coming out are from Democrat-leaning outfits," he pointed out. "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. On the crap poll showing Harris ahead on economic trust, we know for a fact that's wrong," he added, reiterating the findings from Cygnal's upcoming poll.
Mike Miller also highlighted at our sister site RedState that Vance told Shannon Bream during his "Fox News Sunday" appearance that polls released in 2016 and 2020 were meant to depress Republican turnout.
"Consistently, what you’ve seen in 2016 and 2020 is that the media uses fake polls to drive down Republican turnout and to create dissension and conflict with Republican voters. I’m telling you, every single person who’s watching this, the Trump campaign is in a very, very good spot. We’re going to win this race. We just have to run through the finish line," he offered.
We still have over two months until Election Day, and these forecasts sure can change quickly. Stay tuned!
