Harris leads Trump in polls as Election Day approaches

Voters in the US are preparing for the upcoming presidential election on November 5. The main focus now is whether America will have its first female president or a second term for Donald Trump.

Since entering the race at the end of July, Harris has outperformed Trump in the national polling averages, as the chart below illustrates. The most recent numbers are rounded to the nearest whole number.

Just over 67 million people watched the two candidates square off in a televised debate in Pennsylvania on September 10.


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The week following the debate, most national polls indicated that Harris had made some slight gains due to her performance; her lead had grown from 2.5 percentage points the day before the debate to 3.3 points in less than a week, as quoted in a report by the BBC.

However, Trump's average fell by half a percentage point in the week after. National polls are useful for gauging a candidate's popularity but not for predicting the election outcome. The US uses an electoral college system, with each state having a number of votes proportional to its population size.

Battleground states or swing states are the only places where both candidates have a chance of winning.

Swing state polls show tight races in the seven battleground states for the 2020 election, with only one or two percentage points between candidates.

Pennsylvania is crucial as it has the highest number of electoral votes, making it easier to reach the 270 needed votes. Since Harris joined the race, she has been leading in Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin, which were Democratic strongholds before Trump turned them red in 2016, as reported by BBC.

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Polling analysis website 538 creates these averages by collecting data from individual polls carried out by various polling companies. However, polls suggest Kamala Harris and Donald Trump are within a couple of percentage points of each other in swing states, making it difficult to predict winners.

Polling companies will try to make adjustments to reflect the voting population but still need to make educated guesses about voter turnout.

FAQs

Who currently leads the national polls, Harris or Trump?
Since entering the race in July, Kamala Harris has held a slight lead over Donald Trump in national polling averages.

Which states are major battlegrounds in the election?
The race is close in swing states such as Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin. Winning these will be critical for either candidate to win the presidency.