Kamala Harris vs. Donald Trump is the closest presidential race of the century
The 2024 presidential election continues to be the closest of the century. In fact, it is the closest race for the White House in the past 60 years.
Polling since the September 10 debate between Donald Trump and Kamala Harris shows that while the vice president seems to have opened up a slight national edge over her Republican rival, their race remains well within the margin of error and too close to call. This is especially the case when looking at the Electoral College.
Consider the polling that came out Sunday from CBS News and NBC News. Their surveys were some of Harris’ best to date, and yet she is only ahead by 4 and 5 points, respectively. The Democratic nominee’s largest leads in the CBS News/YouGov and NBC News polls in 2016 and 2020 were at least double where Harris is now.
To put the new Sunday polls into further context, consider all the national surveys conducted since the debate. This includes the aforementioned polls and surveys from ABC News/Ipsos, Fox News and The New York Times/Siena College. On average, according to the latest CNN Poll of Polls, Harris is ahead by 3 points.
This matches what we’ve seen all year: Neither candidate has been able to open an advantage of 5 points or more in the national polling. This includes the period when President Joe Biden was the likely and then the presumptive Democratic nominee.
The fact that no one has led by at least 5 points this cycle is noteworthy because it’s incredibly rare. Even in races that end up being very close, one candidate at some point almost always builds a significant advantage. This year, most voters seem locked in.
Even Harris’ dominating debate performance over Trump – according to the voters – has only appeared to move the dial by a few points.
You’d have to go back to the 1960 campaign to find a race in which the major-party nominees were always within 5 points of each other in an average of the national polling. Every presidential year since then has had at least three weeks when one candidate was up by 5 points or more.
A 3-point edge in the national polls is far from secure for Harris. Since 1948, the average difference between the polls on the eve of the election and the Election Day result has been 3 points. Some years, like 2020, the error rate is even higher.
(This far out from the election, the average difference between the polls and the eventual result would be, not surprisingly, greater.)
