After a campaign that included a candidate switch, a pair of assassination attempts and dramatic twists seemingly every day, the conventional wisdom from months ago ultimately prevails in three polls showing Donald Trump ahead in most swing states.
If Kamala Harris can do what Democrats have done in most elections for decades and win Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin — the blue-wall states — she’ll likely have the 270 electoral votes she needs to win.
If she can’t, Trump will almost certainly be the next president.
But there’s plenty of drama possible before results are finalized — which wouldn’t happen until early next year under some possible scenarios.
A Redfield & Wilton-The Telegraph survey, in the field the last four days of October, shows the former president up in Arizona, Georgia, Nevada and North Carolina, giving him 268 electoral votes.
Those leads redefine the word marginal, though, as the third-time GOP nominee leads 48% to 47% in all four states.
But the poll presents a best-case scenario for Trump and his supporters, suggesting two of the three blue-wall states, which have 44 electoral votes among them, are still in play.
In Michigan, the candidates are tied at 47%. In Pennsylvania, it’s 48%.
Only in Wisconsin does Harris lead — and it’s not by much: 48% to 47%.
The analysis follows from Trump doing a better job converting Joe Biden voters from four years ago than Harris is in flipping Trump’s 2020 supporters.
“Between 9% and 14% of Biden 2020 voters in these states now say they will vote for Trump, while between 5% and 9% of Trump 2020 voters now say they will vote for Kamala Harris,” the pollsters assert, saying that’s the case in every state surveyed.
The Times-YouGov polling of 6,600 registered voters across the battlegrounds between Oct. 25 and 31 finds the blue wall holds up for Harris, pushing her to 270 electoral votes.
In a multi-candidate Michigan field, Harris leads Trump 47% to 45%. In Pennsylvania, she’s ahead 48% to 46%. And in Wisconsin, she’s up 48% to 45%.
Assuming one of those states falls through, Harris also leads in Nevada, 48% to 47%, which would give her another six electoral votes.
Interestingly, voters in both Nevada and Pennsylvania expect Trump to win the election, their own preference notwithstanding. He’s +4 in the former state and +5 in the latter.
The best polling for Trump, from Emerson College, shows the former president evenly splitting the blue-wall states — which would be far and away the best scenario for him.
While Harris leads in Michigan, 50% to 48%, Trump actually ties her in Wisconsin, 49% to 49%. And he takes Pennsylvania and its 19 electoral votes, 49% to 48%.
Emerson sees a tie in Nevada, leaving its six electoral votes in suspense, but has Trump with single-point leads in Georgia and North Carolina and a 2-point Arizona advantage.
The battle of the sexes shapes the battleground contests, per pollster Spencer Kimball.
“In Michigan, where Harris has an edge over Trump, and Wisconsin, men and women break in opposite directions: men for Trump by 12, and women for Harris by 11. In states where Trump has a slight edge, like North Carolina and Pennsylvania, men support Trump by a wider margin than women support Harris,” he says.
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One wildcard that’s escaped national polling could shift the results, even if Harris wins the blue-wall states.
In Maine, where the two congressional districts choose their own electors alongside the two statewide winners, polling has suggested Trump could flip the 2nd District, which is projected as a Harris hold.
If that’s the case, even if Harris wins Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, the Electoral College could be tied at 269 for each candidate — assuming no “faithless” electors violate their pledge to vote for the candidate whose slate they’re on.
In a tie, the House of Representatives’ state delegations would pick the president, and senators would elect the veep.
Given GOP House domination and Democratic control of the Senate, that could lead to a Trump-Walz administration and a new wrinkle in what has been the most action-packed and surreal election cycle since at least 1968.
But the members elected in 2024 would be the ones voting — not the current crop of legislators — which means the ultimate resolution of this unlikely scenario would depend on House and Senate elections, giving GOP efforts in states like Ohio, Pennsylvania and Michigan a new saliency. If Republicans flip the Senate, they’d have the advantage.
And if the Senate is 50-50, Harris could elevate Walz in a tiebreaker. But she’d be looking for a new job after that, in what would be a capstone irony in a presidential race that looks more like a Fellini film than the antiseptic scenarios taught in K-12 civics classes.
