A poll released Thursday showed Vice President Kamala Harris holding a slight lead over former President Donald Trump, thanks to an expected surge in approval ratings following last week's Democratic National Convention.
of The Wall Street Journal The latest national polls show Harris leading Trump by one percentage point.
In head-to-head contests, the Democratic candidate received 48% support, while the Republican candidate received 47% support.
When third-party candidates were included in the survey, Harris' lead increased by two points, to 47% to 45%.
Both results were within the poll's margin of error of 2.5 percentage points.
The survey results suggest that the 78-year-old Trump has a good chance of winning the Electoral College election, as Democratic candidates typically receive higher approval ratings than their Republican counterparts in national polls.
Democratic presidential candidates typically need at least a 3-point lead nationally to show they also have an advantage in battleground states that can decide the election.
For example, in 2016, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton beat Trump in the national popular vote by 2.1 percentage points but lost several battleground states, giving Trump a decisive electoral college victory.
According to The Wall Street Journal, the poll marks the first time since April last year that Trump has trailed in a head-to-head presidential election.
The vice president's surge in approval ratings, likely reflecting the glowing praise heaped on Harris during four days of nationally televised Democratic conventions in Chicago, often fizzles out.
A poll conducted after the Democratic National Convention showed that Democrats favored Harris (90%) more than Republicans favored Trump (82%), another likely side effect of the convention.
But despite the positive atmosphere at the Democratic National Convention, VP Harris' approval ratings remain low, with 51% disapproving and 42% approving.
On those issues, voters still believe Trump would do a better job of handling the economy (8 points) and inflation (5 points) than Harris.
Voters also saw Trump as better equipped than his vice president to deal with the war between Israel and Hamas and threats from Russia and China.
While Harris did gain support among black voters, the poll found her approval rating among them at 83%, lower than the 91% approval rating Biden received in exit polls for the 2020 election.
The Wall Street Journal poll was conducted Aug. 24-28 among 1,500 registered voters.
