Former President Donald Trump appears to be seeing impressive gains in support among independents and Latino voters, about 14 points, over Vice President Kamala Harris in a new poll.
Trump, 78, led Harris among independents in the multicandidate race by three points, 49% to 46%, outvoting her. August poll He lost to Harris, 59, by 11 points, 48% to 37%. According to a new NPR/PBS News/Marist poll.
Between the August and September polls, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who had a 12% approval rating in the previous poll, dropped out of the race and endorsed Trump. Moreover, Harris' “honeymoon” following her surprise nomination appears to be starting to wane.
Among Latino voters, Trump led by 4 points with 51% to Harris' 47%, a dramatic reversal from August, when Harris led by 15 points with 54% to Trump's 39%.
“When Trump and Harris face off in Philadelphia, the stakes are extremely high because the race is so close,” explained Dr. Lee M. Miringoff, president of the Marist Institute for Public Opinion Research.
“On most issues that matter to voters, the candidates are separated by single digits. But voters who value honesty overwhelmingly support Harris, while voters who want strong leadership largely support Trump. Will that be the case on Wednesday morning?”
The poll results were released just hours before Trump and Harris were set to debate on ABC News at the National Constitution Center in Philadelphia.
According to the poll, about 70% of Americans say they will watch the debates, and while 30% of registered voters believe the debates will influence who they support, 69% feel the debates will probably not help.
Another positive for Trump is that he closed the gap to Harris by two points in national contests, giving the vice president a slight lead.
In the most recent survey of voters in multicandidate races, Harris beat Trump 49% to 48%. In August, she was leading voters in multicandidate races 48% to 45%.
For comparison, In a July survey Among registered voters, President Trump was projected to beat President Biden 43% to 42%.
A September survey showed Harris' lead over Trump among likely voters widened to 51% to 48%.
A September poll also showed Harris leading Trump among women by 15 points, while Trump led Harris among men by 12 points.
In the multi-candidate race, Harris won the support of 74% of black voters, compared with 24% for Trump.
Harris also received slightly higher ratings from voters in terms of favorability, with 47% favorable and 46% unfavorable, compared with 45% favorable and 50% unfavorable for Trump.
When asked which candidate would be most likely to support change, 52% chose Harris, compared with 47% who chose Trump. Similarly, 52% said Harris is more likely to care about ordinary Americans than Trump (47%).
On ideology, 47% said Harris is too liberal, 41% said her tendencies are “about right,” and 9% said she is too conservative, while 43% said Trump is too conservative, 43% said she is about right, and 10% said Trump, a Republican, is too liberal.
In the general congressional popular vote, 46% said they supported the Democrats and 45% said they supported the Republicans.
Broken down by issue, Trump received high marks on immigration (53%), the economy (52%) and the Middle East (51%), but Harris led on abortion (56%).
Heading into Tuesday night's debate, Harris is boasting that she is leading Trump by 1.9 percentage points in the latest national polls. RealClearPolitics Poll Aggregation. RCP's battleground state map shows Trump with an advantage.
The NPR/PBS News/Marist poll was conducted Sept. 3-5 among 1,529 adults and has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.2 percentage points. The margin of error among the subset of 1,413 registered voters was plus or minus 3.3 percentage points.
