The Polls Are As Close As Ever Two Months Out
The election is tightening. In 2020 a handful of states decided the closest election in recent memory. In 2016 the same. Now 2024 is set to be perhaps the closest of all of them and could come down to any number of combinations in the main seven swing states with just a few minor shifts between now and election day. Let’s take stock of where we are a few months out. Nationally and in the swing states.
Kamala Harris Will Likely Win The Popular Vote
Looking at the three main polling averages, which for our purposes are ABC’s 538, Real Clear Politics, and founder and former 538 staffer Nate Silver’s independent average.
National Polling Averages:
FiveThirtyEight: Harris +2.8
Real Clear Politics: Harris +1.4
Nate Silver: Harris +2.5
All of the major polling averages have Kamala Harris winning the national popular vote fairly comfortably. It is assumed that a 3-point national average generally secures an electoral college victory give or take any weird stuff in the swing states. Notably, Kamala Harris is below that threshold, making an electoral college/popular vote split like in 2000 or 2016 increasingly likely. Which in turn makes the swing states and parsing which combinations of victories lead to electoral college victories increasingly important.
The Swing States Are All Incredibly Close
The current “swing states” are as follows: Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, North Carolina, Georgia, Arizona, and Nevada. The current polling averages in each of these states puts the closest (Pennsylvania) within half a point and all of them within a few.
Pennsylvania
FiveThirtyEight: Harris +0.7
Real Clear Politics: Tie at 47.6%
Nate Silver: Harris +0.3
Nevada
FiveThirtyEight: Harris +0.5
Real Clear Politics: Harris +0.6
Nate Silver: Harris +0.5
Arizona
FiveThirtyEight: Trump +0.5
Real Clear Politics: Trump +1.6
Nate Silver: Trump +2.1
North Carolina
FiveThirtyEight: Trump +0.8
Real Clear Politics: Trump +0.7
Nate Silver: Trump +1.1
Michigan
FiveThirtyEight: Harris +1.9
Real Clear Politics: Harris +1.2
Nate Silver: Harris +1.4
Wisconsin
FiveThirtyEight: Harris +3.0
Real Clear Politics: Harris +1.5
Nate Silver: Harris +2.2
Georgia
FiveThirtyEight: Harris +0.3
Real Clear Politics: Harris +0.1"
Nate Silver: Harris +0.1
The Tipping Point Could Be Any Number of States
There are a number of combinations of tipping point states that could come into play this election. Either candidate needs 270 electoral college votes to win, the tipping point state is the state that secures the 270 votes most easily for either candidate. In most projections Pennslyvania is the most likely tipping point state. Depending on how the rest of the map falls, it could be some combination of Georgia, North Carolina, Nevada, and Arizona. Michigan and Wisconsin are in some projections but seem to be leaning fairly blue at the moment. Where the candidates campaign and where they eventually win will matter a lot. Looking at the numbers above it is incredibly close and any of these states could be the difference in the end.
Polling Misses in Recent Elections
According to the American Association for Public Opinion Research polling in 2020 missed the mark and favored Biden by 3.9 points, which was the biggest polling error since 1980. According to an analysis by FiveThirtyEight the error was actually 5.0 points. In an environment like this an error of that magnitude would significantly impact the gap between the results and the polling.
The polls aren’t always wrong though. FiveThirtyEight found that the polls in 2022 were actually historically accurate. The polling error was D +0.8 compared to D +3.9 in 2020. Even that level of polling error in favor of Democrats would skew the results in some of the states above and flip the election potentially.
The race is incredibly close and the polls will likely be off at least a little bit. That will matter a lot.