With five weeks to go until the election63jili, the polls show a close and stable race for president.
Overall, Kamala Harris is ahead of Donald J. Trump by three percentage points in The New York Times’s average of national polls, while the race remains extraordinarily close in the seven key battleground states. No candidate enjoys a significant lead in states worth the 270 electoral votes needed to win.
National Polling Average ›By The New York Times
If you’ve read this weekly polling update before, that summary might sound pretty familiar. The polls have been remarkably steady, with no clear indications of any meaningful shift either way.
Still, there is something different about the polls this past week. It’s not a difference in the top-line numbers, but the context: This was a relatively calm week of political news, at least compared with the last few months. As a result, this might be the clearest read we’ve had of the race so far. It was arguably the first “quiet” week since Vice President Harris’s entry into the race.
Think of all that happened from late July to mid-September. Over just that short span, Ms. Harris became her party’s nominee; she selected her vice-presidential running mate; the Democrats held their convention; Ms. Harris and Mr. Trump debated; and then an assassination attempt against Mr. Trump was thwarted on Sept. 15.
At every stage, these events made it harder to be sure the polls were offering a relatively unvarnished assessment of the race. It was reasonable to wonder, for instance, whether Ms. Harris’s standing was being inflated by a series of media-driven bounces. Good news for Mr. Trump, on the other hand, could be interpreted as a sign that an earlier Harris bounce was fading.
Polling Leader If Polls miss like they did in … 2022 2020 U.S. National +3 Harris +3 Harris +1 Trump Wis. Wisconsin +2 Harris +4 Harris +8 Trump Nev. Nevada +1 Harris +4 Harris +2 Trump Mich. Michigan +1 Harris +7 Harris +4 Trump Pa. Pennsylvania +1 Harris +6 Harris +3 Trump N.C. North Carolina Even +1 Harris +4 Trump Ga. Georgia +1 Trump +1 Trump +3 Trump Ariz. Arizona +2 Trump +1 Harris +5 Trump Includes polling as of Sept. 29. See the latest polling averages »Electoral votes counting only states where a candidate leads by 3 or more:
226 Harris 219 TrumpElectoral votes if current polling translates perfectly to results (it won’t):
276 Harris 262 TrumpElectoral votes if state polls miss in the same way they did in 2020:
226 Harris 312 TrumpElectoral votes if state polls miss in the same way they did in 2022:
303 Harris 235 Trump Includes polling as of Sept. 29. See the latest polling averages »We are having trouble retrieving the article content.
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