Former President Donald Trump has posted his largest national lead over Vice President Kamala Harris in more than a month, a sign that support for the Republican hasn’t been dented among likely voters following Tuesday’s first, and perhaps only, presidential debate.
A new survey of 2,390 likely voters conducted by Rasmussen pegs Trump at 49% to Harris’s 47%, with just 1% preferring an alternative candidate and 2% remaining undecided. The results are good news for President Trump on a number of fronts. In addition to not being bogged down by a mostly panned debate performance on Tuesday, he is benefiting from the end of Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.’s campaign and subsequent removal from state ballots; even if the independent former candidate, who endorsed Trump, can’t extricate himself from swing state ballots, the poll shows that voters are becoming aware he is no longer in the race and throwing their support to Trump.
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In addition, Vice President Harris appears to have hit a ceiling among voters following an extended honeymoon period she enjoyed for weeks after suddenly leading Democrats’ national ticket. She was buoyed through a national convention that kept the spotlight on her and Tim Walz, the Minnesota governor turned running mate, and continued to draw attention away from President Trump among national media outlets focused on probing her policy positions. Now, voters appear to be indicating they have grown tired of her vague pledges to grow jobs and restrict price hikes, sentiments a few expressed following Tuesday’s debate.
To be sure, Rasmussen’s results don’t incorporate reactions to the debate, which Trump allies accuse moderators of unfairly manipulating to portray him in a negative light. Respondents were queried between September 5th and 8th. The margin of error of +/- 3% means President Trump will also need to see more national polls presenting him with a lead in order to feel confident that his pole position is intact.
With 53 days to go before Election Day, a mudslinging slog is quickly becoming the norm between both camps. President Trump jumped on stories about migrants eating pets and wildlife in Springfield, Ohio, accusing Harris of allowing the immigration crisis to spiral out of control. Harris in turn has worked to define Sen. J.D. Vance (R-OH), Trump’s running mate, in an unfavorable light following comments about “childless cat ladies” running the Democratic Party. Vance has gone on offense, highlighting Walz’s abandonment of his National Guard battalion and subsequent run for Congress as a glaring example of “stolen valor.” During a joint interview, the only one conducted by Harris since jumping into the race, she defended herself in light of media investigations showing she previously took extremely far-left positions on immigration, economics, and other matters before running for president.
“I think the most important and most significant aspect of my policy perspective and decisions is my values have not changed. You mentioned the Green New Deal. I have always believed, and I have worked on it, that the climate crisis is real, that it is an urgent matter to which we should apply metrics that include holding ourselves to deadlines around time,” Harris told CNN’s Dana Bash. “We did that with the Inflation Reduction Act. We have set goals for the United States of America and by extension the globe around when we should meet certain standards for reduction of greenhouse gas emissions as an example.”
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