Yesterday, I argued that President Biden withdrawing and Vice President Harris taking his place as the presumptive Democratic nominee has resulted in a rebooted race. Not only because Biden’s age been removed as a central campaign issue but because, unlike Biden or Trump, Harris still has the ability to change public perception.
Looking at the early polling, not much has changed on the surface. There are now several polls conducted since Biden quit the race and Trump still has a modest lead:
Domenico Montanaro‘s deeper dive into the NPR/Marist poll (“Presidential race hits a reset with Harris vs. Trump“) though, shows the effect I was expecting.
The 2024 presidential campaign has hit a reset with more voters moving into the undecided camp now that Kamala Harris is potentially the Democratic nominee, a new NPR/PBS News/Marist poll finds.[emphasis mine]
Harris and former President Donald Trump are statistically tied, but 1 in 5 independents, including almost 3 in 10 independent women, now say they are undecided. So these next few weeks will be vital for Harris to reintroduce herself before views solidify.
The survey also found that Democrats are feeling better about their chances now, and Black voters, in particular, say they are more fired up to vote.
Democrats are more energized, which you’d expect after weeks of doom and gloom from party elders about Biden’s inability to win. Independents haven’t yet moved her way. But here’s the key:
In a head-to-head matchup, Trump gets 46%, while Harris is at 45%, with 9% undecided. In Marist’s survey earlier this month, just 2% were undecided between Trump and Biden. [emphasis mine]
and, it thus follows
With more folks undecided, there’s an opportunity for Harris that Biden did not seem to have. It’s another key indication of just how much of a restart this move is for the campaign.
Even deeper:
There’s no guarantee that these people will overwhelmingly move to Harris’ camp, of course. But they’ve had eight years of exposure to Trump and clearly don’t like what they see. And they now have a new option that isn’t the 81-year-old they also didn’t like.
