By: Summer

Swing state poll shows presidential candidate closing the gap in four crucial battlegrounds after RFK Jr dropped out.

New polls show that Kamala Harris is favored to win in three out of four crucial swing states she brought back into play after taking over from Joe Biden.

The vice president is leading Donald Trump in Georgia and Nevada by two percent and Arizona by one percent, and trailing in North Carolina by one percent.

These four states appeared out of reach before President Biden dropped out of the race on July 21 in favor of his vice president, but they are now winnable for the Democrats.

The polls by Beacon Research and Shaw & Company Research for Fox News, done after the DNC and Robert F Kennedy Jr dropped out, showed how Harris redrew the electoral map over the past month.

To stay president, Biden needed to win all of Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania, all of which looked like they favored Trump.

‘These results show Harris has succeeded at expanding the electoral map,’ pollster Chris Anderson said in his analysis for Fox News.

‘When Biden was at the top of the ticket, the only pathway to an electoral college victory for the Democrat ticket was a sweep of the blue wall states of Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania.

‘That’s no longer the case with these Sun Belt states in play.’

Michigan and Wisconsin now appear safe for Harris, but Pennsylvania could go either way, heightening the importance of states like Arizona and Georgia.

The Beacon/Shaw poll showed how much Harris improved the prospects of a Democratic victory that looked faint after Biden’s June 27 debate disaster.

Beyond the top-line numbers, they showed how Harris boosted Democratic support among black and Hispanic voters—which notably waned for Biden—plus better numbers among young people and even Americans over 65.

Previous Fox News-sponsored surveys from earlier this year had Biden well behind Trump in each state, to the point that polling was much less frequent.

He was down five percent in both Arizona and Nevada in June, six percent in Georgia in April, and five percent in North Carolina in February.

The new poll results mirrored those of the 2020 election, in which Biden only lost North Carolina, and all the results were by less than 100,000 votes.

The poll is one of the first since RFK Jr. dropped out of the race and endorsed Trump last week. Though three-quarters of voters who said they had a favorable view of him backed Trump, the full effect of his exit is still yet to be seen.

Harris improved support among black voters from Biden’s to 79 percent, 56 percent among Hispanic citizens, 55 percent of those under 30, and 51 percent among voters 65 and over—all averaged across the four polls.

Women preferred Harris by 11 percent, men backed Trump by the same amount, and independents favored Harris by six percent.

Voters surveyed said the economy (41 percent), immigration (14 percent), and abortion (13 percent) were the biggest issues for them.

Arizona was the outlier, with just 37 percent ranking the economy number one and instead being slightly more worried about immigration and abortion at 16 percent each. 

Healthcare and ‘election integrity’ were distant fourth and fifth concerns, and voters favored Harris.

Trump led Harris on who voters thought would better manage the economy, 53 to 45 percent, and was far ahead on immigration, 57 to 41 percent.

Harris was trusted more on abortion but down 44 to 52 percent on handling the Israeli invasion of Gaza.

The question is whether Harris can maintain and build on her improving poll results with last week’s Democratic National Convention in the rear-view. 

‘Campaigns experience a bump in poll numbers after their convention, and that typically dissipates in the month following — and that could be what happens here, but this isn’t a traditional campaign,’ Anderson said.

‘A lot of people thought Harris received a bump after Biden dropped out, but that has endured.’

Source: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13791063/Swing-state-poll-shows-presidential-candidate-closing-gap-four-crucial-battlegrounds-RFK-Jr-dropped-out.html