Donald Trump v Kamala Harris: who’s ahead in the polls?
• On November 5th Americans will go to the polls to elect their next president. Until June 27th it seemed that the match-up would be between the same two candidates as in 2020: Joe Biden, the Democratic incumbent, and Donald Trump, his Republican predecessor in office. But that night Mr Biden delivered a disastrous debate performance. It immediately made Democrats question Mr Biden’s fitness for the task. On July 21st he bowed to pressure and withdrew from the race. He endorsed his vice-president, Kamala Harris, as the Democratic candidate.
• The results shows the latest national polling averages. Ms Harris has the support of enough delegates to the Democratic National Convention to win the nomination. She will have little time to define herself to voters and counter Mr Trump’s campaign. Mr Biden’s presidency has been associated with by high inflation, big industrial-policy bills and turmoil abroad, things which Republicans will seek to pin on Ms Harris too. But she has one clear advantage over Mr Biden: her age. At 59 she is over two decades younger than he is, and 18 years younger than Mr Trump.
• Mr Trump, meanwhile, has a dismal record: supporters tried to overturn his election loss in 2020; he faces federal charges over his alleged participation in that scheme and has been convicted of felonies for hush-money payments connected to his 2016 presidential campaign. On July 13th, at a rally in Pennsylvania, a 20-year-old man shot at Mr Trump, grazing the former president’s ear and killing a bystander. After this assassination attempt, politicians of all stripes urged allies and rivals to lower the political temperature. Mr Trump, who showed rare restraint in the aftermath of the shooting, has since returned to his divisive rhetoric in speeches.
• An average of the polls, you can also see historic polling data for Mr Biden and Mr Trump, more recent polling since Ms Harris entered the contest, and key dates in the race and candidate biographies.
