Recent national polls have shown a general shift in the presidential election toward Vice President Kamala Harris. American Strategies’ most recent national poll shows a similar shift with Harris getting 46 percent of the national vote and Donald Trump getting 41 percent. Our last poll in April showed a much tighter race, with President Biden at 39 percent. Our new poll shows that this shift is due to Harris consolidating the “typical” Democratic base. Compared to our national poll in April, Harris has made gains over Biden among African American, Hispanic, and Asian respondents, and younger voters. Harris is not taking votes from Trump among younger voters; rather, Harris is consolidating voters who supported third party candidates or were undecided. Among African American, Hispanic, and Asian voters, the shift toward Harris does come at the expense of Trump’s vote share.
Based on traditional voting trends, we would expect that people of color and younger voters to be more likely to vote for the Democratic Presidential candidate. In the April national poll, however, we found that these groups were either undecided or split 50-50 between Biden and Trump. Respondents aged 18 -29, a traditional Democratic base, favored Trump ahead of Biden (37% to 30%). While this is a small sample size (n = 110), the results were congruous with other polls published at that time. Our August polls show a 15% increase in support for Harris among younger voters while Trump gained 2% more support in the same period. We see similar trends with African American, Hispanic, and Asian voters who are supporting Harris in higher numbers.
Among young voters the Democratic support is not coming at the cost of Republican support. This suggests that Trump is not losing voters to Harris; rather, third party and undecided respondents are shifting towards supporting Harris at high rates. Moreover, there is a general decrease in third party and undecided support. In the April edition of American Strategies’ national poll, 23 percent of respondents said they were undecided or choosing a third-party candidate. But in the August poll, that number has dropped to 13 percent. That 10% is moving towards Harris and this is where she is gaining ground. The shift toward Harris among Voters of Color does come at the expense of Trump, with his vote share among these voters decreasing by 14-points, with 9-points of Harris’s shift coming from undecided or third-party supporters.
Every minority group that American Strategies measured shifts toward Harris, and away from Trump, at double-digit rates. While Trump has lost some support from minority groups, he has not lost his base. He is still polling well amongst White voters who make up a large part of his base, and has since gained 10-points among White voters according to the August survey. We see a similar trend in the previous demographics here where Harris has not lost White voters, but rather Trump consolidated third-party and undecided voters from the group.
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