Harris, Trump Hit Battlegrounds As Polls Signal Tight Finish

A flurry of polls released Sunday show Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump remain poised for a photo finish in this week’s presidential election, with voters narrowly split both nationally and across the pivotal swing states that will decide the election.

There were some encouraging signs for the Democratic nominee, with the final poll from ABC News and Ipsos giving Harris a 49%-46% edge nationally, while the New York Times/Siena survey released Sunday showing Harris ahead in five of seven swing states.

A poll by the Des Moines Register showing Harris with a 47%-44% lead in Iowa — a state Trump has won in each of his prior elections — was likely an outlier, but suggested the vice president could be succeeding in her efforts to make inroads with White voters in the Midwest.

Still, Harris’ advantage across all of the surveys was within the margin of error, and a NBC News poll released Sunday showed the race deadlocked 49%-49%.

Both candidates are campaigning as if the race remains on a knife’s edge: Harris spoke at a church service and is holding a campaign rally at Michigan State University, while Trump rallied in Pennsylvania and North Carolina before heading to Georgia. 

The whirlwind pace was evident as Trump in North Carolina sought to acknowledge Republican senate candidate David McCormick from the stage, only to remember the former hedge fund executive was seeking office back in Pennsylvania. 

Each candidate emphasized their competing economic platforms, especially with the polls showing at least one consensus - that the economy remains the top concern for voters. 

Data released last week showed that the US economy continued to grow as inflation cooled and the US added jobs, albeit at a slower-than-expected pace due to a pair of major hurricanes and strikes by aircraft machinists that weighed on employment data.

Here’s what is happening on the campaign trail:

At a rally in Lititz, Pennsylvania, Trump spent large swaths of his speech suggesting, without evidence, that the election system, polling firms and media were corrupt and conspiring against his campaign — the latest signal that the former president is gearing up to contest the results of the election if he doesn’t prevail.

The former president even suggested he shouldn’t have departed the White House after losing the 2020 election to President Joe Biden.

“I shouldn’t have left, I mean, honestly,” Trump said. “We did so well.”

Trump’s campaign has pointed to his departure to refute questions about his role in the Jan. 6, 2021, attempted insurrection and dismiss queries about whether he’d accept the results of this year’s contest.

Trump devoted copious time to denouncing early voting, even as his advisers have pointed to higher turnout among Republican early voters to suggest his campaign has momentum. He said he believed voting should only be held on Election Day, with results certified immediately that night.

“Everyone’s afraid to damn talk about it, and then they accuse you of being a conspiracy theorist,” Trump said.

Trump himself said last month that he intended to vote early, after radio host Brian Kilmeade suggested it could serve as a model to his supporters. But in recent days, Trump aides have indicated he’ll vote on Election Day.

Trump went on to say he believed the US voting system was worse than in developing countries, and complained his top campaign aides needed to spend time strategizing about challenging election procedures rather than campaign spending or rally locations.

A Harris campaign official, speaking to reporters Sunday, said Republicans are mounting a doomed challenge to a few thousand ballots in Pennsylvania purely to delay their counting and bolster any subsequent claim of fraud. The ballots will likely be counted a few days after the election now, the official said.

Trump also raised eyebrows during his remarks with a long riff about the bulletproof glass he’s now mandated to use at outdoor events following the attempted assassination in July where he was shot in the ear.

Trump commented on the amount of ballistic material surrounding his stage, at one point saying: “To get me, somebody would have to shoot through the fake news, and I don’t mind that so much.”

The former president’s campaign hastily issued a statement saying Trump’s comments weren’t intended to suggest he would accept members of the news media being targeted.

“The President’s statement about protective glass placement has nothing to do with the media being harmed, or anything else,” Trump Campaign Communications Director Steven Cheung said in a statement. “In fact, President Trump was stating that the media was in danger, in that they were protecting him and, therefore, were in great danger themselves, and should have had a glass protective shield, also,” he continued.

The Republican nominee also gave a phone interview to NBC News on Sunday and repeatedly declined to rule out controversial health policies advocated by Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the former presidential candidate who has now endorsed his campaign.

Asked about Kennedy’s statement on social media that Trump would push to remove fluoride — which is added to prevent tooth decay — from the water supply, the former president said they hadn’t spoken about the idea “but it sounds OK to me.” 

“You know, it’s possible,” Trump said.

Trump also didn’t rule out banning certain vaccines; Kennedy is a longtime vaccine skeptic despite evidence that global immunisation efforts have saved tens of millions of lives.

“I’ll make a decision, but he’s a very talented guy and has strong views,” Trump said.

Harris, who has seen Trump chip into her advantage with Black voters, visited the Greater Emmanuel Institutional Church of God’s service in Detroit and told worshipers that Black churches were essential in driving the nation’s progress.

“As a nation we face real challenges. We face real challenges, we carry real burdens, we feel real pain, and we must remember that faith combined with our actions, gives us power,” Harris said.

Trump has stressed the bite of inflation and some of Harris’ progressive social policies as he’s pursued a broader coalition of voters. Surveys suggest that Black men in particular are supporting him at a higher clip than any other Republican candidate in recent history. 

Harris asked the assembled crowd to support their shared values by turning out to vote.

“Let us turn the page and write the next chapter of our history,” she said.

Later in the afternoon, Harris visited a Black-owned business — Kuzzo’s Chicken and Waffles, a restaurant in Detroit’s Livernois district owned by former Detroit Lions player Ron Bartell. She then stopped in Elam Barber Shop in Pontiac, telling the assembled customers she was “putting it all on the field.”

A senior Harris campaign official said the team launched over 57,000 volunteer shifts on Saturday and knocked on more than 1.85 million doors through the battleground states.

The campaign did the bulk of its weekend door-knocking in Pennsylvania, which is considered the most critical swing state, where they knocked on over 807,000 doors, the official said.

Harris is planning a pair of rallies in Pittsburgh and Philadelphia to wrap up her campaign, and will be leaning heavily on her celebrity supporters to help drive attendance. 

In Pittsburgh, Katy Perry will lead a lineup that also includes D-Nice and Andra Day. At Harris’ final event in Philadelphia, Lady Gaga headlines performances that feature hometown acts such as The Roots and DJ Jazzy Jeff. Talk-show icon Oprah Winfrey and Ricky Martin are also expected to attend.

In North Carolina, the campaign is hosting a concert with singer-songwriter James Taylor and American Idol stars Fantasia Barrino and Remi Wolf. And in Atlanta, 2 Chainz and Anthony Hamilton will headline an event that includes remarks by Usher.

The celebrity outreach started early, with Harris throwing a “Tailgate for Turnout” event Sunday featuring actor Robert De Niro and former Secretary of State John Kerry, taking advantage of the crowds gathering before the Philadelphia Eagles took on the Jacksonville Jaguars.

Posing for photos in a green tent, as volunteers passed coasters and “Hotties for Harris” hats, Kerry said he was encouraged by Harris’ support from prominent Republicans and national security officials. 

“I think it’s remarkable to have more than 200 major Republican national security people stand up and say, ‘This man is dangerous and shouldn’t be president,’” Kerry said. “When has that happened before?”

Harris revealed to reporters that she submitted an absentee ballot to California, but declined to say how she voted on a pivotal ballot measure.

Proposition 36, endorsed by the state’s Republican Party, would impose harsher sentences for those convicted of repeat drug or retail theft offenses. Harris has avoided weighing in on the measure, likely seeing little political upside in wading into concerns over crime in the state that Trump has used as a cudgel during the campaign.

“I am not going to talk about the vote on that, because, honestly, it’s the Sunday before the election, and I don’t intend to create an endorsement one way or another around it,” she said.