These new numbers are just… wow!

| 3:47 pm EDT August 8, 2024
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Last night I pointed out that Kamala Harris had finally pulled slightly ahead in the RealClearPolitics polling average, the last major average where Donald Trump had been clinging to a small lead. At this point Harris is now ahead in every major average. But where is this headed?

If you want to know where a race is right now, you look at the polling averages. But if there’s a sea change going on like the one we’re seeing right now, and you’re trying to figure out where things might be headed next, it would be interesting to look at the top of the range.

Most polls have Kamala Harris ahead of Trump by one to four points, while a few other polls show a tied race or Trump slightly ahead. But the new Marquette University poll, which is considered one of the most accurate, now says that Harris is six points ahead of Trump. For that matter, when RFK Jr is included as a polling option, Harris is ahead of Trump by eight points. Wow.

Again, this is the top of the range. You don’t look at your candidate’s best poll number and say “That’s where we’re at now.” That would be delusional. But when the polls are trending strongly in your candidate’s direction, you can look at that top number (if it’s from a legitimate pollster) and say maybe that’s where we’ll be in a few weeks.

Six points sounds like a blowout, right? It is. But at the same time, Joe Biden won by five points in 2020, and that was barely enough to carry the Electoral College. So six points is no time to rest your laurels in a presidential election. Six points is a time to roll up our sleeves and try to drive that number even higher. Remember, there will always be Republican election antics. And as we successfully saw in 2020, the way to overcome them is to win by a bigger margin than they can cheat by.

And again, Kamala Harris is not currently ahead by six points. On average right now, the polls have her ahead by about two points, which is not enough. But with the positive reaction to Tim Walz still coming in, and the Democratic National Convention coming up, I would say that a realistic goal would be for Harris to be ahead by six points in the polling averages by the end of August. Now let’s go help make it happen 🙂