Harris trails Biden, Clinton vs. Trump at this stage of race

Vice President Harris, for all her momentum since becoming the Democratic presidential nominee, is behind where President Biden and Hillary Clinton stood at this point in their own battles against former President Trump during the 2020 and 2016 presidential races. 

Harris is outpacing Trump in national polls kept by the FiveThirtyEight political website with 47 percent support to 44 percent with 62 days to go before the election.

But Biden had a bigger lead by that measurement in 2020. He was ahead of then-President Trump by 7 points, 50 percent to 43 percent, at this point in the 2020 race, according to FiveThirtyEight.

Clinton, running in 2016 at the end of former President Obama’s second term in office, was ahead of Trump with 42 percent support to 38 percent, according to the same data, at this stage of that race.

The RealClearPolitics polling average shows a similar trend to the one from FiveThirtyEight.

Its polling average has Harris ahead of Trump nationally by 2 points.  

But at this point in 2020, Biden was ahead of Trump by 7 points — 49 percent support to 42 percent. In 2016, the RealClearPolitics national average of polls also showed Clinton ahead of Trump with 46 percent support to his 42 percent. 

Harris is also trailing among some key demographics in comparison to where Biden stood when he defeated Trump in 2020.

While Harris has shown polling gains among Black voters since becoming the Democratic standard-bearer, a Suffolk University poll released Tuesday found her winning a big margin, but a smaller one than those enjoyed by Biden and Clinton.

The poll, which surveyed 1,000 likely voters, found Harris winning 76 percent of the Black vote compared to 12 percent for Trump. But a similar survey conducted by Suffolk in early September 2020 showed Biden with 82 percent of support from Black voters compared to 4 percent for Trump. During the same time period in 2016, Suffolk revealed that Clinton had an 88-point lead among Black voters over Trump, 92 percent to 4 percent. 

Similarly, a Reuters/Ipsos poll released this week showed Harris with a 13-point lead over Trump with Hispanic voters. In 2020, a Quinnipiac University poll taken after both the Democratic and Republican conventions showed Biden leading Trump with 56 percent support to 36 percent among Hispanic voters. A Quinnipiac poll from 2016 reported that those voters backed Clinton 50-33 percent. 

Scott Tranter, the director of data science at Decision Desk HQ, said the polling highlights that “it’s not in the bag” for Harris. 

“She’s had a great six weeks,” Tranter said of Harris. “I’d rather be her than him but I’m not betting the house.” 

To be sure, Harris has seen her number bounce up with some groups, and she is in a much better position than President Biden was before he dropped out of the race and endorsed his vice president.

An ABC/Ipsos survey released this week, for example, showed that Harris is leading Trump with 54 percent support to 41 percent among women, the same percentage Clinton received according to exit polls in 2016. Before the Democratic Party gathered in Chicago last month, Harris was up by 6 points with women.  

Exit polls in 2020 showed that women supported Biden over Trump 57 percent to 42 percent. 

Biden was trailing Trump in the seven swing states likely to determine the election’s winner. Since entering the race, Harris has closed those gaps, making Nevada, Arizona, Georgia and North Carolina competitive. Some polls have had her ahead in Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania.

Polling averages for those three states kept by Decision Desk HQ and The Hill show Harris with the lead, though it is close. In Pennsylvania, she leads by only seven-tenths of a percentage point in the polling average.

While Harris didn’t see a bounce coming out of the Democratic National Convention, the increasing support from women shown in polls has energized some in the party.

“Harris seems to still be on an upward trajectory, and she’s already ahead nationally and in most battlegrounds,” said Democratic strategist Christy Setzer. “I’ll take it!”

“There’s plenty of time to get to and surpass Biden’s 2020 performance,” she added. 

Democratic strategist Basil Smikle, who served as the executive director of the New York State Democratic Party, said Harris still has time to better her standing.

“She can make up some of this ground,” Smikle said, adding that both Clinton and Biden were “known quantities” to the electorate. “It’s a difficult but not insurmountable challenge.”

He said one of the most striking metrics — to counter the comparison of Harris’s standing with that of her Democratic predecessors — has been the sheer volume of fundraising, much of which has come from a significant population of first-time donors who are looking to be part of a movement. 

“There’s a willingness not only to get to know her but to also be a part of something that is bigger than her,” he said. 

Still, Smikle said the campaign has done a good job at managing expectations, with two months to go until Election Day. 

“It’s important to maintain almost an underdog status” in the remaining weeks of the campaign, he said. 

Democratic strategist and pollster Fernand Amandi said Harris “has performed so flawlessly” in recent weeks. Still, he called the polling comparisons “troubling.” 

“The fact that Trump has been in self-sabotage, worst-candidate-ever mode and the polls still are as close as they are, is remarkable,” Amandi said. “If any Democrat says they’re not concerned between now and Nov. 5th, they’re lying.”

Brett Samuels contributed