Vice President Kamala Harris’s lead over former President Donald Trump is narrowing as the 2024 presidential race enters its final month, according to a new Yahoo News/YouGov poll. The latest figures suggest that the bump Harris received following her strong debate performance last month is fading – and a race that once seemed to give Harris an edge is now tightening.
Just after September’s presidential debate, Harris enjoyed a five-point advantage, with 50% of registered voters supporting her compared to Trump’s 45%. But in the days following Ohio Senator JD Vance’s well-received debate performance against Tim Walz last week, the numbers tell a different story. The latest poll shows Harris leading Trump by only two points, with 48% of registered voters backing her and 46% supporting Trump. When third-party candidates are included in the survey, Harris’s lead shrinks even further, showing her at 46% and Trump at 45%. Among likely voters, the race is tied at 47% for each candidate, effectively making the contest too close to call.
Figures fall within the survey’s margin of error, which hovers around three percentage points. This means that the current 48%-46% lead Harris holds could swing to a 51%-43% advantage in her favor — or even a 49%-45% Trump lead. With the margin so slim, the race remains in a statistical deadlock, mirroring earlier pre-debate numbers.
In August, both candidates were tied at 47% among likely voters, and the numbers today have returned to that level. The narrowing lead is reflected not only in the overall voter preferences but also in Harris’s favorability ratings, which have seen modest declines. Following her debate in September, Harris’s favorable rating ticked up to 49%, but it has since slipped back to 46%. Her unfavorable rating, meanwhile, has climbed to 49%, indicating that some of the gains she made post-debate may have been erased.
But the race between Harris and Trump is not purely about individual personalities. The so-called “generic ballot” question — asking voters whether they would choose a Democrat or Republican for Congress — consistently favors Democrats by three or four percentage points, according to recent Yahoo News/YouGov polls. However, this does not appear to be translating into a clear advantage for Harris in her contest with Trump.
JD Vance’s recent debate performance also seems to have played a role in shaping voter perceptions. While the immediate post-debate reaction among viewers found no clear winner between Vance and Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, more in-depth polling shows a slight edge for Vance. Forty-one percent of respondents who watched the debate or followed coverage afterward said Vance was the winner, compared to 32% for Walz. Vance was also rated positively by 59% of those polled, though his favorability remains lower than that of Walz.
Still, Vance’s solid performance seems to have resonated with the Republican base, with 38% of Americans now saying Trump made the right decision in selecting Vance as his running mate, up six points from August. The shift reflects increased confidence among Republicans in the Trump-Vance ticket, even as the broader electorate remains divided.
