Kamala Harris’ Chances of Holding Onto Georgia: New Polls

Vice President Kamala Harris appears to be a slight underdog against former President Donald Trump in Georgia’s presidential election, according to recent polls.
President Joe Biden narrowly defeated Trump in Georgia in 2020, becoming the first Democrat to win the Peach State since former President Bill Clinton in 1992. A repeat win in Georgia this year, with Harris at the top of the ticket, could be vital to Democratic hopes of keeping control of the White House.
An internal Trump campaign survey, conducted by pollster Tony Fabrizio earlier this week and released on Thursday, shows the former president with a 5 percentage point lead over the vice president. In the poll, Trump was supported by 50 percent of likely Georgia voters, while Harris was supported by 45 percent.
Other polls show a closer race. Republican polling firm The Trafalgar Group gave Trump a one-point lead over Harris in a survey conducted on October 7 and 8. Forty-six percent of likely voters backed Trump, 45 percent backed Harris, and 9 percent were undecided or supported other candidates.
The two most recent nonpartisan polls of Georgia, by Emerson College and Redfield & Wilton Strategies, suggest that the race is dead even.
The Emerson College poll, conducted between October 5 and 8, found that each candidate was supported by 50 percent of likely voters. Trump and Harris both had 47 percent support in the Redfield & Wilton Strategies survey of likely voters, conducted from September 27 to October 2.
An average of recent polls compiled by FiveThirtyEight showed Trump with a 0.7-point lead over Harris as of late Thursday afternoon. Trump has had a slight lead in the average since September 9, one day before the candidates met for their first and likely only presidential debate in Philadelphia.
Newsweek reached out to the Harris and Trump campaigns via email for comment.
Earlier this month, voter registration data in Georgia showed that over 120,000 new voters had signed up, with nearly four times more Democrats registering than Republicans.
Georgia is one of at least seven swing states that both campaigns consider crucial to their chances of winning in November. While the battlegrounds are likely to be close contests, polls have recently shown the swing states split between the candidates.
Trump currently has a polling edge in most “Sun Belt” battlegrounds. As of Thursday, the former president had small leads in FiveThirtyEight averages in Georgia, North Carolina and Arizona, while Harris was slightly ahead in Nevada.
Meanwhile, Harris has an advantage in the “Rust Belt” swing states that form the so-called “blue wall,” with FiveThirtyEight averages showing her holding small leads in Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin on Thursday.