New US election poll: Harris and Trump neck and neck nationwide

A week and a half before the US presidential election, a new poll puts Kamala Harris and Donald Trump neck and neck across the country. The poll published Friday by the New York Times (NYT) and Siena College showed 48 percent approval for both the Democratic and Republican candidates. Compared to the survey published by the newspaper at the beginning of October, Harris lost her national lead of three percentage points over Trump.

The national result does not determine the outcome of the presidential election, but the survey results are seen as an indicator of the overall mood. The “NYT” viewed the result as disadvantageous for Vice President Harris: In the last presidential election, Democratic candidates were in the lead nationwide, even if this did not automatically mean election victory.

The survey also showed that the majority are pessimistic about the current development of the USA. Only 28 percent of those surveyed believed that the USA was moving in the right direction. Such a result is usually a negative sign for Harris’ ruling party, according to the “NYT” analysis.

In the USA, the president is elected indirectly by a college of 538 electors sent by the individual states. At least 270 of these voters are required to win. Due to this peculiarity, the decision is likely to be made in only seven US states, the so-called swing states, where the election outcome is particularly close.

For these seven states – Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin – the polls have been predicting an extremely close neck-and-neck race between Harris and Trump for weeks.

The outcome of the election on November 5th is seen as pointing the way for the future of US democracy and the future foreign policy of the world power. Trump wants to return to the White House after his first term in office (2017-2021) and his election defeat in 2020.

The incumbent Vice President Harris took over the candidacy after incumbent Joe Biden resigned at the end of July. She would be the first woman to head the world’s largest economic and military power.