Democratic candidate for U.S. president Kamala Harris and Republican Donald Trump remain in a tight race in the country's seven battleground states two days before the U.S. national election, according to the final New York Times/Siena College poll.
The opinion poll showed Vice President Kamala Harris with marginal leads in Nevada, North Carolina and Wisconsin and former President Donald Trump just ahead in Arizona. The two are in close races in Michigan, Georgia and Pennsylvania, according to the poll, which surveyed 7,879 likely voters in the seven states from Oct. 24 to Nov. 2.
In all seven states, the matchups were within the poll's 3.5% margin of error.
About 40% of the respondents had already voted and Harris led among those voters by 8 percentage points, while Trump leads with voters who have said they are very likely to vote but have not yet done so, the poll found.
The tied race in Pennsylvania shows Trump gaining momentum in a state Harris had led by four percentage points in all prior New York Times polls, the outlet said.
Both candidates are campaigning in battleground states this weekend, with Trump set to appear in Pennsylvania, North Carolina and Georgia on Sunday, while Harris will campaign in Michigan.
But in Iowa, a new poll released on Saturday, conducted by Ann Selzer for the Des Moines Register/Mediacom, showed Harris surpassed Trump in the state he won in 2016 and 2020, likely thanks to women voters, responsible for the turnaround.
The poll of 808 likely voters, who were surveyed Oct. 28-31, has Harris leading Trump 47%-44% in Iowa, which has been trending deeply Republican in recent years. It is within the 3.4 % margin of error, but it marked a turnaround from a September Iowa Poll that had Trump with a 4-point lead, the newspaper reported.
"The poll shows that women, particularly those who are older or who are politically independent, are driving the late shift toward Harris," the Register said.
Kamala Harris appears on SNL
(Courtesy of Yes)
Trump won Iowa in his past two presidential campaigns by more than 9% in 2016 and 8% in 2020.
The Trump campaign released a memo from its chief pollster and its chief data consultant calling the Des Moines Register poll "a clear outlier," and saying that an Emerson College poll - also released Saturday - more closely reflected the state of the Iowa electorate.
The Emerson College Polling/RealClearDefense survey of a similar number of likely voters Nov. 1-2 had a starkly different result, with Trump leading Harris by 10%. This poll also has a 3.4% margin of error.
The Emerson College survey had Trump with strong leads over Harris among men and independents, while Harris was performing well with those under the age of 30.
Whoever wins Iowa will collect six Electoral College votes. A total of 270 are needed to capture the White House. Both parties have been concentrating their efforts during the closing days of their campaigns on "battleground" states such as North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin.
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