Harris and Trump neck-and-neck in polls with early voting under way

More than 1.4 million people have now voted in the presidential election, as Kamala Harris and Donald Trump continue to crisscross the country in the final stretch of a neck-and-neck campaign.

Their vice-presidential picks, JD Vance and Tim Walz, also faced off this week in the only vice-presidential debate of this cycle. But initial polls suggested voters saw the debate as a draw, without clear impact on the race.

The race is similarly close in the four other battleground states, Nevada, North Carolina, Georgia, and Arizona.

One slight exception may be in Pennsylvania, Cohn wrote. Polls showed Harris leading in the state by about 2 points after the 10 September debate, but now the race there was essentially tied, he wrote.

When Joe Biden won Arizona in 2020, he carried Latino voters by nearly 25 points. Four high-quality polls released this week showed Harris leading among Hispanic voters by no more than 12 points, Cohn noted. A national poll from NBC News/Telemundo/CNBC found Harris leading among Hispanic voters 54%-40%. Biden won 59% of the Hispanic vote in 2020.

Hispanic voters are not a monolith and Trump and Biden may be targeting different parts of the demographic. A Pew analysis found Biden won college-educated Hispanic voters 69% to 30% in 2020. But among non-college educated Hispanics, he won a much narrower 55% to 41%.

Recent polling from the non-partisan Cook Political Report also found that the race was essentially tied. But its analysis did show some good signs for Harris.

A plurality of voters now think Harris will win the election, with 46% saying so compared to 39% for Trump.

There were also some encouraging signs for Harris on the economy, the Cook Political Report found. While Trump continues to lead among voters who believe he is better equipped to handle the economy, voters are evenly split on who would be better to get inflation under control. In August, Trump had a 48%-42% advantage on the issue.