Heading into Tuesday night's first and potentially only presidential debate between Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic nominee, and Republican former President Donald Trump, the race couldn't be tighter in Michigan.
Late last month a Free Press poll showed Trump ahead by the slimmest of margins — 47% to 46% for Harris in a head-to-head matchup and well within the statewide survey's plus or minus 4-percentage-point margin of error.
But you don't have to take our word for it alone. Some polls have shown Harris ahead and others have had Trump leading in the race for the state's 15 Electoral College votes which will help determine the winner of the Nov. 5 election. But virtually every poll done of Michigan since the Democratic National Convention ended last month has shown a razor-thin margin between the two, meaning the debate offers both a chance to attract some of the still undecided voters (that Free Press poll showed 7% undecided in the head-to-head matchup.)
For what it's worth, nationally Harris appears to have a lead of anywhere from about 1% to 3% over Trump , but because of the way presidential elections are structured — with each state and Washington D.C. awarding a certain number of Electoral College votes, with 270 needed to become president — and most states' results considered all but a foregone conclusion, in reality the outcome will come down to how voters in a handful of more evenly divided swing states, including Michigan, decide.
Here are the polling averages in Michigan according to several websites that track and aggregate polling data, as of Monday afternoon:
- FiveThirtyEight.com: Harris 46.8% (+1.9), Trump 44.9%.
- RealClearPolitics.com: Harris 48.3% (+1.2), Trump 47.1%.
- 270towin.com: Harris 47.8% (+2.6), Trump 45.2%.
They're different, by the way, because each site has its own methodology for which polls they aggregate and over what period of time but they're generally a good bit in line with each other in terms of what voter surveys are showing.
And in Michigan, what they're showing is a spread that is decidedly in too-close-to-call territory, especially given Trump's knack for outperforming the polls. In 2020, for instance, Democratic President Joe Biden beat Trump by 2.8 percentage points in Michigan on his way to winning nationally, but polls on average had Biden ahead by more than 4 points going into Election Day. Four years before that, Trump won Michigan by two-tenths of a percentage point, even though polls on average had Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton ahead by more than 3 points on Election Day.
It's a very similar story across the other handful of states − Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Arizona, Nevada, North Carolina and Georgia − that will likely decide the race. Here's what those polling averages look like in those states as of Monday, as well as the number of electoral votes each has and how each voted four years ago:
Pennsylvania (19 EC votes, 2020 result: Biden 50%-48.8% +1.2)
- FiveThirtyEight.com: Harris 46.7% (+1), Trump 45.7%.
- RealClearPolitics.com: Harris 47.6% (tie), Trump 47.6%.
- 270towin.com: Harris 47.4% (+0.4), Trump 47%.
Wisconsin (10 EC votes, 2020 result: Biden 49.6%-48.9% +0.7)
- FiveThirtyEight.com: Harris 47.7% (+2.8), Trump 44.9%.
- RealClearPolitics.com: Harris 48.7% (+1.5), Trump 47.2%.
- 270towin.com: Harris 48.6% (+2.6), Trump 46%.
Arizona (11 EC votes, 2020 result: Biden 49.4%-49.1% +0.3)
- FiveThirtyEight.com: Trump 46.3% (+0.6), Harris 45.7%.
- RealClearPolitics.com: Trump 48.4% (+1.6), Harris 46.8%.
- 270towin.com: Trump 48.4% (+2), Harris 46.4%.
Nevada (6 EC votes, 2020 result: Biden 50.1%-47.7% +2.4)
- FiveThirtyEight.com: Harris 46% (+0.5), Trump 45.5%.
- RealClearPolitics.com: Harris 48% (+0.6), Trump 47.4%.
- 270towin.com: Harris 47.8% (+0.6), Trump 47.2%.
North Carolina (16 EC votes, 2020 result: Trump 50%-48.7% +1.3)
- FiveThirtyEight.com: Harris 46.4% (+0.3), Trump 46.1%.
- RealClearPolitics.com: Trump 47.9% (+0.1), Harris 47.8%.
- 270towin.com: Harris 47.8% (+0.5), Trump 47.3%.
Georgia (16 EC votes, 2020 result: Biden 49.5%-49.2% +0.3)
- FiveThirtyEight.com: Trump 46.5% (+0.5), Harris 46%.
- RealClearPolitics.com: Trump 48.3% (+0.3), Harris 48%.
- 270towin.com: Trump 47.6% (+1.2), Harris 46.4%.
Contact Todd Spangler: tspangler@freepress.com. Follow him on Twitter@tsspangler.
Editor's note: Polling averages were updated in this story Tuesday with changes made by the websites based on polling and other data added later on Monday.
This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Heading into Harris-Trump debate, here's what polls in Michigan and elsewhere say
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