Kamala Harris dips in key states, making US election contest a toss-up

Stan Gilliland/EPA/AAP by Adrian Beaumont, The University of Melbourne The United States presidential election will be held on November 5. In analyst Nate Silver’s aggregate of national polls, Democrat Kamala Harris leads Republican Donald Trump by 49.3–46.5, a slight gain for Trump since last Monday, when Harris led by 49.3–46.2. Joe Biden’s final position before his withdrawal as Democratic candidate on July 21 was a national poll deficit against Trump of 45.2–41.2. The US president isn’t elected by the national popular vote, but by the Electoral College, in which each state receives electoral votes equal to its federal House seats (population based) and senators (always two). Almost all states award their electoral votes as winner-takes-all, and it takes 270 electoral votes to win (out of 538 total). Relative to the national popular vote, the Electoral College is biased to Trump, with Harris needing at least a two-point popular vote win to be the Electoral College favourite in Silver’s model. Last Monday, Harris led by one to two points in Pennsylvania (19 electoral votes), Michigan (15), Wisconsin (ten) and Nevada (six). In the last week, Trump has gained in all these states in Silver’s aggregates, reducing Harris’ lead to about one...