Pennsylvania polls show Kamala Harris leading Donald Trump, but not by much

WASHINGTON — A bevy of new polls released in the last 24 hours have Kamala Harris either leading or tied with Donald Trump in the crucial battleground state of Pennsylvania — though none shows the former president ahead, as he was before President Joe Biden dropped out.

Polls from the New York Times/Siena College/Philadelphia Inquirer, Franklin & Marshall College and Quinnipiac University gave Harris an advantage over Trump — all of Harris' advantages, however, were within the polls' margin of error. The Washington Post survey showed a negligible 1-point lead for Harris, and the Marist College survey had the race as a dead heat.

Even as surveys showed that Harris handily won the recent debate with Trump, she has been unable to open any significant distance from her opponent, who carried Pennsylvania and the other Blue Wall northern battleground states in 2016 en route to the White House but lost all three to Biden, a native of Scranton, Pa., four years ago.

Harris has eliminated Biden's deficit in state polling; at the time he ended his reelection bid, the Real Clear Politics poll average had Trump ahead of Biden by 4.5 percentage points.

In the Times/Siena/Inquirer poll of likely voters, Harris led Trump, 50% to 46%. As Democrats need to do, she had large margins in Allegheny County (58%-37%), Philadelphia (79%-16%) and the Philadelphia suburbs (58%-39%) while running neck and neck in the Lehigh Valley (Trump led, 49%-48%). Trump led in the Central (67%-31%), Western (55%-42%) and South-Central (52%-42%) parts of the state.

Those results were similar to Quinnipiac's poll of likely Pennsylvania voters, which had Harris in the lead by 51% to 46%. What was most notable about the Quinnipiac survey was that it showed Trump's lead on economic issues all but dissipated; he was favored by only 50% to 48% over Harris.

The Franklin & Marshall poll of registered Keystone State voters gave Harris a 49% to 45% advantage.

Meanwhile, the Washington Post survey had the race virtually tied, with Harris ahead, 48% to 47%. But while voters said protecting democracy was their top issue — even over the economy — Harris had only a slight advantage, 48% to 45%, even as Trump continues to falsely claim the race was stolen from him in Pennsylvania and elsewhere and is under indictment for trying to overturn the results of the 2020 election.

And the Marist poll of likely Pennsylvania voters showed an actual dead heat, with both candidates at 49%.

"Pennsylvania is attracting the most attention of the Rust Belt states from the presidential candidates and with good reason," said Lee Miringoff, director of the Marist Institute for Public Opinion. "It's the biggest prize in the region and the most competitive. Winning Pennsylvania doesn't guarantee the White House, but it goes a long way."

Both the Times and Post polls show Trump doing better among Black voters in Pennsylvania than he did in 2020. Harris led Trump among Black voters by 82% to 13% in the Times poll and 78% to 17% in the Post poll. While the margins are high, they are significantly below Biden's 92% to 7% edge in CNN exit polls four years earlier.

The Times/Siena/Inquirer survey of 1,082 likely Pennsylvania voters was conducted Sept. 11-16 with a margin of error of plus or minus 4.3 percentage points. Quinnipiac's poll of 1,331 likely Pennsylvania voters was conducted Sept. 12-16 and had a margin of error of plus or minus 2.7 percentage points. The F&M survey of 890 registered Pennsylvania voters was conducted Sept. 4-15 and had a margin of error of plus or minus 4.1 percentage points.The Washington Post poll of 1,003 likely Pennsylvania voters was conducted Sept. 12-16 with a margin of error of plus or minus 3.6 percentage points.

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