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Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump are reportedly in a dead heat in two crucial battleground states, according to a new poll released on Thursday (September 19).
The two candidates are reportedly tied at 49% in Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, while Harris has a five-point lead in Michigan in the Marist institute for Public Opinion poll.
“Pennsylvania is attracting the most attention of the Rust Belt states from the presidential candidates — and with good reason,” said Marist Institute Director Lee Miringoff.
“It’s the biggest prize in the region [with 19 electoral votes] and the most competitive,” he added. “Winning Pennsylvania doesn’t guarantee the White House but it goes a long way.”
Harris leads Trump by a 12-point margin (55% to 43%) among female voters while the former president has a 10-point edge (54% to 44%) among male voters.
Harris is also reported to be leading Trump by a 51% to 45% margin among all voters, as well as 47% to 41% among Independents, in the Morning Consult poll published on Tuesday (September 17). The vice president also has the support of 94% of Democrats and 93% of voters who previously supported President Joe Biden's campaign in 2020.
"A majority of likely voters — including 1 in 5 Republicans — believe Harris won the debate, and performance appears to be crystalizing her national lead over the former president," said Eli Yokley, political analyst at Morning Consult, in an emailed statement shared by Axios.
Last week, a flash poll conducted by SQL Server Reporting Services (SSRS) showed that the majority of voters who watched the debate believed Harris outperformed Trump. Harris' performance was favored by 63% of respondents, which outpaced expectations for her and Biden's performance against Trump in a previous debate held in July, prior to the president ending his re-election campaign.
The same voters were evenly split at 50% on which candidate would perform the strongest prior to the debate. Additionally, 96% of Harris supporters said their candidate had a better performance while a smaller 69% majority of Trump's supporters believed he had a stronger showing.
The former president claimed he did a "great job" in what he called an "unfair" and "rigged" presidential debate Harris broadcasted and moderated by ABC News. Trump called into FOX News' morning show FOX & Friends and claimed "it was three on one" after he was fact checked by ABC News moderators Linsey Davis and David Muir several times.
"I thought I did a great job," Trump said.
“It was a rigged deal, as I assumed it would be, because when you looked at the fact that they were correcting everything and not correcting with her,” he added.
“It was a three-on-one — that’s OK, I’ve had worse odds before, but never so obvious,” Trump said of the moderators. “They’re dishonest. I think ABC took a big hit last night … They ought to take away their license for the way they did that.”
Davis and Muir corrected Trump a total of four times, which many Republicans perceived as a lack of impartiality, yet the former president still believed he had a strong performance.
“I’ve been told I’m a good debater,” Trump said. “I think it was one of my better debates, maybe my best debate.”