Misleading Momala Momentum?

There’s no question that Kamala Harris, aka “Momala,” has had a great start to her candidacy. She coalesced the Democratic party around her, raised an incredible amount of money

However, the incredible enthusiasm surrounding her campaign can be misleading.

CNN Senior Data Reporter Harry Enten, formerly of FiveThirtyEight, presented three positive points for Trump:

1. Trump was previously underestimated by 9 points in 2016 and by 5 points in 2020 for Minnesota, Wisconsin and Michigan polls. Currently, Harris leads him in these states by under 5 points, which is within the margin of error.

2. In May, 62% of Biden’s registered voters planned on turning out and 58% of Trump’s registered voters planned on turning out in the three above states. Now, Harris gets 61% and Trump gets 60%.

3. Trump currently has an approval rating of 44%. On August 13th, 2020, he hit 41% and on August 13, 2016 he hit 33%.

Enten summed up his data as follows: “So the bottom line is yes, Kamala Harris is doing better in the polls, but there’s a long way to go. The polls can shift, the almost certain vote hasn’t actually shifted and Donald Trump is more popular today than he was at either 2016 or 2020 at this point.” (2:57–3:09)

I’m particularly curious to see the numbers after two events.

North of 150 groups are planning on protesting the Democratic National Convention (DNC) next week in Chicago over Israel-Palestine and “the U.S. government spending billions of dollars of military aid and not investing more in underresourced American communities.” Depending on how chaotic the protests and the responses to them get, there could be a lot of bad press for the Democrats, much like they received at the 1968 DNC, also held in Chicago. Trump claims to be the “law and order” candidate and a debacle at the DNC could help him out.

Interestingly, two men who protested at the 1968 do not believe 2024 will follow the same pattern. They state that “the police are much more disciplined and better trained” and “the convention was divided against itself and people were at war within families, adults for the war, kids against it” with Major Richard Daley believing that the protestors were “bad guys and scum.”

Secondly, the presidential debate on September 10th could lead to undecideds changing their votes and tipping a close election to one side. According to MSU Professor of Communication Dustin Carnahan, “some research has suggested that candidates’ debate performances can impact how they are perceived by voters, which can affect the choices of undecided voters. Additionally, a lopsided debate performance or significant gaffe committed by a candidate can have a lasting effect on candidate evaluations.”

Trump in particular has made some head scratching decisions lately, including attacking the popular incumbent Republican governor of Georgia and obsessing about Harris’s crowd sizes, arguing that some photos of the event were “photoshopped.” It’s conceivable that he has a similar moment in the debate.

Harris has remained mum on her end, likely because Trump keeps shooting himself in the foot. She cannot hide forever, though.

Ultimately, a presidential race within the margin of error goes invokes the saying “it ain’t over ’til it’s over.”

The wisdom of Yogi Berra pays dividends again. I wonder what he’d think of the race?