New Conservative Poll Shows Key Shift for Donald Trump

Former President Donald Trump has improved his lead over Vice President Kamala Harris in Georgia, according to the latest figures from conservative pollster Rasmussen Reports.
In a survey released Thursday, Trump was found leading Harris 51 percent to 46 percent in the Peach State, a key battleground state that could affect the results of the presidential election. Trump’s 5-point lead falls outside the poll’s margin of error of 3 percentage points. The results were collected between October 25 and 28 and are based on the responses of 910 likely voters.
In the same poll conducted between September 19 and 22, Trump was ahead of Harris by 3 points (50 percent to 47 percent) among 1,152 likely Georgia voters. That lead, however, fell within the poll’s margin of error of 3 percent. Rasmussen Reports is seen as a pollster leaning in favor of Republican and conservative politicians.
Trump’s apparent momentum comes a few weeks after the state began early voting, which saw a record-high turnout. As of Thursday, according to the Georgia secretary of state’s office, over 3.6 million people have cast a ballot in the general election, accounting for over half of the state’s active voters.
Georgia is considered a “must-win” state for Trump. The former president won the Peach State over Hillary Clinton in 2016, winning 51.3 percent to 45.6 percent. In 2020, however, he lost by a razor-thin margin to President Joe Biden, who beat the former president by just 0.3 percent of the overall votes cast (49.5 percent to 49.2 percent).
According to a forecast by polling analysis site FiveThirtyEight, the former president is favored to win the Peach State over Harris, with Trump having a 64 percent chance of securing Georgia’s 16 electoral votes. The polling aggregator site Real Clear Polling (RCP), however, considers Georgia a “toss-up” race between Trump and Harris.
Polling expert Nate Silver, who founded FiveThirtyEight, also gives Trump a higher chance of winning Georgia (67 percent to 33 percent), according to his latest election forecast in Silver Bulletin, his Substack publication. Silver’s tracking also finds that polling in Georgia has shifted toward Trump by 0.8 points over the past month.
Anna Kelly, a spokesperson for the Republican National Committee, told Newsweek over email on Thursday that Trump “is a candidate for ALL Americans which is why he is winning or tied in every battleground, including Georgia—his message resonates with voters across the country. ”
“As CNN reported, for the first time since 1984, more Americans now identify as Republicans because Kamala Harris and the Democrat Party’s dangerously liberal policies have failed America,” Kelly added. “Harris broke our economy, border, and peace around the world, but President Trump will fix it.”
Newsweek also reached out to Harris’ campaign via email Thursday for comment on the state of the race in Georgia.
According to RCP’s tracking, Trump is up by 2.6 points on average in the swing state as of Thursday. In FiveThirtyEight’s analysis, Trump is leading Harris by 1.7 points on average across polls in Georgia. FiveThirtyEight does not include Rasmussen Reports in its analysis because the pollster does not meet its requirements.
Harris has maintained a small lead across national polls as Election Day approaches, although the gap is closing. As of Thursday, the vice president is leading Trump by 1.2 points on average nationwide. At the end of September, she was up by 2.8 points on average, according to FiveThirtyEight’s tracking.
Update 10/31/24, 7:42 p.m. ET: This story has been updated with additional comment from the Republican National Committee.