CNN senior data reporter Harry Enten said on Friday that former President Donald Trump will win the November election if he can slightly surpass his current poll projections.
Vice President Kamala Harris is leading Trump by just 0.2% in the top seven battleground states, according to the RealClearPolling average. Enten, on “CNN News Central,” noted that Harris’ narrow lead means Trump could win in November if his final vote tally exceeds present poll projections by just one point.
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CNN Data Guru Says Trump Will Win If He ‘Outperforms His Current Polls By Just A Single Point’ pic.twitter.com/HwOwnMNeMU
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“Look, most of the time there’s at least some stretch where one of the candidates is ahead by at least five points, at least three weeks in which one candidate led by at least five points, that happened in every single campaign from 1964 to 2020,” Enten told host John Berman. “How many days have we had this campaign where one candidate was ahead by at least five points nationally? Look at this zero, zero days, zero days. The fact is this race has been consistently tight in a way that we have never seen before.”
“Look at the Democrat versus Donald Trump and those seven closest battleground states. Look at the 2020 final margin and average across these seven states, it was Biden plus 0.9 points. You don‘t think that could get any closer? We can, in fact, get closer. Look right now, Kamala Harris up, but get this, by just 0.6 points on average, only about half a point, six-tenths of a point,” the data reporter added. “My goodness, gracious, that is how tight we are talking right now across these seven battleground states. It is a race, Mr. Berman, that is well within the margin of error when you look across these seven key battleground states that will determine this election.”
Democratic strategist James Carville in August warned his party not to be overconfident about Harris’ likelihood of winning, as Trump has historically outperformed his polling average. NBC News national political correspondent Steve Kornacki said on Tuesday that the vice president’s slim polling advantage over Trump may be insufficient to secure the electoral college as the former president outperformed polling expectations in both 2016 and 2020.
“Alright, so let’s just say the polls match up perfectly to what the results end up being. Kamala Harris would win this election with 292 electoral votes to Donald Trump’s 246. But let’s just say we move the current polls and let’s say the result differs … by a single percentage point and Donald Trump is the beneficiary of it,” Enten said. “Look at this, if Trump outperforms his current polls by just a single point, you take that Kamala Harris win and look at this.”
“Donald Trump gets 287 electoral votes because the bottom line is Pennsylvania would flip up here and you would also get this flip out in Nevada over here. And that, my friend, is what we’re talking about,” he continued. “We’re talking about the closest campaign in a generation where a single point could make all the difference in the world. John, this is a truly exciting race right now, where any slight movement can make all the difference in the world.”
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