HARRIS-WALZ OPENS 6 POINT LEAD IN NEVADA
From Today’s Big Thing:
Yesterday evening, Vice President Kamala Harris secured the endorsement of the Culinary Union. It’s hard to overstate how crucial an endorsement this was, especially in Nevada where the union is particularly strong. Harris and Tim Walz are fighters for working people, and it’s cool to see them enjoying support from organized labor. Also, a new poll in Nevada shows VP Harris leading by six points in the state.
From The Nevada Independent:
A new poll of likely Nevada voters found Vice President Kamala Harris with a nearly 6 percentage point lead over former President Donald Trump — the largest lead for a Democrat in any presidential poll of Nevadans this cycle.
While Nevada polls have been relatively scarce since Harris replaced President Joe Biden as the Democratic nominee, the vice president appears to have closed the gap that existed between Trump and Biden, who had not led Trump in a single public poll taken in the state since October 2023.
A Bloomberg/Morning Consult poll of Nevada in late July found Harris with a 2 percentage point lead in the head-to-head matchup — Democrats’ first leading poll of the cycle — and the Cook Political Report moved Nevada back into the “toss-up” category Thursday after previously categorizing it as “lean Republican.”
This latest poll, conducted by Decipher Ai’s David Wolfson, a pollster and Columbia University lecturer, sampled 991 likely voters across Nevada from Aug. 3-5 in a SMS/text-to-web poll on the presidential and House races. The statewide margin of error is 3 percentage points and between 6 percentage points and 7 percentage points for House races.
While Wolfson and political strategist Woodrow Johnston, who also worked on the poll, have been pollsters and consultants for Republicans, they received no commission for the poll. Wolfson and Johnston previously collaborated on a poll for the Nevada presidential primary race, correctly finding that former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley would lose to the state’s “None of these candidates” option.
On the presidential ballot, Harris garnered 49.2 percent support while Trump received 43.6 percent. Independent candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. received only 3.9 percent of the vote. Kennedy’s vote share is lower than the 8 percentage points to 10 percentage points he had been receiving, on average, when Biden was on the ballot. In an interview, Johnston said Kennedy’s polling fade reflects what typically happens to third-party candidates as the election nears.
Harris’ lead in this poll may be an outlier, but it mimics Biden’s position at this point in the cycle in 2020 when FiveThirtyEight polling averages showed he led in Nevada by about 6 percentage points. Biden ultimately won the state by about 2.4 percentage points.
Johnston said Harris is riding a polling honeymoon since Biden dropped out — and that the poll reflects a more typical outcome for a Democratic nominee at this point in the cycle.
“There's just been almost like a collective sigh of relief that Joe Biden is not going to be running and is not the nominee, that I honestly think that anyone would be polling as well at this point of the race,” he said.
The poll also found Nevada’s three House Democrats leading in their re-election races — and Rep. Mark Amodei (R-NV) in a closer contest than he is used to.
In Southern Nevada, Reps. Dina Titus (D-NV), Susie Lee (D-NV) and Steven Horsford (D-NV) led by margins close to the 6 percentage to 7 percentage point margins of error for their districts.
In 2022, Lee had the closest race of the three, winning by 4 percentage points. But the poll found Horsford to be in the tightest race, with a lead of 4.3 percentage points over former North Las Vegas Mayor John Lee.
Horsford won in 2022 by 4.8 percentage points against Sam Peters, a relatively unknown Republican in a race that saw far less outside spending than Congressional Districts 1 and 3.
Ultimately, all three seats remained in Democratic hands, and Republicans have been far more reluctant to spend in Southern Nevada — neither the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC) nor Congressional Leadership Fund (CLF) have made ad reservations in Las Vegas this cycle. But the NRCC did name John Lee to its “Young Gun” program, marking his race for extra support from the organization.
Johnston said Democratic polling advantages reflect the lack of investment by national Republicans.
“I thought Drew [Johnson] would be doing a little bit better, but he's just not,” Johnston said. “But it's somewhat reflective [of] Congressional Leadership Fund not, as of now, spending any money on either of these races.”
Johnston said the poll shows that there is opportunity to flip Horsford’s district if Republican groups want to seize it — a chance for the GOP to flip the district for only the second time since the seat was created after the 2010 redistricting process. While Congressional District 3 is fairly suburban — a geographic area where Democrats have made gains in recent cycles — Congressional District 4 encompasses parts of rural central Nevada, where Trump has performed well when on the ballot.
The poll found about 16 percent of voters remain undecided in Congressional District 4, with a margin of error of 6 percentage points.
In Congressional District 3, the poll found Susie Lee with a 6.1 percentage point advantage over her opponent Drew Johnson, a tax analyst and conservative columnist. The margin of error for the district was 6 percentage points, and about 9 percent are undecided.
Of the House members, Lee had the highest support — 48.5 percent.
And in Congressional District 1, where Titus is in a rematch with her 2022 Republican opponent Mark Robertson, the poll found the incumbent leading by 5.7 percentage points — nearly identical to the margin by which she beat Robertson in 2022. The margin of error for the district was 7 percentage points, and nearly 17 percent are undecided.
Finally, Rep. Mark Amodei (R-NV) has won every election in his Northern Nevada-based district by 15 points or more. But this cycle, rather than facing a Democratic challenger, he’s running against independent Greg Kidd, an entrepreneur who is self-funding his campaign and running an active ad campaign.
The poll found Amodei up just 4.4 percentage points on Kidd — well within the 6 percentage point margin of error. But more than a third of the electorate remains undecided. Another third supported Amodei, with Kidd at 28.5 percent vote share. Republicans have controlled the district since it was created in 1983.
Johnston cautioned that the poll was taken before this week’s Japanese stock market crash or Sen. Jacky Rosen (D-NV) endorsement of Kidd, both of which could affect the race. But even with a large percentage of voters undecided, he said the margin is a warning sign.
“If I’m Amodei, I'm really worried right now,” he said.
And while the poll reflects well on Democrats, Johnston cautioned against reading into the numbers too much.
“I don't want to badmouth my own poll, but I don't think most polls should be taken that seriously until after Labor Day,” he said.
Thank you paid subscribers for making this possible. It’s only $7/month or $70/year.
Comments are for paid subscribers.
There was also a new batch of polling from Times/Siena today. Their results have been historically poorer for Democrats, but today they are showing a sizable shift. According to Josh Marshall at TPM they have it as Kamala up 50-46 among likely voters in all three swing states, Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania. These results are in line with the national trends.
My blood pressure is trending in the opposite direction.
Harking back to TC’s post on Lawrence O’Donnell‘s iconically vehement editorial two nights ago, I read someone’s Substack post yesterday (apologies I don’t recall whose, but I read all the usual suspects) seeming to have an inside story that Trump’s supposed press conference was a prime example of obsequiousness, that he cherrypicked certain reporters to attend, and they were given a role to play. Period! If true, not surprising, but I thought I’d post it here for visibility rather than backtracking to comments of several days ago.
Forward looking honest joy vs Backward looking dark subterfuge.
The Prosecutor vs the Felon. Plain language vs word salads. Yes, Lawrence, agreed, can we please stop with the double standards and witness some straight up real reporting???! This both-sides-ism doesn’t cut it.