Tuesday this week was exactly 28 days (aka four weeks) until Election Day! When we did our two month outlook, things seemed to have turned sharply toward Harris. Since that post we’ve had the first (and apparently, only) debate between the two candidates, the Vice Presidential debate, a second assassination attempt, and bullish economic signs galore while the conflict in the Middle East meanwhile expands. And, significantly, the election is underway- 18 states are already doing early voting and/or have mailed out ballots. In the midst of all this, what are the numbers showing?

Harris maintains a lead in both the Real Clear Politics and 538 national polling averages, widening it a little in RCP, and narrowing it a little in 538, with total undecided down in each. In both cases her lead is within the margin of error, but the impression of Harris maintaining a lead is clear:

Ah, but the election isn’t decided nationally, is it? At this moment only seven states are seriously in doubt, and what happens in these states is what it will all come down to. RCP now shows Harris leading in 2 of 7, and 538 with its more robust methodology has her ahead in 4 of 7. This chart overwhelmingly gives an impression of tightening. One state flipped form Harris to Trump since last time, one flipped from Trump to Harris, and 6 of 7 have a margin of less than 1%:

So what does that add up to? RCP currently has Trump winning the electoral vote in its “no toss-ups” map:

As mentioned above, 538 uses a more robust methodology for its averages (they weight things according to pollster track record and history of partisan lean) and their current polling averages would give Harris a narrow win:

The important thing to keep in mind here is that, with all seven swing states within a margin of error, and six of them separated by less than 1%, the most substantive thing we can say is that it’s very close. While a mixed result is most likely, based on these polls it wouldn’t be ridiculous to see Harris or Trump win all seven.

So what else can we look at? The approval ratings comparison is another stand in for preference, and it shows a clear edge for Harris. She has swung into positive territory, while Trump remains more than nine points net negative:

Democrats also retain their lead in the Generic Congressional ballot, though by less than a month ago:

And, through 100 special elections over the past two years, Democrats have outperformed by an average of 6% against the partisan lean of the races in question (per a spreadsheet compiled by Nathaniel Rakich of 538):

There’s no change in this indicator, but it remains true that Biden’s percentage in Democratic primaries was ahead of Trump’s in Republican primaries, indicating that Trump had comparatively more wavering partisan supporters to bring home:

The betting markets, meanwhile, have doubled down on the edge they gave Trump last month (see what I did there?), predicting a 53% chance of him winning the election:

Taking everything together, Harris retains an overall edge in the leading indicators, but tightening of the race since a month ago is readily apparent. That’s where 538’s forecast model comes out, giving Harris an edge, but not a huge one:

538’s founder Nate Silver left 538 in May 2023 as Disney/ABC was making huge layoffs there and struck out on his own. He took the proprietary code for 538’s original model with him, and has built a new model based on it. It’s behind a paywall, but he issues periodic updates and his latest comes out nearly exactly where his former colleagues are:

So, the best models out there have the election pretty close to being a coin toss. And let us now pause to remember that the 2016 election came down to 78,000 votes in Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin, and the 2020 election came down to 42,000 votes in Georgia, Arizona, and Wisconsin. Clinton lost 2016 despite winning the vote by +2.2%, and Biden barely won 2020 while winning the vote by +4.5%. This is probably going to be a long election night/week…

We’ll check in again week after next with two weeks to go! Until then, our indicators are: