New polling reveals Harris has tightened the race in Florida

New polling shows Vice President Kamala Harris has significantly narrowed the gap between herself and Donald Trump in Florida with less than a month left in the 2024 Presidential Election. 

Trump is leading Harris by two points (50% to 48%) in his home state according to a new poll from RMG Research that was commissioned by Napolitan News Service. However, Trump's tiny lead was not what made the poll interesting. 

The data revealed that there is a “stark age divide” in the Sunshine State according to The Independent’s analysis of the findings, which noted that Harris was doing great in Florida among young voters while Trump is beating Harris with older voters. 

“Harris dominated young Floridians, with 55 percent of those polled supporting the Democratic nominee, compared to just 43 percent supporting Trump,” The Independent’s Kelly Rissman explained. 

“The former president leads significantly with the older crowd; more than half of those 65 and older — 53 percent — expressed backing Trump compared to 44 percent backing Harris,” Rissman added. 

Trump was also beating Harris among men in the state (53% to 47%) while Hariss was soaring ahead of Trump with women in Florida (49% to 45%). Whether or not Harris can flip Florida has been in question for months.

Trump has been in danger of losing Florida to Harris since at least August when polling began to show that the Vice President and newly appointed Democratic presidential nominee is only trailing Trump by a few points.

A poll in August from USA Today/Suffolk University/WSVN-TV found Harris was trailing behind Trump by 5 points in Florida (47% to 42%) at the time among likely voters in the state.

The numbers might not have seemed very close but Harris had closed the Democratic Party's gap in a state with more than one million registered Republican voters, and that Trump won in both 2016 and 2020, The Hill reported.

“Given those circumstances, I was surprised that Harris is within striking distance, being only 5 points down,” explained David Paleologos, Director of the Suffolk University Political Research Center, in a report to USA Today that was published August 13th.

Harris was ahead of Trump by 41% to 34% among independent voters in Florida in the poll while third-party candidate Robert F. Kennedy took 10% of the independent voter share.

“This poll seems to indicate that the overwhelming Republican Party registration advantage is partially offset by Kamala Harris winning independents, especially independent women,” Paleologos explained at the time.

“Florida could become more of a battleground state than anyone would have expected, especially given that there will be an abortion rights question (Amendment 4) on the statewide ballot, which could drive up turnout among women," Paleologos argued.

The news that Harris was putting Florida back in play came amid a rising tide of positive polling showing several swing states at the time were now shifting to highly contested races after Harris replaced Biden at the helm of the 2024 Democratic Presidential ticket.

The withdrawal of Joe Biden from the election and the rise of Harris as the Democratic Party’s presidential nominee upended the race at that time and altered the polling numbers in a variety of important states.

Several key swing states appeared to be back in play. For example, in Florida, previous polling from before the USA Today/Suffolk University/WSVN-TV poll had shown there was a possibility, but no real likelihood, that Trump could lose Florida.

According to the Florida Department of State, the Sunshine State has 30 electoral votes through 2024, which makes it one of the most important states to win for any candidate to win, but the state has been thoroughly red for years now. 

“It had once been a key battleground state but has leaned more Republican in recent election cycles. Trump won 51.2 percent of the vote in 2020, for instance, compared to 47.9 percent for Joe Biden,” Newsweek’s Kate Plummer wrote about Florida. 

On July 4th, Newsweek reported that Trump was likely to beat Biden in Florida again when the two were still facing off against one another. At that time, data from polling aggregator FiveThirtyEight gave Trump a significant lead over Biden. 

The former president led Biden with 46.1% of the vote compared to the 36.2% of the vote that Biden held. However, the numbers have changed a lot since Biden dropped out of the race.

Polling from the University of North Florida’s Public Opinion Research Lab in August found Harris was sitting at 42% of the vote in the state, according to The Palm Beach Post, the first news outlet to report on the polling numbers from the university. 

Unfortunately for Harris supporters in the state, the poll also showed Trump increased his chances of winning the state at that time. He held a commanding 7-point lead, with 49% of the vote. However, this result was to be expected one pollster noted. 

“It's not a huge surprise to see Trump ahead in his home state of Florida, which he won by three points in 2020," the Director of the University of North Florida’s Public Opinion Research Michael Binder told The Palm Beach Post in a statement. 

Binder added, however, that with Harris just joining the race for president, “enthusiasm amongst her supporters has livened up what was once thought to be an easy win for Trump in Florida." Yet the state is likely still in Trump’s hands. 

It was difficult to tell where Florida would stand back in August since there was a lack of polling on how Harris shaped up against the former president, but Democrats in the state said Florida was back in play now that Harris had taken over the ticket. 

"Look, here in Florida, we saw unprecedented actions from volunteers from across the entire state, in blue counties and in red counties,” Orlanda Congressman and member of Harris' national advisory board Maxwell Frost told The Palm Beach Post.

“People are excited to get out there and vote for the vice president to be the next President of the United States,” Frost added. Whether or not this is true has yet to be seen, but it looks like the Harris campaign is focusing its attention elsewhere. 

The excitement Frost spoke about in August does appear to have made a bit of difference in Florida. However, the latest polling from Napolitan News Service and RMG Research suggested Trump was leading Harris by 4 points, so the race could still be his.