WASHINGTON – If the presidential election hinged on abortion or climate change, Kamala Harris might be feeling pretty comfortable about her chances on Nov. 5, based on the polls. The Democratic nominee is also competitive on economic issues against Republican Donald Trump.
But Harris knows this is an extremely tight race — and that it could well serve as a test of just how much policy matters to voters, and which policies ultimately matter the most.
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The vice president leads Trump on abortion, election integrity, climate change, taxes for the middle class and management of natural disasters, according to the latest survey by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs.
She’s essentially split with Trump on several specific economic issues such as jobs and the cost of groceries and gasoline. The two are basically even as well on crime and the situation in the Middle East. Trump has a slight advantage over Harris on tariffs, and a bigger edge on immigration.
Despite Harris’ advantage on a number of issues, her campaign still has plenty of anxiety about a historically close race. It’s a sign that policy can matter — but it doesn’t always outshine issues like personality, partisan loyalty or even demographic factors that shape voters’ identities.
The latest polling marks something of a shift from 2020, when the pandemic was the top priority for many voters. But it also shows that Trump can no longer claim the economy as a relative strength for his candidacy, as it was when President Joe Biden was still in the race. How voters think about the economy could prove decisive; a September AP-NORC poll identified that as the top issue for many voters.
The Harris campaign, in its own polling, finds that the Democratic nominee is competitive against Trump on the economy, and sees that as a reflection of how she's emphasized the middle class in her speeches and advertising.
“She outperforms Trump very significantly on understanding the needs of middle class and working families,” said Molly Murphy, a Harris campaign pollster. “Voters tend to trust that if you talk about something relentlessly that you care about it.”
Xiaowen Xu, a psychologist at the College of William & Mary, stressed that there are many factors at play when understanding people’s political leanings.
“Some will place more emphasis on policy, whereas others just have it as a ‘check box’ so to speak,” Xu said. “And factors like personality differences, political identity, strength of political leaning, media consumption ... all can contribute to how policy-related info is digested.”
Biden experienced this disconnect firsthand before exiting the race. His aides would point to data suggesting that he bettered Trump on policy specifics, yet he still rated poorly on the economy due to the impact of inflation spiking in 2022 as well as doubts about his age. The policy edge was insufficient to boost his popularity.
Trump has leaned into his persona as a property tycoon. He claimed at a recent roundtable that Harris' time as San Francisco's district attorney ruined the city and that he understands this because “I own property there.” At the same time, while saying that inflation was bad, Trump said that illegal border crossings were a bigger issue than the economy.
Trump had a 45% to 37% advantage on immigration in October’s poll, roughly in line with his edge in the September and August polling. And it's an issue that was particularly important to GOP voters during their primaries earlier this year, with Trump pledging mass deportations of immigrants without authorized status.
“Americans trust President Trump to get our economy back on track because he is a businessman with a proven track record of economic success from his first term in the White House,” said Karoline Leavitt, the Trump campaign's national press secretary.
Trump has gone after Harris on various issues such as her 2019 call to ban fracking (which she has since disowned) and her willingness that same year to cut funding for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (she has since called for more funding on border security). He has also attacked her support for transgender rights and the meandering answers she has given at times to interview questions.
“I think she’s narrowed a lot of advantages that Trump had earlier in the year, but it seems like some of the attacks on her are taking a toll," said Patrick Ruffini, a Republican strategist who says that persuadable voters still appear to prefer Trump on issues like the economy and immigration.
Ruffini noted that Harris and her Democratic surrogates are increasingly focused on Trump's own foibles, such as claims by former aides that he's a fascist, his sometimes rambling speeches and the limits of his campaign schedule. That suggests that Harris knows there's a greater advantage to attacking Trump than promoting policy.
“What we see from the Harris campaign in the final stretch is they’re trying to emphasize Trump’s instability,” he said.
Still, Harris is making a case on the economy and pushing multiple messages at the same time. Her campaign on Wednesday highlighted a letter signed by 23 Nobel economists who said her policies would be “vastly superior” to Trump's ideas. Her campaign has also labeled his tariff plans a “national sales tax.”
Ads run by groups backing Harris have featured voters who ditched Trump because they saw him as caring more about tax cuts for billionaires than the middle class. Other ads go after Trump’s tariffs for increasing expenses for everyday people, messages all designed to suggest that the former president prioritizes himself.
The Democratic nominee has called for $25,000 in down payment assistance for first-time homebuyers, expanded tax breaks for parents, new benefits to encourage more start-ups, and the doubling of registered apprenticeships to bolster blue-collar work. Her campaign has proposed high taxes on corporations and the wealthy to cover the costs of her programs without adding to projected budget deficits.
“These things do resonate,” said Steven Durlauf, an economist at the University of Chicago. “There are really stark differences between the candidates.”