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Donald Trump has a small polling lead over Joe Biden in the critical swing states with six months to go before US voters elect their next president on November 5.

It marks a stunning reversal for Trump, who exited the White House in 2021 with a record-low approval rating of 29 per cent after a mob of his supporters stormed the Capitol on January 6 in a bid to overturn his electoral loss.

More registered voters now view Biden’s presidency to be a failure compared with Trump’s, according to a recent CNN poll — 55 per cent of US respondents said Trump’s presidency was a success compared with 39 per cent for Biden.

Biden’s approval rating has dropped by 19 percentage points since the start of his presidency, to 35 per cent in April, according to Pew Research.

Still, the 2024 election looks to be an exceptionally close rematch of the 2020 race, when just 43,000 votes out of 155mn cast delivered victory for Biden. 

With six months to go, here is where the race stands.

What are the polls saying right now?

National polling has been tight. Trump and Biden are both polling just above 40 per cent, with Trump currently holding a slender edge of 0.8 percentage points, well within bounds of statistical error, according to FiveThirtyEight’s averages. The independent candidate Robert F Kennedy Jr has been polling at about 10 per cent, though support for such candidates tends to be higher in pre-election polling than in actual elections.

But US presidential elections are not decided by a national vote. Rather they are decided by winner-takes-all contests in the 50 states, which send electors to the Electoral College. Whichever candidate secures 270 of the 538 Electoral College votes becomes president.

In seven crucial “swing states” — Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin — Trump leads Biden by between one and six points.

What are the issues that will decide the election — and who’s leading on them?

The top priority for US voters remains the economy — an issue that has boosted Trump against Biden. 

Overall, 41 per cent of voters trust Trump with the economy, compared with just 35 per cent for Biden, according to the latest Financial Times poll conducted with the University of Michigan Ross School of Business.

A recent CNN poll found that 65 per cent of registered voters called the economy “extremely” important to their vote — higher than any other issue — and near levels not seen since October 2008.

While inflation has certainly hurt Biden, political views of the economy also play a role. Of those who said the economy was “poor”, 41 per cent said a change in political leadership in Washington would improve their perception of the economy, while 37 per cent said lower inflation and 14 per cent said better personal finances.

Other top issues include immigration — where polling suggests voters believe Trump is more competent than Biden — and protecting democracy, preserving abortion rights and lowering healthcare costs. Biden is stronger on the last three.

Most Americans do not vote based on foreign policy. But voters have consistently said they think the US is spending too much on military and financial aid to Ukraine and Israel, according to monthly FT-Michigan Ross polling. This could help Trump.

Though Trump has not said that he will cut funding for either country, the former president has made clear that he expects other countries in Europe to step up their defence spending when it comes to countering Russia. Republicans have also stalled congressional efforts to approve aid to the two countries — only relenting in mid-April after months of deadlock.

Perhaps even more important than the issues is how voters view Biden and Trump as people. 

A majority of voters say Trump, 77, is more physically and mentally fit than Biden, 81, but are less confident that Trump will act ethically in office. According to an April poll by Pew Research, 62 per cent of registered voters said they were not confident Biden is mentally up to the job, compared with 59 per cent who said they were not confident that Trump would act ethically.

Trump is facing four criminal indictments, including federal and state charges that he conspired to overturn the 2020 election. A majority of independent Americans believe Trump is guilty in the four cases, according to a Politico Magazine/Ipsos poll. And 24 per cent of registered voters who support Trump say that if the former president is convicted, they might reconsider, according to a CNN poll.

Who’s got more money and where is it being spent?

Biden has massively outraised Trump in the money race, leaving Biden groups with $66mn more on hand than Trump groups by the end of March.

Trump’s coffers have been drained by his legal fees. His donors have paid $76mn on Trump’s lawyers since January 2023 — 26 per cent of the total raised for the ex-president.

Biden’s campaign has already spent more than $39mn on ads this year, according to AdImpact, compared with $25mn for Trump. But much of Trump’s ad spend went towards the presidential primary, as he fought off well-funded Republican challengers, including Nikki Haley and Ron DeSantis.

Future Forward Pac, a pro-Biden super Pac that can raise unlimited sums, has already booked $130mn in ads beginning in September, targeting the seven swing states and Nebraska’s one electoral vote in Omaha.

FILE – The White House is visible through the fence at the North Lawn in Washington, on June 16, 2016. A driver died Saturday night, May 4, 2024 after crashing a vehicle into a gate at the White House, authorities said.

Andrew Harnik/AP

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Andrew Harnik/AP

FILE – The White House is visible through the fence at the North Lawn in Washington, on June 16, 2016. A driver died Saturday night, May 4, 2024 after crashing a vehicle into a gate at the White House, authorities said.

Andrew Harnik/AP

WASHINGTON — A driver died after a vehicle crashed into a gate at the White House Saturday night, but the fatal collision is being investigated “only as a traffic crash” and there was no threat to the president’s residence, law enforcement authorities said.

The male driver, who was not immediately identified, was found dead in the vehicle following the crash shortly before 10:30 p.m. at an outer perimeter gate of the White House complex, the U.S. Secret Service said in a statement.

The Washington Metropolitan Police Department said the vehicle crashed into a security barrier at the intersection of 15th Street and Pennsylvania Avenue NW.

“At this time, the incident is being investigated only as a traffic crash by MPD’s Major Crash Investigations Unit,” the metro police said in a statement posted on social media.

Security protocols were implemented but there was no threat to the White House, the Secret Service said.

The Secret Service will continue to investigate the matter, while turning over the fatal crash portion of the investigation to the metro police, the agency said.

Warren Buffett said Greg Abel should have the final decision on investments at Berkshire Hathaway, making clear that his successor will have authority over not just takeovers but the sprawling conglomerate’s mammoth stock portfolio as well.

At Berkshire’s annual general meeting in Omaha on Saturday, Buffett gave his most direct answer yet on how responsibilities will be doled out among the small executive team that will one day lead the company, handing Abel responsibility for how hundreds of billions of dollars are allocated.

“I think the responsibility ought to be entirely with Greg,” Buffett said from the stage at the CHI Health Center in downtown Omaha. “I used to think differently about how that would be handled, but I think that the responsibility should be that of the CEO.”

He said Berkshire’s board would ultimately make the decision when he dies, although he said “I may try to come back and haunt them if they do it differently”.

Investors had expected that Abel would lead the company’s operating subsidiaries and be the person to do Berkshire’s big game hunting — how Buffett refers to the multibillion-dollar acquisitions on which he has made his name.

But many had anticipated Berkshire’s $336bn stock portfolio would fall to Buffett’s two investment deputies, Todd Combs and Ted Weschler, and that those two men could play a large role in how the company’s $189bn cash pile is deployed.

“I think the chief executive should be somebody that can weigh buying businesses, buying stocks, doing all kinds of things that might come up at a time when nobody else is willing to move,” he said.

Abel has played a large role in Berkshire’s acquisitions, including its takeovers of PacifiCorp in 2006, and Dominion Energy’s pipeline business in 2020. Buffett disclosed during the annual general meeting that Abel had also played a role in Berkshire’s failed bid for technology distributor Tech Data in 2019.

It was unclear if Abel would want to run the common stock portfolio himself, or simply have the investment managers report to him, allowing them to make their own trades.

Last year, Abel told CNBC that Combs and Weschler ran their own portfolios “and that’s the way it’ll always be, and they’ll manage it accordingly”.

“I may ask them: ‘That was really interesting. What triggered your interest?’” Abel said of his conversations with Combs and Weschler over their stock investments. “But that’s the extent of it. And outside of having relationships with both of them, which are important, that’s their portfolio.”

Buffett in recent years has talked about how he shares similar views on capital allocation to Abel, who rose through the company’s utility business and now has oversight over all of its non-insurance operations as vice-chair. He added that his decision was influenced by the sheer size of Berkshire. “We do not want to try and have 200 people around that are managing $1bn each.”

Christopher Rossbach, the chief investment officer of Berkshire shareholder J Stern & Co, said the comment by Buffett was “very significant” as it showed “part of the path forward”. He added that it raised new questions, including how Abel would approach managing the stock portfolio.

“We have not heard much from Greg yet about the public investments,” Rossbach said. “It’s going to be part of this ongoing transition, to learn more about how that business is going to be structured, and then also more about how Greg Abel thinks of it.”

Compared to previous years, Abel took on a larger role at Saturday’s meeting, the first since Buffett’s longtime business partner and Berkshire vice-chair Charlie Munger died in November. Buffett also turned the official portion of the day — when shareholder proposals were voted on — over to Abel to lead, citing trouble with his own voice and eyesight.

Abel spent the day sitting next to Buffett on stage for both the morning and afternoon sessions; vice-chair Ajit Jain, who runs the insurance operations, only joined for the first part of the day. Abel appeared relaxed as he spoke about how the BNSF railroad was performing, how Buffett had approached his investment in Occidental Petroleum, as well as how it was handling litigation over wildfires — including its push to get state laws passed that would limit its liabilities in future catastrophes.

“We don’t want to throw good capital after bad capital,” Abel said of the utility business following the wildfires, repeating a comment Buffett made in his annual letter in February. “We’ll be very disciplined there.”

Investors have seen Abel as a strong operator of Berkshire’s underlying businesses, helping improve margins and profitability at the company, a point Buffett credited him with on Saturday.

“If you have 20 children and you are very rich you’ll have some that will be go-getters anyway and you’ll have some that won’t,” Buffett said. “We are a very, very rich company and we haven’t had a history of being very tough on people that coasted.”

“Greg will do something about it,” he added.

At the start, Buffett mistakenly referred to Abel as “Charlie” when passing a question to him. The packed arena — so full that hundreds of people sat behind the stage, unable to see Buffett in the flesh — broke into a thunderous applause.

“I’m so used to . . . ” he said, before laughing. “I checked myself a couple times already. I’ll slip again.”

Asked what he would do if he had one more day with Munger, Buffett replied: “We had a lot of fun doing anything. We’d play golf together. We’d play tennis together. We did everything together . . . we had as much fun, perhaps even more to some extent, with things that failed because then we really had to work.”

Munger’s death emphasised the fact that there may not be many more meetings featuring Buffett. Dominic Evans, who travelled to Omaha from London, got in line at 4:45am so he could get a good seat. He said he wanted to come to “show his support” for Buffett.

“Bring out the Kleenex for this year because, you know, you’ve lost somebody who’s a great teacher,” he said. “Luckily, so much of his material is already out there . . . but, you know, it’s going to be irreplaceable.”

Buffett acknowledged his mortality several times on Saturday. He told shareholders: “I not only hope you come next year, but I hope I come next year.”