Former President Donald Trump may be facing unexpected challenges in Pennsylvania, where new polling shows a dip in his support among white voters—a crucial demographic in the battleground state.

According to the latest Fox News poll, conducted between October 24 and 28 among 1,310 registered voters in Pennsylvania, Trump is leading white voters by only 4 points, 52 percent to Vice President Kamala Harris’ 48 percent. The poll had a margin of error of plus or minus percentage points.

White voters are central to Trump’s base. In 2016, 54 percent of the demographic voted for him nationally, giving him a 15-point edge over Hillary Clinton, while 55 percent voted for him in 2020, giving him a 12-point advantage. His lead among white voters was just as large in Pennsylvania in 2020, when he won the demographic by 15 points, according to CNN exit polls.

But polls suggest Trump’s white voter base may be shrinking in Pennsylvania. According to AtlasIntel’s latest poll, conducted between October 25 and 29, Trump leads among white voters by just 6 points. The latest CNN/SSRS poll, conducted between October 23 and 28, showed Trump leading among white voters by just 4 points.

Meanwhile, Quinnipiac University’s latest poll, conducted between October 24 and 28, showed Trump leading among white voters by a larger margin, but still by a smaller amount than previous years, with an 11-point lead. Newsweek has contacted the Trump and Harris campaigns for comment via email.

With the national race tight, Trump’s narrowing base of white voters in Pennsylvania could jeopardize his path to victory in the state—and potentially in the overall election. Pennsylvania, with its 19 critical Electoral College votes, has historically been a bellwether, voting for the winning candidate in 48 of the past 59 elections.

Meanwhile, Pennsylvania’s population is predominantly white and working class, with this demographic making up 75 percent of the state’s residents—making it a crucial component of Trump’s base.

Overall, polls remain extremely tight in Pennsylvania. Harris was leading in the Keystone State after becoming the Democratic nominee, but in the last two weeks Trump has taken the lead, according to 538’s poll tracker, which shows Trump with a slim 0.4-point edge. Pollster Nate Silver’s data similarly puts Trump up by 0.6 points, while RealClearPolitics has him leading by 0.7 points.

But there is still potential for the state to flip in Harris’ favor following remarks by comedian Tony Hinchcliffe at Trump’s rally in Madison Square Garden in New York on Sunday that sparked a firestorm of criticism and dominated news headlines.

Hinchcliffe joked that Puerto Rico was a “floating island of garbage.” While Trump campaign adviser Danielle Alvarez said Hinchcliffe’s controversial remarks “do not reflect the views of President Trump or the campaign,” the joke went over badly. The backlash could hit Trump especially hard in Pennsylvania—the swing state with the highest percentage of Puerto Rican residents with 3.7 percent of the population. In 2020, Joe Biden won the state by 1.2 points after Trump won it in 2016.

On the same day as the Madison Square Garden rally, Harris was in Allentown, Pennsylvania, and used the visit to release a video on her plan for Puerto Rico, which Puerto Rican music icon Bad Bunny shared on his Instagram account.

Early voting data from Pennsylvania shows that more Democrats than Republicans have voted, with registered Democrats making up 57 percent of early voters, compared with 32 percent for Republicans, according to the University of Florida’s early vote tracker. It is unclear what this means for the election since the early vote data reveals only whether voters are registered with a party, not who they are voting for.

We’re down to days and still don’t know who wins the state most say is most needed to win White House. It’s that kind of year.

Not because candidates are so good. But because neither one’s convincing a majority of Pennsylvanians that they’re good enough. That’s just how we see it. And have seen it.

Check this out. I looked at 70 Pennsylvania polls on Kamala Harris or Donald Trump (and, yeah, and I know you’re thinking, geez, get a life). But guess how many times either got above 50%?

Remember, this is in the oh-so-split Keystone State, in polling from the start of the race — right after President Biden got out and backed Harris in July — to the dwindling days of the campaign.

Okay, you don’t have to guess. I’ll tell you. Harris topped 50% just four times. And not by much. She hit 51% in a Bloomberg Poll in August. Then, in September, 52% in a Boston-based MassINC poll, 51% in another Bloomberg Poll, and 51% in a Quinnipiac Poll.

Trump? Topped 50% only once. He got 51% in a September AtlasIntel Poll out of Sao Paulo, Brazil (I don’t know, maybe somebody said, `Just find me a good poll. I don’t care if it’s in South America!’).

The latest of the 70 polls were just before Trump’s Madison Square Garden “lovefest” last Sunday. So, they don’t reflect any impact a speaker calling Puerto Rico “a floating island of garbage” has on the state’s 620,000 eligible Hispanic voters. Nor any effect of Joe `that’s-not-what-I-meant’ Biden then calling Trump supporters “garbage.”

But of the 70 polls, all showing a tight race, 20 were ties, Harris led slightly in 32, Trump led slightly in 18. And the average of the last seven had Trump up, 48.1% to 47.7%. A Quinnipiac poll released Wednesday shows Trump 47%, Harris 46%. Or, as we say in the biz, a virtual tie possibly trending toward Trump.

Now what? Well, now it’s what every election’s about, turnout. Who votes? How much of each candidate’s reliable base shows up? And what about the intangible, slippery, maybe-not-even-voting undecideds? I mean this in the sense of who votes Tuesday and by mail: 1.3 million mail-ins are in; about 2 million mail ballots were requested.

State polls point to candidates’ strongest support: for Harris, women, Blacks and college-educated voters aged 30-to-44 in Philadelphia and Allegheny County; for Trump, white men without college degrees, aged 45-to-64 in central and western counties. Generalizations, I know, and maybe over-stated. But what in politics isn’t?

Plus, this is a squirrely race. And speaking of squirrely, national Democratic guru James Carville, who made his bones in Pennsylvania, wrote in The New York Times he’s “certain” Harris wins. Meanwhile, national polling expert Nate Silver wrote in The Times on the same day he has a “hunch” Trump wins.

As for me, I’m not certain of anything. But I have a hunch. Since this is Pennsylvania – Land of Low Expectations — things won’t go smoothly. I hope I’m wrong.

But there’s mail-in ballot processing, which, thanks to the feeble minds writing our state laws, can’t begin until Election Day. That flaw, left unfixed by our Legislature for four years, could cause conspiracy-inspiring delayed results, as it did in 2020.

State officials expect fewer mail-ins this year (no pandemic), and note county election boards got state grants for more personnel and new equipment to speed the process. We’ll see.

There’s also litigation over improperly filed mail-ins. The state Supreme Court recently ruled voters whose mail-ins are rejected for errors such as being undated can cast “provisional” ballots which can still count. State and national Republicans sought a stay of that court order pending an appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court.

And this stuff we know about. Who knows what else lurks out there?

I keep wondering how history judges this election. U.S. voters chose wisely? U.S. voters chose poorly? Seems it’s up to Pennsylvania voters to write that history.

John Baer may be reached at baer.columnist@gmail.com

The United States presidential election will be held next Tuesday, with results coming in Wednesday AEDT. In analyst Nate Silver’s aggregate of national polls, Democrat Kamala Harris leads Republican Donald Trump by 48.6–47.5, a slight gain for Trump since Monday, when Harris led by 48.6–47.4. Harris’ national lead peaked on October 2, when she led by 49.4–45.9.

The US president isn’t elected by the national popular vote, but by the Electoral College, in which each state receives electoral votes equal to its federal House seats (population based) and senators (always two). Almost all states award their electoral votes as winner-takes-all, and it takes 270 electoral votes to win (out of 538 total).

Relative to the national popular vote, the Electoral College is biased to Trump, with Harris needing at least a two-point popular vote win to be the narrow Electoral College favourite in Silver’s model.

In Silver’s averages, Trump has a 0.6-point lead in Pennsylvania (19 electoral votes), up from 0.3 on Monday. Trump has slightly larger leads of one to two points in North Carolina (16), Georgia (16) and Arizona (11). Harris is narrowly ahead by 0.1 point in Nevada (six) and about one point ahead in Michigan (15) and Wisconsin (ten).

If current polls are exactly right, Trump wins the Electoral College by 281–257. Not making Pennsylvania’s popular governor Josh Shapiro her running mate could be Harris’ biggest mistake.

In Silver’s model, Trump has a 54% chance to win the Electoral College, slightly higher than 53% on Monday. There’s a 29% chance that Harris wins the popular vote but loses the Electoral College. The FiveThirtyEight forecast gives Trump a 51% win probability.

Without a major event, there isn’t likely to be much change in the polls before the election, but a polling error where one candidate overperforms their polls could still occur. Silver’s model gives Trump a 22% probability of sweeping the seven swing states and Harris a 12.5% probability.

I wrote about the US election for The Poll Bludger yesterday, and also covered three Canadian provincial elections and Japan’s conservative LDP, which has governed almost continuously since 1955, losing its majority at an election last Sunday.

Biden a drag on Harris and favourability ratings

Joe Biden remains unpopular with a net -16.5 approval in the FiveThirtyEight national aggregate, with 55.8% disapproving and 39.3% approving. As Harris is the incumbent party’s candidate, an unpopular president is a key reason for Trump’s edge.

Biden’s remarks on Tuesday, in which he seemed to call Trump supporters “garbage”, resembled Hillary Clinton’s “basket of deplorables” in the 2016 presidential campaign. This won’t help Harris.

Biden is almost 82, Trump is 78 and Harris is 60. Trump’s age should be a factor in this election that favours Harris, but Silver said on October 19 that Democrats spent so much time defending Biden before he withdrew on July 21 that it’s now difficult for them to attack Trump’s age without seeming hypocritical.

Harris’ net favourability in the FiveThirtyEight national aggregate is -1.5, with 47.8% unfavourable and 46.3% favourable. Her net favourability peaked at +1 in late September. Trump’s net favourability is -8.5 with 52.1% unfavourable and 43.6% favourable; his ratings have improved a little in the last two weeks.

While Harris is more likeable than Trump, that’s not reflected in head to head polls. Silver said on October 23 that Trump’s campaign is promoting him as not-nice, but on your side, and as someone who will get things done. They argue Harris’ campaign lacks clear policies.

Harris’ running mate Tim Walz is at +2.6 net favourable, while Trump’s running mate JD Vance is at -6.9 net favourable. In the past few weeks, Vance’s ratings have improved slightly while Walz’s have dropped back.

Congressional elections

I last wrote about the elections for the House of Representatives and Senate that will be held concurrently with the presidential election on October 14. The House has 435 single-member seats that are apportioned to states on a population basis, while there are two senators for each of the 50 states.

The House only has a two-year term, so the last House election was at the 2022 midterm elections, when Republicans won the House by 222–213 over Democrats. The FiveThirtyEight aggregate of polls of the national House race gives Democrats a 46.2–46.1 lead over Republicans, a drop for Democrats from a 47.1–45.9 Democratic lead on October 14.

Senators have six-year terms, with one-third up for election every two years. Democrats and aligned independents currently have a 51–49 Senate majority, but they are defending 23 of the 33 regular seats up, including seats in three states Trump won easily in both 2016 and 2020: West Virginia, Montana and Ohio.

West Virginia is a certain Republican gain after the retirement of former Democratic (now independent) Senator Joe Manchin at this election. Republicans have taken a 5.4-point lead in Montana in the FiveThirtyEight poll aggregate, while Democrats are just 1.6 points ahead in Ohio.

Republicans are being challenged by independent Dan Osborn in Nebraska, and he trails Republican Deb Fischer by 2.3 points. Democrats did not contest to avoid splitting the vote. In Democratic-held Wisconsin, Democrats lead by 2.1 points, while other incumbents are ahead by at least three points.

If Republicans gain West Virginia and Montana, but lose Nebraska to Osborn, and no other seats change hands, Republicans would have a 50–49 lead in the Senate. If Harris wins the presidency, Osborn would be the decisive vote as a Senate tie can be broken by the vice president, who would be Walz. This is the rosiest plausible scenario for Democrats.

The FiveThirtyEight congressional forecasts give Republicans a 53% chance of retaining control of the House, so it’s effectively a toss-up like the presidency. But Republicans have an 89% chance to gain control of the Senate.