Less Than a Week Until the Big Day – Where are the Polls?

Election 2024 is less than a week away. Media reports, particularly on social media, are in a gaslighting frenzy of fake news and misinformation. It is hard to know what to believe and what is nonsense. Opinion polls, while hardly perfect, at least provide a quantitative peek behind the electoral curtain.

I like to look at two of the most reliable pollsters for a sense of the electorate. Starting with Rasmussen Reports, “One week before Election Day, former President Donald Trump has a two-point lead over Vice President Kamala Harris in the latest daily tracking poll for the 2024 presidential election.”

This suggests that Trump may win the popular vote. The last Republican presidential candidate to win the popular vote was George W. Bush in his reelection two decades ago in 2024.

While winning the popular vote can certainly stifle some of the expected Democrat caterwauling that Trump, if he wins next week, is an “illegitimate president,” the national popular vote does not determine the winner, as Hillary Clinton learned in 2016.

Instead, the next occupant of  the White House will be determined by the Electoral College -- 50 separate state elections. AtlasIntel, the most accurate pollster of the 2020 cycle, predicts a Trump victory with 296 electoral college votes compared to Harris's 242, not a landslide but certainly a solid win.

Most states are solidly red or blue, Republican or Democrat, respectively, and not in play. As in most years, a handful of battleground states will determine the winner.

RealClearPolitics provides us with the average polling results in the seven battleground states, offering a more granular look at the election in terms of the Electoral College. Over these seven states, Trump is up +1.0.

Looking at specific states, Arizona is Trump +2.2, Nevada is Trump +0.5, Wisconsin is Trump +0.6, Michigan is Harris +0.5, Pennsylvania is Trump +0.6, North Carolina is Trump +1.0, and Georgia is Trump +2.4.

Trump needs most, but not all, of these states in his column to win on November 5. One can game out various combinations and permutations of different states, but at this point, one week before Election Day, the numbers favor Trump.

Since this article began with national numbers, let’s compare them with past elections. The RealClearPolitics national average 7 days before the election shows Donald Trump +0.4. While it's a small lead, where was candidate Trump four and eight years ago?

In 2020, seven days before the election, this same national average showed Joe Biden +7.4, an election he barely won, leaving other possibilities aside.

In 2016, seven days before the election, the RCP national average had Hillary Clinton at +2.2. And we know how that turned out.

Trump being ahead by +0.4 nationally may not seem like a big deal, but as Newsweek reports, “Republican nominee Donald Trump is narrowly leading Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris in aggregator RealClearPolling's average of national polls for the first time since August.”

Trends are important, particularly in the home stretch.

One can also look at crowd size and enthusiasm at political rallies, although these are more difficult to quantify. However, both metrics favored Trump. One recent example was his recent event at Madison Square Garden in deep blue New York City.

Lastly, let’s look at betting odds. Opinion polls reflect what voters want to happen while betting odds reflect what bettors think will happen, putting their money on expectations rather than on wishes.

RealClearPolitics' latest betting odds give Trump a 64% chance of winning the election compared to Harris at only 35%.

Election integrity is partially on the ballot, with the two parties differing on this issue. One example is in my home state of Colorado. “Secretary of State Jena Griswold admits to counting fraudulent ballots in this election.” And this: “Election equipment passwords were published on SecState’s official website, quietly corrected without public announcement or remedy.”

Pennsylvania too. The Lancaster County Board of Elections found that “Up to 2,500 fraudulent voter registration applications were dropped off in two batches shortly before the deadline.”

In his decision for his newspaper to not endorse either presidential candidate, Washington Post owner Jeff Bezos made this important point. “Voting machines must meet two requirements. They must count the vote accurately, and people must believe they count the vote accurately. The second requirement is distinct from and just as important as the first.”

Opinion polls and betting odds go only so far if election integrity is in question. What do voters say about this issue?

Rasmussen Reports discovered, “Most voters don’t believe state officials have done enough to prevent voting by illegal immigrants or to stop outside groups from interfering in elections.”

Unlike what Democrats and the media claim about Donald Trump, election integrity is the real “threat to democracy.” If voters can’t trust the electoral process, how is America different from Venezuela, Cuba, or the old Soviet Union?

After credible claims about electoral fraud in 2020, let’s hope Trump and his team have taken measures to prevent a repeat in 2024. If not, this would meet the definition of insanity. Trump is too smart, in my opinion, to go through the same process, expecting a different result.

The opinion polls and betting odds are in his favor. The ultimate poll is on November 5, and hopefully, the final result reflects the will of the voters.

Brian C. Joondeph, M.D., is a physician and writer.

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