Poll: Harris, Trump remain in tight race in Minnesota as finish line nears

WASHINGTON — Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump continue to be locked in a tight race in Minnesota, with few undecided voters left to boost either candidate.

A new MinnPost-Embold Research poll showed Harris with a slight edge over Trump, 48%-45% in the state, a result that was virtually unchanged from Harris’ 49%-45% lead last month in a similar poll. Both results were within the poll’s 2.4 percentage point margin of error.

One reason there’s no movement among Minnesota’s likely voters? Very few undecided voters remain this late in the campaign cycle; only 2% of the poll’s respondents said they were undecided, down from 3% last month.

“Between September and October, the numbers are essentially unchanged,” Embold Research pollster Jessica Mason said.

Five percent of the poll’s respondents said they plan to vote for someone other than Harris or Trump.

The poll also showed that independents favored Trump over Harris 36%-27%. Another 24% percent of these independent voters said they preferred “another candidate.”

Meanwhile, the poll detected a significant change in Sen. JD Vance’s favorability ratings. In September, his unfavorability rating was minus 16%, meaning more respondents had a “very unfavorable” or “somewhat unfavorable” view of Trump’s running mate than a favorable view.

But that unfavorability rating was cut in half – to minus 8%  – in the latest MinnPost-Embold poll.

Mason said the surge in Vance’s popularity was attributable, at least in part, to his debate with Gov. Tim Walz on Oct. 1. Mason said the vice presidential debate, which was characterized by its civility, “put Vance’s face in front of voters” and introduced him to the nation in a positive way.

Snap polls taken just after the debate, including a CBS/YouGov poll of respondents who watched the debate, indicated both candidates increased their favorability — though more viewers still held Walz in higher regard than Vance.

Walz favorability ‘gives Harris small lift’ 

The latest MinnPost-Embold Research poll also showed there was little movement as far as the favorability of other candidates who are at the top of the Democratic and Republican tickets this year. And, once again, only one candidate, Walz, had a positive favorability rating, 2%. Harris and Trump continued to have negative favorability ratings.

Harris’ unfavorable rating was minus 5% and Trump’s was minus 11%.

Steven Schier, professor emeritus of political science at Carleton College, said Walz’s high favorability ratings “probably results in a small lift” for Harris. 

And Schier said Trump’s unfavorable rating, which is more than twice as large as that for Harris, hurts him. 

“Trump has never been very popular in Minnesota,” he said. 

In 2016, Minnesota’s GOP presidential primary voters favored Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla. In addition, no Republican presidential candidate has won Minnesota since Richard Nixon carried the state in 1972.

Still, Schier said “we’ve got a very tight race here.”

The lack of substantial movement in the presidential race in Minnesota is mirrored in national polls and in polls of swing states that will likely decide the Nov. 5 election. The latest averaging of national polls by FiveThirtyEight shows Harris with a slim 48%-46.6% advantage over Trump, with little change in the neck-and-neck nature of this race over several weeks.

Schier also said small shifts in polling of the presidential race are the result of “normal errors in survey research.”

The MinnPost-Embold Research poll surveyed 1,734 likely 2024 Minnesota voters between Oct. 16-22. It has a margin of error of plus or minus 2.4 percentage points.

A gender ‘canyon’ 

A huge gender gap continues in the presidential race.

The latest MinnPost-Embold research survey showed Harris is up by 13 percentage points with women and Trump is up by 12 percentage points with men.

“That’s not a gap, it’s a canyon,” Schier said.

The professor also said “the agendas for men and women are different,” leading to the difference in support for the candidates.

According to the survey, 26% of men said abortion is a top concern while 42% of women cited abortion a top concern. And when it comes to inflation, 69% of men said it was a top concern in contrast to 53% of women.

The geographical divide in Minnesota may be even greater. Respondents in Greater Minnesota overwhelmingly said they supported Trump over Harris, 64%-31%, a response that was flipped in Minneapolis and St. Paul where Harris was favored 69%-20%. In the seven-county metro area excluding Minneapolis and St. Paul, Harris had a narrow 48%-45% lead over Trump.

One benefit for Harris: 19% of respondents said they have already voted — overwhelmingly for her. Of those early Minnesota voters, 70% said they cast their ballot for Harris, while only 27% said they voted for Trump.

Schier said the strong early vote for Harris means “you’re banking your vote early and you don’t have to depend on weather and turnout on Election Day — and that’s a big advantage.”

According to the Minnesota Secretary of State’s office, 565,909 Minnesotans had cast their ballots as of Oct. 24. But that’s about half of the approximately 1.2 million early ballots that had been submitted at this time in 2020, when the pandemic kept many from public polling places.

Schier also said Harris has another advantage — a strong  Democratic ground game in the state. “The DFL is in a better position to get voters out on Election Day,” he said.

Ana Radelat

Ana Radelat is MinnPost's Washington, D.C. correspondent. You can reach her at aradelat@minnpost.com or follow her on Twitter at @radelat.

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