Kamala Harris was expected to experience a post-convention “bump” in the polls, but her campaign seems to have encountered a significant challenge: her public statements.
A week after unveiling her policies following the convention, the anticipated surge in polling has not materialized, particularly in key state polls.
The initial “excitement” surrounding Kamala Harris, following the Democrats’ decision to prioritize her over Joe Biden, appears to be fading—even in the home state of her vice presidential pick, Tim Walz.
According to KTSP, what many consider a successful Democratic National Convention in Chicago where Vice President Kamala Harris and Gov. Tim Walz launched their campaign as running mates, our new KSTP/SurveyUSA poll shows Harris’ lead in Minnesota cut in half from a month ago.
According to our poll, Harris now leads Republican Donald Trump by five points, 48% to 43%, with four percent preferring another candidate and five percent undecided. Last month, Harris, in her first appearance in our poll as the Democratic presidential nominee, had a 10-point lead, 50% to 40%.
“I think you see in the national polls that Kamala Harris is getting sort of a post-convention bump,” says Brian McClung, communications director for former Republican Gov. Tim Pawlenty. “So the opposite has occurred in your SurveyUSA poll, but I think this is where we expect the race to be.”
Former Minnesota DFL Party Chair Mike Erlandson agrees, saying the 10-point lead for Harris last month might have been the result of excitement about a shake-up in the race with President Joe Biden dropping out.
In 2020, Biden won Minnesota by over 7 percent.
In a statement to Newsweek, Trump’s Communications Director Steven Cheung said the former president “continues to build momentum every single day by campaigning, meeting voters, and engaging with media.
“Meanwhile, the more voters learn about Comrade Kamala and her radical policies, the more they realize she is weak, failed, and dangerously liberal.”
The magazine also noted that “despite the decline in Harris’ lead, Minnesota is not considered a swing state in this election cycle. The state has voted for the Democrats in every presidential election since 1972, and poll aggregators show that is not set to change in November.”
