New York: Underscoring the uncertainty hanging over the presidential election ten days away, two major newspapers, The Washington Post and The Los Angeles Times, have decided in a break from tradition not to endorse either Vice President Kamala Harris or former President Donald Trump. Two separate polls by The New York Times and CNN released on Friday have them locked in a tie.
The Times poll showed them both at 48 per cent, with Harris’ lead of 3 per cent in a poll earlier this month vanishing, although it was – like the latest – within the margin of error.
Analysing the poll, the Times ominously wrote, “The result, coming less than two weeks before Election Day, and as millions of Americans have already voted, is not encouraging for Ms Harris”.
The CNN poll had them tied at 47 per cent. The RealClearPolling, the authoritative poll aggregator showed that Harris’ lead shrunk to 0.2 per cent on Friday from the 2 per cent on October 1.
Tellingly, the Times opinion section which is tilted towards Harris, ran an essay on Friday by a highly regarded election statistics analyst declaring that his “gut” feeling is that Trump is going to win.
Nate Silver, who runs the FiveThirtyEight website that was with the Times and is now in the ABC News stable, wrote, “My gut says Donald Trump. And my guess is that it is true for many anxious Democrats.”
He added the caveat, “In an election where the seven battleground states are all polling within a percentage point or two, 50-50 is the only responsible forecast.”
If the polls are correct – a big IF given their failure in 2016 when they predicted a Hillary Clinton victory – it would appear that neither Harris nor Trump have managed a breakthrough with their intensive campaigns.
Polls showing a setback for a candidate can also have the effect of the base redoubling its efforts and making a late hour impact.
Harris calling Trump a “fascist” and a threat to democracy, and hammering away on his age, his character, his lies, and his instability has not made an impact.
Nor had her stand on nationally legalising abortion or her moderating her policies moving towards the centre, shown any effect.
The star power — Taylor Swift, Beyonce, and Leonardo DiCaprio among others — she has deployed hasn’t yet turned things around.
Trump calling her a “Communist” and also a threat to democracy, nailing her to President Joe Biden’s failures, and harping on illegal migration and inflation, failed to move the needle significantly.
Besides the two newspapers, Teamsters, the powerful transportation workers’ union with 1.4 million members, refused to endorse either candidate even though the majority of workers supported Trump in an internal poll. (IANS)
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