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Nate Silver's polling average on Sunday showed Vice President Kamala Harris' lead on former President Donald Trump shrink this week.
Silver, who is the founder of ABC News' poll aggregator FiveThirtyEight and considered one of the leading polling analysts in the United States, created a presidential model for November's election, which currently has Harris, the Democratic presidential nominee, ahead of Trump, the GOP presidential nominee, but not by much. Silver is no longer affiliated with ABC News or FiveThirtyEight.
Harris is ahead of Trump by 2.5 points (48.7 to 46.2 percent), according to Silver's numbers from Sunday mid-morning. While Harris is still winning, Trump gained 1.1 points since last week.
When reached by Newsweek for comment, Trump's communications director, Steven Cheung, linked to a social media post sharing a screenshot from Silver's latest forecast. Silver predicted on Sunday that Trump now has a 63.8 percent chance of winning the Electoral College compared to Harris' 36 percent chance.
Newsweek also reached out to Harris' campaign via email for comment on Sunday afternoon.
While polls show the popular vote, which is important in an election and can indicate where different states might land on the election map, the popular vote does not guarantee a win because of the Electoral College system. Harris or Trump will need at least 270 electoral votes to win the presidency.
Silver's Sunday update puts Harris "in dangerous territory in the Electoral College."
The polling averages in Silver's presidential model adjust for variables such as the type of voters surveyed and house effects, which are systematic tendencies for polling firms to favor one party's candidate over another. Additionally, more reliable polls are weighed more heavily in Silver's polling averages.
Silver works with Eli McKown-Dawson, an incoming post-grad student at The London School of Economics studying social statistics and survey methods, on the presidential model.
How Are the Nominees Doing in Swing States?
Swing states are crucial to win the Electoral College vote in November's election.
Harris is currently ahead of Trump by 0.3 points in Pennsylvania (48.2 to 47.9 percent), but the former president did gain 0.9 points from last week. Trump also gained 0.4 points in Michigan since last week, but Harris is still leading by 1.4 points (48.2 to 46.8 percent). Georgia is currently their closest race in the battleground states Silver includes in his polling averages, with a 0.1 margin favoring Harris (48.1 to 48 percent) after Trump gained 1 point this week.
The vice president has a stronger lead in Wisconsin as she is 2.2 points ahead of Trump (49.3 to 47.1 percent), but the former president did gain 1.1 points from last week. Lastly, Harris is ahead of Trump in Nevada by 0.5 points (48.5 to 48 percent). Although, Trump did gain 0.3 points in the state this week.
Meanwhile, Trump is leading Harris by 1.1 points in North Carolina (49 to 47.9 percent) after gaining 0.8 points this week. He is also ahead of Harris by 2.1 points in Arizona (49.3 to 47.2 percent) after getting 1.5 points since last week.
With national and state polls showing Harris and Trump neck-and-neck, it is sure to be a tight race.
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About the writer
Rachel Dobkin is a Newsweek reporter based in New York. Her focus is reporting on politics. Rachel joined Newsweek in ... Read more