Well, here we are—it's the final two-week home stretch of this marathon 2024 election cycle. It all comes down to this. Pretty crazy!

Statistically, the presidential race between Donald Trump and Kamala Harris is a toss-up: the top-level national horse race and the races in the seven key swing states all show a race within the margin of error. But there are good reasons for believing this race is not currently a toss-up, and that former President Trump is currently in a very good position to move back into the White House for a second and final time come January 2025.

First, we cannot forget pollsters' catastrophic misses in both the 2016 and 2020 presidential elections. There is little reason to believe they have meaningfully course-corrected since then. As a fascinating New York Times article surmised, in comparing the well-known catastrophic polling inaccuracies of the two most recent presidential elections with that of the 2022 midterm election (which was comparatively more accurate): "Pollsters simply can't reach enough of the least politically engaged voters—and these voters overwhelmingly back Trump. The polls can do fine in midterm elections, when only the highly engaged (and now relatively Democratic-leaning voters) cast ballots, but they underestimate Trump in presidential elections." This strikes me as a highly plausible explanation.

Second, all other available data is currently trending Donald Trump's way. Early voting returns across the country are looking very, very good for Republicans—including in key battleground states such as Arizona, Georgia, and Pennsylvania. Numerous vulnerable Senate Democratic incumbents, such as Sens. Bob Casey Jr. (D-Pa.) and Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.), have been rolling out campaign advertisements wherein they tout their sympathy—if not outright support—for President Trump and the MAGA agenda. Some (though hardly all) polling right now suggests Trump is outright winning the national Hispanic and Arab votes, and the youthful 18-35 demographic is looking like a veritable toss-up.

Furthermore, Harris is now diverting from the main seven battleground states to campaign in red states, such as Texas and Kentucky. It's unclear why, but one might be forgiven for thinking that the campaign may be throwing in the towel and is now just trying to help Democrats retain control of the House. That is certainly my own conjecture.

All of this is devastating for the Harris-Walz ticket. We are witnessing the real-time collapse of the 2008 Barack Obama Democratic Party coalition—the intersectional "coalition of aggrieved interests" that remade American politics but, like so many other once-formidable political coalitions before it in American history, is now petering out. Trump is peaking at exactly the right time, and Harris is cratering at exactly the wrong time. It's not too late for the race to take yet another unexpected turn, but I frankly do not see that coming. It's officially panic time for Kamala Harris and Tim Walz.

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Our highlighted Newsweek op-eds from the past week include selections from Sens. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) and Catherine Cortez Masto (D-Nev.), Shawn Ryan, Max Abrahms, John Spencer, and David P. Goldman.

We will be back in your inbox next week. And to my fellow Jews, for the final time this month, I wish you a chag sameach!