Harris up by 3 points, against Trump alone and with third-party candidates: Poll

Vice President Harris leads by 3 points in a head-to-head 2024 match-up against former President Trump and in a six-way contest that includes third-party candidates, according to polling data released Tuesday.

A new NPR/PBS News/Marist poll, conducted Aug. 1-4, 2024, shows Harris leading Trump, 51 percent support to 48 percent, with 2 percent of respondents undecided, in a two-way race. Harris also leads Trump among independents, 53 percent support to 44 percent.

Harris maintains her lead in a multicandidate race, with 48 percent support. Trump earns 45 percent support, independent Robert F. Kennedy Jr. gets 5 percent, the Green Party’s Jill Stein gets 1 percent, and both independent Cornel West and Libertarian Chase Oliver get less than 1 percent.

Among independents, Harris’s lead grows in a multicandidate race, leading Trump by 11 points, 48 percent support to 37 percent. Kennedy follows with 12 percent.

Harris’s head-to-head performance in the August poll represents a 4-point jump from her showing in the previous poll, conducted the day after Biden announced his withdrawal from the race. At that point, much of the party had started coalescing around Harris, but she was not yet the official nominee.

In that poll, conducted on July 22, Trump edged out Harris in a head-to-head race, leading 46 percent support to 45 percent, with 9 percent of respondents undecided. The July 22 poll showed Harris and Trump tied at 42 percent support in a multicandidate race, with Kennedy following at 7 percent.

In the prior poll, conducted July 9-10, Biden led Trump by 2 points, 50 percent support to 48 percent, with 2 percent of respondents undecided. In the multicandidate race, Trump took the lead over Biden 43 percent support to 42 percent. Kennedy had 8 percent support, West had 3 percent, Stein had 2 percent and Oliver had less than 1 percent.

Harris’s improved performance comes as she gets an enthusiasm bump in the polls among Democratic voters. The recent August poll was conducted in the days leading up to her running mate announcement.

“For months, comments on the presidential race typically included the phrase, ‘baked in.’ That’s no longer the case," Lee Miringoff, director of the Marist Institute for Public Opinion, said in a press release.

"Democrats have renewed enthusiasm and confidence with Harris at the top of the ticket, and the new matchup has ignited interest in the contest on both sides,” Miringoff continued.

In a national polling average from Decision Desk HQ and The Hill, Trump had 47.1 percent support and Harris has 47 percent support.

The poll included 1,513 registered voters and had a margin of error of plus or minus 3.4 percentage points.