Harris, Trump deadlocked in new New York Times poll

Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump are neck and neck in a major new national survey, with less than two months to go before Election Day.

The poll, from The New York Times and Siena College, has Trump at 48 percent to 47 percent for Harris among likely voters, within the poll’s margin of error. The results are similar to a survey from the pair from July, right after President Joe Biden dropped his reelection bid.

The poll comes ahead of Harris and Trump’s ABC News debate on Tuesday night, the only scheduled debate so far between the two candidates. And that debate could be even more crucial for the vice president: According to the poll, 28 percent of likely voters said they feel like they need to learn more about Harris, compared to 9 percent who said they need to know more about Trump.

Additionally, 47 percent of likely voters viewed Harris as too liberal, while 32 percent of likely voters saw Trump as too conservative.

The NYT/Siena survey is one of the few high-quality, national polls that did not show the vice president receiving at least a small bump following her quickly capturing the nomination and her coronation at the party’s nominating convention last month in Chicago.

As the Times notes, this is the first time Trump has had at least a nominal lead in a “major nonpartisan national survey” in about the last month. In The New York Times’ own polling averages, Harris has a slight lead over Trump, 49 percent to 47 percent. The Times’ survey has played an outsized role in American politics in recent years, often driving fundraising and news coverage more than any other individual national survey.

The poll was conducted among 1,695 registered voters between Sept. 3 and 6. The poll’s margin of error is +/- 2.8 percentage points among likely voters.