Marquette poll puts Kamala Harris and Donald Trump in a dead heat in Wisconsin
Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump are in a statistical dead heat in battleground Wisconsin, according to the final Marquette University Law School poll released before Election Day.
Among likely voters, 50% support Harris and 49% back Trump. In the last Marquette poll conducted in late September, Harris had a four-point lead among both groups, but still within the margin of error.
"The race has tightened a little bit," poll director Charles Franklin said. "If I haven't made it clear by now, let me just say it again. It should not surprise anyone if Donald Trump wins, and it should not surprise anyone if Kamala Harris wins."
The poll was conducted between Oct. 16 and 24. It surveyed 834 registered voters, 753 of which are considered likely to vote, based on their voting record since 2016. The margin of error was plus or minus 4.4 percentage points for both registered voters and likely voters.
The Marquette survey is rated among the best in the country. Other polls aggregated by RealClearPolling.com show Trump with a slight lead in Wisconsin. In 2020, the election in Wisconsin was decided by less than a percentage point. Franklin has noted the Marquette poll was off by four points that year, and by six points in 2016.
A USA TODAY/Suffolk University poll of 500 likely voters in Wisconsin conducted last week found Trump at 48% and Harris at 47%, with a margin of error of 4.4 percentage points.
Both campaigns are frequenting Wisconsin in the final days of the presidential race. Harris will be joined by celebrity musicians as she rallies college voters at the University of Wisconsin-Madison Wednesday, while former Green Bay Packers quarterback Brett Favre will join Trump in Green Bay today.
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When factoring third-party candidates like Jill Stein, Cornel West and Chase Oliver, Harris leads Trump by two points among likely voters. While support dropped in the last poll for independent candidate Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., he has bounced back up to 5%, despite dropping out of the race.
"This 9% that say, 'I'd kind of like to vote for one of these third-party candidates,' could so easily tip this race one way or the other," Franklin said.
Democrats have slight advantage in enthusiasm
Enthusiasm has been a key storyline through the past several rounds of Marquette polling, and the last poll shows Democrats with a slight advantage.
Democrats lagged far behind in enthusiasm to vote when Biden was still in the running. Harris erased that gap and kept an edge over Trump in voter enthusiasm in the last poll, but there were signs Republicans were inching up.
In the new poll, two-thirds of Wisconsin voters say they are "very enthusiastic" about voting. Among Democrats, 75% said they are very enthusiastic, up from 71% in the last poll, and 66% of Republicans said the same, compared to 67% in the last poll.
"2020 set records for turnout. It would be hard to reach those levels again, because breaking a record every time is hard," Franklin said. "But I do think with this level of enthusiasm, we do have some reason to believe that we should expect to see turnout close to the 3.3 million we saw last time, maybe a shade higher, maybe a shade lower."
Partisan differences in voting early or on Election Day
Both parties have heavily encouraged early voting in Wisconsin, which is offered through Nov. 3 depending on the municipality.
The Marquette poll found Harris supporters are more likely to vote absentee by mail, 70% to 30%. Those who say they will vote absentee in-person back Trump 52%, compared to 47% for Harris. Those planning to vote on Election Day align with Trump 56%, and Harris 44%.
The first few days of early voting saw an increase of nearly 40% over 2020 levels, and higher-than-expected turnout caused a slowdown in the system some clerks use to print labels for the outside of absentee envelopes.
As of Tuesday, about 1,146,000 voters have returned absentee ballots in Wisconsin, with about 45% of that total coming from early, in-person absentee voting, according to the Wisconsin Elections Commission.
"Once again, we should expect the early count of returns from precincts which are primarily in-person to lean Republican. We should expect the late absentee votes to lean Democratic, possibly very heavily Democratic," Franklin said.
(This story has been updated to include new information.)
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This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Harris, Trump in a dead heat in Wisconsin, new Marquette poll says