JUST IN: New Poll Forecasts ‘Shock Win’ In Popular Vote For Surging Candidate

One of the election season’s final polls is showing former President Donald Trump opening up a sizable lead over Vice President Kamala Harris just five days before most Americans go into the voting booth.

The Daily Mail‘s last poll of the season gives the former president a greater chance than ever of winning the election. Pollsters at J.L. Partners surveyed more than 1,000 likely voters and found Trump trending for a “shock win” in the popular vote; he now leads Harris by 3 points, 49%-46%. That result is just within the poll’s 3.1% margin of error, but it breaks with past results showing a much closer race; one month earlier, a similar poll showed Harris with a 1-point lead. If those numbers hold, they will put Trump on track to be the first Republican candidate since former President George W. Bush to win the national popular vote, an honorary victory normally secured by the Democratic nominee.

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Both campaigns are adding frenetic energy to their ground games in states like Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Nevada, all of which hinge on just a handful of undecided or disaffected voters who could break either way. In Michigan, Trump has outsourced much of his mobilizing to the super PAC funded almost entirely by billionaire supporter Elon Musk, while in Pennsylvania Harris staffers have broken rank to describe what they say is a disorganized turnout effort in Philadelphia. Across those battlegrounds and others, poll after poll makes clear that any semblance of a honeymoon enjoyed by Harris is now dead and gone.

The vice president jumped into the race in late July following President Joe Biden’s withdrawal, resulting in a coronation by the Democratic Party that President Trump continues to sharply criticize as “undemocratic.” Harris, 60, led in the polls for weeks, leaving observers fearful. After a month, the Trump campaign largely settled on a strategy that targets Harris as unintelligent, mendacious, and nonsensical on the stump.

Those hits appear to have landed as voters begin to express more trust in Trump on some of the year’s most salient issues like immigration and the economy. Despite cooling inflation, voters continue to express frustration with higher prices, an antipathy that Trump has managed to yoke on to Harris. J.L. Partners co-founder James Johnson said he sees those attacks resonating in the latest numbers, portending a good election night for Trump. “The movement under the surface suggests Trump is having a better closing moment in driving up enthusiasm than Harris is, and undecideds and third-party candidate supporters have also broken for Trump in the last month,” he said. “He has also seen improvement among voters of every race, and leads in all age groups apart from 18–29-year-olds.”

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