That's not party affiliation, but party lean among independent voters. Those numbers also fluctuate a decent bit from one month's polling to the next, with the average spread being around 1.7+ R. I don't have a hard time believing that a slight majority of Independent voters lean R, given that the official GOP has abandoned it's party principles to a greater degree than the Democrat party. More Rs have probably left their party while still identifying more with them than the alternative. I'm no longer a Republican or a "Christian" (i.e., I don't attend church or pray), but in both cases I identify closer to my old labels than to any alternatives.
It was also conducted entirely after the debate and before Harris became the nominee…. Let’s see how it looks next month.
Actually the Republicans have a +2 over the Dems. They are a negative 11 compared with Independents and my guess is that the Dems will be equal or greater than the Pubs come the next survey.
It could mean that, yes. It could also mean that a lot of R-leaning independents still hate Trump, just like we did 4 years ago.
Nate silver turned his model back on, and he has it as a 1% race in the critical states of Michigan, pennsylvannia, and Wisconsin…. All “must wins” for Harris, pretty much — Goergia, Arizona, Florida, solidly Trump. Minnesota, Virginia, New Hampshire solidly Harris.
Harris +4 in PA. I still think it's too early to read into these however https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/4800420-harris-lead-pennsylvania-casey-mccormick-poll/
Silver averages all the polls and weighs them for historical bias. Im not sure, because I'm not a subscriber, so I just have access to his free info, but he might be including polls done before Biden dropped out in his average. Harris is doing much better in post Biden polls, but there are not many out there, so he might be using some pre drop out polls.
That would not make sense if there are more people currently identifying as rep over dem AND independents saying they lean R over D...
Best I can tell, Dems and GOP registered voters are nearly even, to possibly a 1% advantage for Dems according to the latest data. I'm not sure why any responsible journalism organization would bother with a poll that oversamples Democrats by 5 or 6 points.
