balls to the walz

It’s a Kamalanomenon!

Folks, Democrats are officially in array. It’s time to break out your iPhone 3g, rewatch the first Twilight movie, and put on your low-waist bootcut jeans — because the vibes in the Democratic Party truly have not felt this good since the summer of 2008.

From Charli XCX endorsements to Zoom calls over 200,000 strong, the Harris-Walz campaign has brought a new burst of energy to the 2024 race. But has the recent vibe shift actually delivered any movement in the polling? We partnered with our friends at Split Ticket to find out.

We tested Harris against Trump among likely voters across Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin — crucial states that provide one of Harris’ most likely paths to victory. The first poll, fielded just before Biden dropped out of the race, found Trump leading Harris by 7 points in a six-way race.

Now, Harris leads by 1 point in both the head-to-head and six-way matchups.

While Harris and Walz are bringing joy back to political campaigning, JD Vance is yelling "im not owned! im not owned!!" as he slowly shrinks and transforms into a corn cob. He’s seen his favorables drop from +1 to -10 in the Rust Belt over the course of two weeks. Add that to the list of reasons JD Vance doesn’t smile.

And it’s not looking great for Old Donald either, with a majority of voters across MI, PA, and WI saying he is too extreme to be president (53%), compared to just 43% saying Harris is too extreme — and nearly half of voters (49%) saying Trump’s actions in the lead-up to and on January 6th are disqualifying. We strongly encourage him to keep doing more of those press conferences.

Read the full poll with Split Ticket here.

Here are some other highlights from DFP this week:

JD Vance’s go-to karaoke song is Creep by Radiohead

If you make friends with white supremacists, intentionally misspell Kamala as “Kamabla,” and say that Donald Trump has done more for the Black community than any president since Abraham Lincoln… you just might be a really weird person.

In a new poll, Data for Progress tested a few completely weird statements made by Republican figures in the past few years. Seventy-nine percent of voters, including 78% of Independents, think that “insulting women and couples who don’t have children” is weird. Vance has frequently disparaged people who don’t have kids.

A significant majority of voters also say it is weird to call for library books to be banned, to give the federal government power to monitor pregnancies, to say that Harris “doesn’t like Jewish people,” to monitor your father or son’s internet usage to ensure they are not watching pornography, and to claim that Harris only recently became a Black person.

A plurality of voters also say that “creepy,” “weird,” “off-putting,” and “strange” better describe Republicans than Democrats. Unfortunately for Trump and Vance, this election isn’t a Halloween contest, and acting creepier than Freddy Krueger isn’t going to win them the top prize.

Read the full poll here.

Trump can’t match her energy

While Trump is focused on winning a gold medal at the C20-lympics, a Kamala Harris presidency could invest in clean energy manufacturing, clean up pollution, and hold oil and gas companies accountable.

A new Data for Progress and Climate Power survey finds that voters strongly prefer Harris’ approach to climate policy over Trump’s.

When given a description of Harris’ and Trump’s climate platforms, voters prefer Harris’ approach by a +12-point margin. Harris' approach would focus on expanding clean energy to lower costs for families and boost American manufacturing while protecting communities’ access to clean air and water from corporate polluters. Harris’ advantage is even larger among Independents (+17 points) and young voters between 18 and 34 (+22 points).

It makes sense that voters prefer Harris over Trump on climate issues. Whenever Trump tries to talk about electric vehicles he ends up going on random tangents about deciding between getting electrocuted by a boat or getting attacked by a shark… we don’t really get it either.

Read the full poll here.

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