Trying to determine the outcome of the 2024 presidential election is a bit like trying to do algebra while being waterboarded. It’s almost impossible to get a real sense of how things stand because there’s so much conflicting data.
If you want polls that show Kamala Harris is on track to win, you can find them. If you want polls that show Donald Trump is on track to win, you can find them. Even the vaunted election modelers are scratching their heads, because most show a pure neck-and-neck race heading into the home stretch of the cycle.
Still, there are some clues as to which way things are heading, and Kamala Harris’ continued desperation for a second debate is one of them. As RedState reported, the vice president resurfaced last week after skipping Fox News and NBC News debates and called on Trump to run against her on CNN. Following a statement and several social media posts on the matter, Harris reiterated her demand on Sunday as she exited Air Force Two.
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Kamala says she would “love to have another debate” with the “former vice president.”
Does she think she would run against Mike Pence? Dick Cheney? Dan Quayle? Has she covered up Biden’s cognitive decline for so long that it has now rubbed off on her? pic.twitter.com/ZfO2vujDZT
— Trump War Room (@TrumpWarRoom) 22 September 2024
The Trump campaign made a large deal out of her falsely referring to him as a “former vice president,” but I think the implications of her demands are the more engaging part of the matter. Why does someone who is supposedly winning the presidential race, or at least the press would say he is, continue to demand another debate? Common sense would say that any candidate in the lead would be foolish to take such a risk. This raises the question of whether Harris Really is in the lead.
RedState’s Bob Hoge reported Monday that Democrats are very nervous internally that Trump could do as well in the polls as he did in 2016 and 2020. While he failed in the last presidential election, the 2024 race is much more exhilarating, meaning a similar mistake could lead to a comfortable Republican victory.
The number of states where Trump would need to perform better has also shrunk dramatically. He is ahead in the polling average in Arizona, Georgia, and North Carolina, meaning the entire election will likely come down to Pennsylvania, where Harris has a very narrow lead (and is even down, according to some polls). In 2020, Trump would have needed a massive overperformance in all the swing states to pull off a win, and he almost did. In 2024, it’s much closer. Trump could win all the swing states except Michigan, and no one would be surprised, since he isn’t down by five or more points in most of them like he was in 2020.
Against this backdrop, Harris’s appeals for another debate paint a different picture than the confident glee she and her allies are promoting in the press. I think the vice president and her advisers are looking at the polls in the context of 2016 and 2020 and have concluded that victory is very much in doubt. So Harris wants another high-profile conversation with the American people in the hope that Trump makes a mistake large enough to ruin himself once and for all. Wisely, he is refusing to play along.
