VP Harris Builds Gap Against Former President Trump According To Latest CA Presidential Election Poll

According a to a new UC Berkeley Institute of Governmental Studies (IGS) poll released on Wednesday, Vice President Kamala Harris gained more ground on former President Donald Trump, with Trump managing to retain all support between the Democratic party ticket shift between President Joe Biden and Harris.

Previous polls before Harris became the presumptive nominee on the ticket showed a much closer race in California. While a Democratic victory was never in doubt in California, with Biden always keeping a around a 20+ point lead, polls in June and July began projecting one of the closest races for California between a Democrat and Republican in decades. Biden’s poor debate performance, questions over his health, growing calls for him to drop out of the race, and Trump’s assassination attempt brought a shift both in California and nationwide. The last polls with Biden on the ticket in California had him only with 18 and 17 points leads, with him dropping a point in the polls in California every 5-7 days. Had that rate continued, California could have gone down a shade of blue for the first time since the 90’s.

However, Biden dropped out, leading to Harris being the new nominee. Armed with a California background and keeping the momentum going with a new VP pick, Harris rapidly gained ground on Trump. Nationally, Trump went from several points ahead of Biden, to, on aggregate, three points behind Harris. In California, with Harris at home state advantage, it was even more staggering. According to the UC Berkeley IGS poll on Wednesday, Harris now leads Trump 59% to 34%, a full 25 points ahead.

When broken down by demographic, Harris saw bumps everywhere. Latino voters, crucial in many California races this November, shot up 10% for Harris. Black voters went up 16%. Voters below the age of 30 went up 23% for Harris in California. Moderate voters also saw a 12 point jump for Harris, with 59% of moderate and independent voters now saying they will vote for her.

“Harris has consolidated the support of Democratic and Democratic-leaning voters in the state,” said Eric Schickler, co-director of the Institute of Governmental Studies, on Wednesday. “With Biden, you saw a lack of enthusiasm and engagement that was especially stark among young people and people of color generally. This looks a lot more like the numbers for Democrats in 2020.

“Those numbers are encouraging for her so far. We know for sure that there will be an effort by Republicans to bring that support down by trying to taint her as an extreme San Francisco liberal. And we’re already seeing that.”

Trump-Harris

However, despite the massive shift in favor of Harris, Trump still has a few bright spots in California, as well as national. For one, Harris has yet to face a major scandal or trip up on her campaign. Trump managed to weather the storm on his court cases earlier this year, and is currently still recovering from comments made a few weeks ago about Harris’ racial identity. Harris, however, has been riding momentum since July, and is expected to continue on through the DNC later this month. Her VP pick, Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, has already had a few hiccups over his military record, but nothing earth shattering has come out. It happens to every candidate every election at least once, and Harris has yet to have that moment.

But the second major thing going Trump’s way can be seen in the poll itself. The IGS poll has him at 34% in CA. Previous polls going back to when Biden was still a candidate had him at between 33% to 35%. He’s not losing any support in California, with a solid base of just over a third of the state. This puts him on par with his 34% performance in California in 2020 and still better than his 31% he got in California against Hillary Clinton in 2016. Despite everything that happened in 2024, Trump still has a bigger base to work with in California than he did in 2016.

So what does this tell us?

“People always wonder how there are more Republicans in California than, say Texas, or wonder why major GOP candidates always go on major fundraising runs through the state,” explained Stephanie Lewis, a pollster in Southern California, to the Globe on Wednesday. “But, as the poll showed, California has a very strong and dedicated GOP contingent to this day. So him not going down in the polls in the state, despite going down nationally and Harris rocketing up? It shows that solid rock there.

“But also let’s not overlook the fact that Harris pissed off a lot of Californians during her time as Attorney General and as DA in San Francisco. And her time in the Senate too to an extent. Trump should have gone down at least a few points, but he didn’t. A lot of people still remember what she did. With Clinton, she had that excitement behind her. But Harris, even with a home state advantage, hasn’t reached her levels of support. That’s because of her past here.

“And you mentioned her not being scandalized yet. Her time in California can definitely reveal something big. And who knows what that will do for her levels of support, especially amongst all the voters seeing her as a squeaky clean lawmaker.

“The Trump team is coming off some missteps by Trump right now, but they likely have something big they are holding too. Perfect time to bring that out is between the DNC and their first debate. But looking back at California, Trump may now be 25 points out with no chance to win California, but damn has he managed to keep that rock of support. And not only that, keep it 3 points above Clinton levels. That has to be at least a little disheartening for Harris.”

More polls are expected soon, with election day now only 83 days away.