Back in June, the Pew Research Center offered a sobering bit of data. The percentage of Americans who viewed both major parties\u2019 presumptive presidential nominees unfavorably had reached 25 percent, 1 in 4. It was the highest such percentage in the history of Pew\u2019s polling, and it suggested that people who disliked both candidates were poised to be the determining factor in November.<\/p>\n
But that was June, back when the two still-presumptive nominees were former president Donald Trump and President Joe Biden. Then Biden \u2014 certainly understanding that his broad unpopularity was not a political asset \u2014 stepped aside. And, just like that, the race was redefined. No longer is 2024 a contest defined by double-haters, people who dislike both candidates.<\/p>\n
Or at least, not so much.<\/p>\n
On Wednesday, Monmouth University released new polling showing the difference between a Trump-Biden race and a Trump-Harris one.<\/p>\n
Evaluating Trump and Biden, about 4 in 10 respondents viewed Trump favorably but not Biden and another 4 in 10 viewed only Biden favorably. About 2 in 10 viewed both unfavorably \u2014 the double-haters.<\/p>\n
When comparing Trump and Harris, though, the double-hater pool was sliced in half. A lot more people view only Harris favorably than view only Trump favorably.<\/p>\n
Put another way, a bunch of the double-haters shifted to liking only Harris. Asked to choose between Harris and Trump, those who view both Biden and Trump unfavorably picked Harris by a 5 to 1 margin.<\/p>\n
You can see Harris\u2019s advantages over Biden and Trump when breaking out the overall responses on Monmouth\u2019s favorability question. Harris is viewed more positively overall. But among members of each politician\u2019s own party, you can see Harris\u2019s wide advantage: A lot of Democrats view Biden somewhat favorably, but three-quarters view Harris very positively. It\u2019s a higher percentage than the percentage of Republicans who view Trump very favorably.<\/p>\n
Among independents, a group that\u2019s generally pretty skeptical of politicians, Harris is viewed about as favorably as unfavorably.<\/p>\n
YouGov released other polling recently that mirrors Monmouth\u2019s findings. Conducted for the Economist, it asked people how they felt about the two presidential and two vice presidential candidates, the latter being Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz (D) and Sen. JD Vance (R-Ohio).<\/p>\n
At both candidate levels, the Democrats were more popular. Walz is now much better known than he was when Harris picked him, but more Americans have an opinion of Vance. A negative one, on net.<\/p>\n
One detail to notice from those results: Republicans are much more lukewarm about Vance than Democrats are about Walz. It\u2019s also worth noting that a Quinnipiac University poll released on Wednesday shows Harris leading in the state of Pennsylvania. Her selection of Walz was criticized by media observers in part because it was believed that selecting Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro was important to her success in that state.<\/p>\n
YouGov also asked Americans whether certain terms applied to Harris and Trump. Despite Trump\u2019s energetic efforts to portray Harris as unintelligent, that perception hasn\u2019t caught on. In fact, Americans are more likely to describe Harris as intelligent than they are to describe Trump that way. Even members of their own parties are more likely to describe Harris as intelligent than Trump. Harris has slightly smaller advantages on \u2018hard-working\u2019 and \u2018qualified.\u2019<\/p>\n
Perhaps the most striking finding, though, is that most Americans believe it\u2019s fair to describe Trump as \u2018corrupt\u2019 \u2014 including 1 in 8 voters who say they plan to vote for Trump to be president. Harris, despite having a much more limited political profile, is viewed as corrupt by more than 4 in 10 Americans, including three-quarters of Republicans. This is unquestionably somewhat a function of \u2018corrupt\u2019 serving as a catch-all pejorative for disliked political actors \u2014 good news, in a sense, for Trump.<\/p>\n
For now, Harris holds a strong position in her race against Trump. Voters like her better than Biden, including Democrats, and they\u2019re rewarding her with their support. (In YouGov\u2019s poll, Harris has a slight lead over the former president.) The campaign isn\u2019t over yet, and Trump and his allies are just starting to target Harris and Walz with negative rhetoric and ads. But, for the moment, Harris has managed to break the grip that political skeptics had on the 2024 contest earlier this year. The double-haters may prove to be less important than the Harris enthusiasts.<\/p>\n
Update: Within minutes of this article being published, Pew released a new assessment of the presidential race. It found, like Monmouth, that Harris\u2019s favorability numbers have improved. It also found that the percentage of people with negative views of both candidates had fallen \u2014 again almost in half.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
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