Anika Begay
U.S. Vice President and Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris speaks at her campaign headquarters in Wilmington, Delaware, July 22, 2024. On Monday, Harris compared her election rival Donald Trump to “predators” and “cheaters,” as she attacked the first former U.S. leader to be convicted of a crime.
Erin Schaff | AFP | Getty Images
Vice President Kamala Harris is catching up with former President Donald Trump in the number of voters who trust her handling of the economy, according to a new Financial Times/Michigan Ross poll.
The monthly poll found that 42% of voters trust Harris on economic issues, a full percentage point more than the Republican presidential nominee. That’s a slim lead that’s well within the poll’s margin of error of +/- 3.1 percentage points. The survey, released Sunday, polled 1,001 registered voters from Aug. 1 to 5.
Other polls have found Trump significantly ahead of Harris on economic issues. Vscek’s most recent All-America Economic Poll, for example, found that voters think they will be better off financially under Trump than under Harris by a 2-to-1 margin.
However, the FT/Michigan Ross result signals a possible changing dynamic for the Democratic ticket: Last month, just 35% of voters said they approved of President Joe Biden’s handling of the economy, compared with 41% for Trump.
Since Biden dropped out of the race and endorsed Harris, the vice president has redefined the dynamics of the battle with Trump, benefiting from a surge in donations, volunteers and rally attendance.
Yet despite the electoral shakeup, the economy has remained a defining issue for voters, who consistently cite inflation and the high cost of living as top priorities in national polls.
Three weeks into her presidential campaign, Harris has yet to release a formal economic policy agenda, though she said Saturday that one will be released in the coming days.
Meanwhile, voters and donors are wondering how far the candidate might depart from the current administration, which regularly carries the brunt of the blame for public dissatisfaction with the economy.
Among those surveyed in the FT/Michigan Ross poll, 60% said Harris should either completely sever ties with Biden’s economic policies or “make substantial changes” to her agenda.
Trump often exploits voters’ economic pessimism as a political tactic, working to turn economic warning signs into narratives of full-blown catastrophe attributable to the policies of the Biden-Harris administration. For example, when markets crashed last week, heightening fears of an impending recession, Trump quickly took to Truth Social to label the moment the “Kamala Crash.”
Linking the Biden-Harris administration to voters’ negative economic attitudes has worked for Trump. The FT/Michigan Ross poll found that 42% of voters say they would be “a lot” or “somewhat” better off in a hypothetical second Trump term, compared with 33% who say the same for Harris.
