A Minnesota Star Tribune/MPR News/KARE 11 Minnesota poll released this week shows that Vice President Kamala Harris is losing ground in blue Minnesota.

In a state that has always been strongly blue, the poll shows that Harris is only five percentage points ahead of former President Donald Trump. Harris has 48 percent of the vote, while Trump only has 43 percent. While there is only a 5% difference between the two candidates, there are more people who haven’t chosen yet (7%) than who will vote.

Not even 2% said they would vote for a candidate from a third party.

Too many things have changed since June, when Joe Biden was still running for president as a Democrat. Those numbers showed that 47% backed Biden, 41% supported Trump, and 6% were still not sure. This means the difference grew from 4 points to 5 points.

There was also a lot more bad feedback about Harris than about Trump among independents in the state, according to the poll. 41% of independents like her, while 57% don’t. This gives her a net -16 among independents. Trump, on the other hand, has a score of -3, meaning that only 48% of people like him and 51% dislike him.

In addition, the poll found that people agreed with Trump on the economy and the border. People chose Harris over Trump to protect democracy and have abortions, according to the Star Tribune.

Between September 16th and 18th, 2024, 800 potential Minnesota voters took the poll as a whole. It has a range of error of 3.5% to 5%.

To give you an idea, Trump almost won Minnesota in 2016 against Hillary Clinton, who ran for president twice but lost, by a margin of 1.5%. That year, Trump lost the state by 7.2%.

Minnesota last went red, for Richard Nixon, in 1972. Beginning in 1976, Minnesota has always chosen blue for president.

Author: Scott Dowdy