New polls show change in Harris-Trump race in Pennsylvania

the big debate tomorrow night is in the city of Philadelphia, which is in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. Now, in a previous episode of CNN News Central, I circled Pennsylvania many, many times to emphasize just how important it could be in the election. Watching from home when I was doing that was CNN senior data reporter Harriette, who is standing right here to kind of put some meat on the bones, right, and do a better job than I did of just circling Pennsylvania. I'm going to be additive. I couldn't do a better job. I'm just going to make the product you've made even better. So I just want to take a look at Pennsylvania, Pennsylvania, Pennsylvania. And what we see is a tightening race in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. Right. This is Harris versus Trump. Margin in the great Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. A month ago when you looked at the polls, New York Times plus for Harris plus three Quinnipiac for Harris Franklin and Marshall plus three for Harris. But look at polls that have come out over the last week or so. And what do we see? We see a much tighter race. We see a tie in the CBS new YouGov poll. We see a tie in the CNN poll. And this to me is part of an emerging pattern which is in a very pivotal state. What we saw was a small Harris lead, but within the margin of error becoming a race. That is way, way, way, way too close to call at this particular point, one that is even, you say, very pivotal. The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania could be how pivotal? How pivotal. All right. So let's take a look at this particular map. This is with the betting favorites. But what Kamala Harris taking the great Commonwealth of Pennsylvania over here. What do we see. We see that Kamala Harris wins in this particular case. Look at that. With exactly 270 electoral votes to Donald Trump's 268. All right. So Kamala Harris wins the Electoral College when she wins the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. But let's take Pennsylvania out of Kamala Harris's column and put them into Donald Trump's column, again with the betting favorites with Trump taking Pennsylvania. What happens when we turn Pennsylvania red? We'll take a look here. Donald Trump wins in the Electoral College 287 electoral votes to Kamala Harris's 251 electoral votes. So that is why I say it is pivotal, pivotal, pivotal, pivotal. It is so important. It's as it is worth adding letters, I will say, and it's worth adding letters. I can't even get it out. The bottom line is it is so important. This state is very, very important. You important data. People like to call it a tipping point. Saying it looks like Pennsylvania could be the tipping point state, which means the one state that will decide the election. Now, if it is in fact the tipping point, say, is there any elected official in Pennsylvania who may have been on a ticket that might have made a difference? Well, this was the great question. When Kamala Harris was making her VP selection, who should she select? And of course, folks like myself thought that she should take Josh Shapiro, of course, as the governor of the great Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. Why? Because his approval rating is 59%. And the bottom line is, if Kamala Harris loses in the state of Pennsylvania, and that is the tipping point state, as Mr. Berman put it, the state that put Donald Trump over the top in the Electoral College, there going to be some real questions as to whether Kamala Harris should have chosen Josh Shapiro, given how popular he is in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. Could she have been a winner if she had chosen him instead of Tim? What? We don't know the answer to that question. We don't know who is going to win the state of Pennsylvania. But it's certainly a question that at this particular moment, with the Pennsylvania polls getting tighter and tighter and tighter, that I'm certainly asking John Harrison, great to see you at pivotal pivotal, pivotal a pivotal this no, I'm sorry. We are now officially J. He can take PivotTable PivotTable PivotTable stick. We're going with that. Thank you gentlemen. Let's talk about all of this and how PivotTable it all is. Joining us right now, CNN senior political analyst and senior editor with The Atlantic, Ron Brownstein. It's good to see you on. Okay, Ron, you coined the phrase Blue Wall. Recently, you were writing more about the history of the blue wall, how Michigan, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin have voted the same way in every presidential election since 1980, save one that suggests what, though, Ron, this time around. Yeah. I mean, it is striking to me these are states that are demographically and economically similar. And as you know, they voted the same way in every presidential election since 80 except one. They've even voted the same way in every gubernatorial election since 1994, except one. They tend to move together. That's the history. but as you're noting, we're seeing something of a different pattern potentially this year. If you look at the totality of the recent polling, the CBS poll yesterday, the, say, 24 hour YouGov project and the CNN polls last week, I think they you look at them all together, they suggest that Harris is opening kind of sort of a little bit of space in Michigan and Wisconsin, which means, as you've been discussing, if she can add Pennsylvania, she gets to exactly, 270 Pennsylvania looks set for, by the way, looking kind of looking at this even more narrowly, Pennsylvania and Michigan have voted the same way in every election since 1940, except for 1 in 1976 when Michigan went with favorite son, Gerald Ford, and Pennsylvania went with Jimmy Carter. So for them to separate, obviously history, you know, prior results is no guarantee of future performance. But for them to separate, would be a striking, deviation from our history over, really, the last 80 years. It is really fascinating. And actually, it's kind of summing up the polling trends of recent years. Put it this way, this morning, which I loved, kind of speaking to all, all American voters, you live in a toss up nation where every election brings coin toss, close fights to run American government. I mean, is that just what you add it all up to? And what we see now? Well, you know, it's really kind of a striking dynamic in that I was recently talking to Karl Rove, and he was reminiscing about how many states as recently as the 2000 election they were playing, and either on offense or on defense, places like Tennessee or Kentucky, that we no longer consider a West Virginia. Even part of the dialog. What's happened is that the number of swing states has dwindled to 6 or 7, but those states themselves have become hyper competitive. I mean, they are swing states because they are balanced, you know, on the edge of a knife. So what you're talking about is a couple hundred thousand people in really 6 or 7 states choosing the direction for a nation of 300 million, 3 to 30 million. And we see some pretty similar patterns, whether we're talking about the national polling or the swing state polling, where Harris, like Biden, is running pretty close to what Biden got in his winning number in 2020 among white voters, maybe a little below where he was among whites without a college degree, maybe a little above where he was among whites with a college degree netting out to about the same place. But despite her gains, she is still not equaling what Democrats usually get among nonwhite voters and young voters. And that, in many ways looks like her challenge and her task in the remaining weeks of the campaign. Let me ask you this. Ron Danna and I were just talking about, I want to get your take on this. Voters continue to say that they want to know more about Kamala Harris's policy positions. Yeah. The Harris campaign has added an issues tab on the campaign website. But I wonder what you think about this perception from voters. And I'm wondering what her campaign thinks about it as well, and if they are okay with that perception. well, first of all, I think we basically know what a Kamala Harris presidency would focus on because there is kind of a communal bottom up agenda from the Democratic Party, really, at all levels. I mean, if you look at the pieces of the Build Back Better bill that passed the House in 2021, and we're stripped out in the Senate by mansion and cinema, that's pretty much a presidential agenda. Child tax credit, increased childcare help, health subsidies, more prescription drug, support. you know, a gun control. There's a broad agenda that's out there. But, you know, voters are saying 30% in that poll in the New York Times, rising to 40% among Latino and Black voters, 50% of younger voters. They need to know more about her. It's not only our agenda. I think it's who she is, who our values are and whether they are comfortable with her as president. I think that's our big job. on Tuesday night, more than making the case against Donald Trump, making the case for herself interesting. Great to see Ron. Thank you so much.