Trump Vs. Harris: Vice President Widens Lead On Key Election Issue That Is Democrats' Achilles' Heel As Debate Performance Establishes Her As Better Economic Steward

The first big economy-focused poll conducted after the televised debate between Vice President Kamala Harris and her Republican rival Donald Trump showed that the former may be solidifying her lead versus the latter.

The Matchup: Harris led Trump on stewardship of the economy with a 44%-42% tally, giving her a two-point lead, an FT-Michigan Ross poll showed. This is an improvement from last month’s survey, which produced a 42%-41% tally in favor of the vice president.

The poll was conducted online by Democratic strategists Global Strategy Group and Republican polling firm North Star Opinion Research from September 11-12. It surveyed 1,002 registered voters, with the margin of error at plus or minus 3.1 percentage points.

Debate watchers viewed her economic stewardship as better than those who didn’t, the poll found. The debate was watched by about 67 million Americans, FT said, citing Nielsen data. Nearly, 75% of respondents who watched the debate said they watched all or part of the 90-minute debate.

See Also: Nate Silver: If Trump Loses, He Will Have Let Election ‘Slip Out Of His Grasp’ As Underlying Factors Favor Him Despite Harris’ Poll Lead

Debate Redeems Harris: Forty-eight percent of debate watchers said they trusted Harris more to manage the economy, while slightly less than 42% said the same about Trump. On the contrary, among those who didn’t watch the debate, Trump had an edge (41%) over Harris (35%) regarding their credentials to steward the economy.

The poll also found that Harris was trusted significantly more than President Joe Biden on the economy. Biden never beat Trump on the question of who voters trusted more to manage the economy, and Harris's support, from 44% of Americans, is an eight-point improvement over Biden, the pollster said.

The numbers prove that Harris might be getting her messaging right and was succeeding in distancing from an “unpopular incumbent even without articulating a clear economic agenda that differs from Biden's,” FT said.

Harris led Trump by a margin of 44%-43% as someone who can be trusted to lower costs of every necessity like food and fuel. She is also viewed as more trusted to help the unemployed find a job, by a similarly tight 44% to 42%.

Harris is seen as better representing the interests of the middle class:

• middle class (49%-36%)
• small businesses (48%-37%)
• union members (45%-35%)
• blue-collar workers (43%-36%)

On the other hand, Trump was seen as better representing the interests of large corporations by a 64%-20% margin and the wealthy by a 67%-19% margin.

“Voters also think [Harris] represents ‘people just like them' better, and that is important given the tendency of people to vote for the candidate they think will do the most for them," said Erik Gordon, a professor at the University of Michigan's Ross School of Business.

One Sore Point: Voters, however, believed they would be better off if Trump were re-elected as he led Harris by a 40%-35% margin on this count.

The poll is likely to be welcomed by the vice president's campaign, given “Harris and the Democrats have historically struggled to convince voters that they are better stewards of the economy than their Republican counterparts,” the report said.

The pushback against her is that is economy is not her forte. Former White House Communications Director Anthony Scaramucci, who was brought in as one of her surrogates during last week’s debate, said in a recent podcast that she has to get the message across that she can lead Americans to a better economic future than Trump.

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