Vice President Kamala Harris’ rapid rise to the top of Democratic ticket hasn’t just reset the 2024 presidential election — it may have disrupted the battle over the Senate majority taking place in the West.
Nevada, Arizona and Montana are three of a handful of “toss-up” Senate seats Democrats are defending to retain a majority in Congress’ upper chamber where they currently govern with 51 seats compared to Republicans’ 49.
In all three Western states, the Democratic incumbents polled far ahead of their party’s previous presidential nominee, President Joe Biden, sparking fears the aging candidate would be a drag on down ballot races, costing Democrats not only the presidency but the Senate as well.
But former President Donald Trump’s 6-percentage-point lead over Biden in the purple states of Arizona and Nevada appears to have been cut in half or eliminated after Biden dropped out of the running and Harris received support from the party establishment. Voters looking for a more electable alternative to Trump now have somewhere to go — a fact that could boost Democratic turnout.
While Harris may present a liability for red-state Democrats, like Sen. Jon Tester, D-Mont., because of her progressive record, having her atop the ticket could help embattled Democrats in other close Senate races, like Sen. Jacky Rosen, D-Nev., according to experts and voters in the Silver State.
How will Kamala Harris affect the Nevada Senate race?
“When you’re running in a presidential year, it’s all about the top of the ticket,” said Kenneth Miller, an assistant professor of political science at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, in an interview with the Deseret News. “(Rosen’s) fortunes rise and fall with the with the fortunes of the presidential race. So Biden’s exit and Kamala Harris’ entry was a massive boon for her campaign.”
Rosen, a one-term member of the U.S House and a former synagogue president, is running against Army veteran Sam Brown, who narrowly survived a roadside bomb in Afghanistan. Echoing national messaging by their respective parties, Rosen has emphasized abortion access while Brown has focused on inflation, immigration and energy independence.
Rosen has consistently led Brown in the polls, with the Real Clear Politics average putting her up by 4 percentage points, significantly outperforming Biden, who was down 5.6 points on average in the state. But polling better than your party’s presidential candidate isn’t typically a good sign, Miller said, because your election showing “is going to come down to the president’s number, you’re not going to bring the president’s number up.”
“(Rosen) was in a situation where it really looked like Biden was going to drag her down,” Miller said. “Biden’s exit has eliminated that problem.”
Only one poll has been conducted in Nevada since Biden withdrew himself on July 21 and Harris emerged as the party’s presumptive nominee. The Bloomberg-Morning Consult poll shows Trump’s lead in the state disappearing, and Harris ahead by 2 points.
Polls only represent a snapshot of how voters are feeling. But the current national snapshot is of a race moving in Harris’ direction.
The latest NPR/PBS News/Marist poll shows Harris up 51%-48% over Trump, 4 percentage points better than her showing two weeks ago, according to the same poll. A new University of Massachusetts Amherst-YouGov poll conducted over the weekend also shows Harris with a 3-percentage-point lead — a 7-point swing from the poll’s findings of a Trump-Biden rematch in January.
Harris led Trump by 1 percentage point nationally, and was tied in the key battleground states, according to a CBS News/YouGov poll released Sunday. And a Morning Consult poll published on Monday showed Harris leading Trump by 4 points. The Hill/Decision Desk HQ now shows Harris and Trump neck and neck in an average of national polls. And pollster Nate Silver’s electoral forecast showed Harris leading Trump for the first time on Monday.
Just a few days after Biden dropped out, Republican pollster Tony Fabrizio predicted a “Harris Honeymoon” period that would exaggerate her popularity as voters expressed interest in a relatively unknown candidate. The temporary shift in polling would not represent a shift in the fundamentals of the race, Fabrizio said.
But Miller said the shift from Biden to Harris will have a very real impact on who comes out to vote: “People decide whether or not participate in the election based on the biggest races.”
Democrats more likely to get out the vote with Harris
Lifelong Nevada resident Lindsey Forbes told the Deseret News she was a “decided” vote for Rosen because of her stance on abortion. But having Harris as the Democratic standard bearer has increased her motivation to volunteer her time for the campaign.
“I think that I was always going to vote but I feel more energized to get people around me to vote,” Forbes said.
Robert Ellis, who works in casino security in Reno, Nevada, told the Deseret News his electoral decisions are motivated by a desire to keep Trump out of office because Ellis sees the former president as irresponsible and a threat to the country’s democratic institutions. While he said he would “vote for any Democrat over Trump,” Ellis believes that Biden being replaced expands the Democratic base from anti-Trump voters to those who want to vote for Harris.
“The morale has been lifted and people are more energized for sure,” Ellis said. “I think people would vote against Trump. Now there’s going to be more people who will vote Democrat.”
To Zach Guymon, a Las Vegas-based GOP strategist at Reformation Strategies, it’s no surprise that Nevadans are now more likely to vote for Democrats in November, including for Rosen. But don’t let the recent wave of positive polls create an exaggerated perception of Harris’ popularity, Guymon cautioned.
“They replaced the worst Democratic candidate they could ever have with a still deeply flawed, pretty unpopular Democratic nominee,” Guymon said.
Republicans have attacked Harris for her role in the Biden administration’s efforts to stem migration at the southern border, as well as her past stances on universal health care programs, gun control and a Green New deal. Harris has yet to face significant media scrutiny and hasn’t sat down for an interview since becoming her party’s nominee for president.
But as the electorate gets to know Harris better, and even when she does make an inevitable gaffe, it is unlikely to derail her campaign because the bar was set so low by Biden, Guymon said.