Donald Trump Could Break 40-Year Record in Pennsylvania, Poll Suggests

Donald Trump could be on track to break a 40-year record in the key swing state of Pennsylvania, according to a new poll.
According to the latest Echelon Insights poll, conducted between October 27 and 30 among 600 registered voters in Pennsylvania, Trump is 5 points ahead of Harris on the expanded ballot. In a head-to-head matchup, he leads her by 6 points.
Such numbers for Trump would amount to the biggest winning margin by a Republican in the state since Reagan, who won Pennsylvania by 7 points in 1984. Newsweek has contacted the Trump and Harris campaigns for comment via email.
Overall, the Republican Party has carried Pennsylvania in 26 presidential elections, while the Democratic Party has carried it in 20. In 2016, Trump carried the state by just 0.7 points, while Biden carried it in 2020 by 1.2 points.
With 19 electoral votes, Pennsylvania is pivotal to win in order to secure victory on November 5. The state has voted for the overall winner in 48 out of the last 59 elections.
Polls currently show a tight race between Harris and Trump but give a slight edge to the former president of between one and three points.
For example, the latest Fox News poll, conducted between October 24 and 28, showed Trump had a 1-point edge over Harris in a head-to-head matchup among likely voters. Harris and Trump were tied among likely voters in the expanded ballot with 48 percent each. All the results among registered and likely voters were within the margin of error.
Another poll, conducted by Monmouth University in the same period, showed Trump 1 point ahead among likely voters, on 47 percent to Harris’ 46 percent—a lead within the margin of error. In Quinnipiac University’s latest poll, also conducted between October 24 and 28, Trump was ahead by 2 points in a two-way race and 1 point on the expanded ballot. The poll had a margin of error of +/- 2.1 percentage points.
Meanwhile, several poll trackers show that the Harris campaign is still trailing the Trump campaign in Pennsylvania.
Harris was previously leading in the Keystone State after becoming the Democratic nominee for president, but in the last two weeks Trump has taken the lead, according to FiveThirtyEight’s poll tracker, which puts him 0.7 points ahead and shows he is projected to win the state.
Pollster Nate Silver’s tracker also shows Trump ahead by a margin of 0.8 points in Pennsylvania, while RealClearPolitics shows him 0.3 points ahead.
But despite Trump’s marginal lead, there is still hope for Harris in the state following remarks by comedian Tony Hinchcliffe at Trump’s rally in Madison Square Garden on Sunday that sparked a firestorm of criticism and dominated news headlines.
At the rally, Hinchcliffe joked that Puerto Rico was a “floating island of garbage.” While Trump campaign adviser Danielle Alvarez clarified that Hinchcliffe’s controversial remarks “do not reflect the views of President Trump or the campaign,” the joke went down badly. The backlash could hit Trump especially hard in Pennsylvania—the swing state with the highest percentage of Puerto Ricans, where they comprise 3.7 percent of the population. In 2020, Biden narrowly won the state by 1.2 points after Trump won Pennsylvania in 2016.
On the same day as Trump’s Madison Square Garden rally, the vice president was in Allentown in Pennsylvania. Harris used her visit to release a video on her plan for Puerto Rico, which Puerto Rican music icon Bad Bunny shared on his Instagram account.
Meanwhile, early voting data from Pennsylvania shows that more Democrats than Republicans have voted in the state, with registered Democrats making up 57 percent of early voters, compared with 32 percent for Republicans, according to the University of Florida’s early vote tracker. However, it is unclear what this means for the election since the early vote data reveals only whether voters are registered with a party, not who they are voting for.
Polling data also shows that Trump’s base of white voters in Pennsylvania is shrinking, which could jeopardize his path to victory in the state—and potentially in the overall election. For example, the latest Fox News poll, conducted between October 24 and 28 among 1,310 registered voters in Pennsylvania, showed Trump is leading white voters by only 4 points. In 2020, he won the demographic by 15 points in Pennsylvania, according to CNN exit polls.
Pennsylvania’s population is predominantly white and working class, with this demographic making up 75 percent of the state’s residents—making it a crucial component of Trump’s base.