In the weeks following President Joe Biden leaving the presidential race, Vice President Kamala Harris—now the official Democratic presidential nominee—has seen her approval rating increase as Democrats have rallied around her bid for the White House.
Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris appears at the Fiserv Forum during a ... [+]
Since July 21—the day Biden dropped out and endorsed Harris—Harris’ approval rating has jumped from -14.6 to -2.4, according to FiveThirtyEight’s average on Wednesday.
Harris’ average favorability declined slightly in the months before Biden dropped out of the race, FiveThirtyEight’s averages show: She had a net favorability of -16.4 on June 20, -15.5 on May 20 and -14.8 on April 21.
Since Harris launched her campaign for the White House, her favorability has improved most consistently among Democrats, according to a Forbes analysis of YouGov/The Economist surveys over the last seven weeks—though Republicans and independent voters also appear to slowly warm to her.
Recent YouGov polls showed that after Harris launched her run, about 90% of Democrats consistently find her favorable, as opposed to the couple of weeks prior, when between 79% and 82% of Democrats found her favorable.
In the two weeks before she was announced as Biden’s replacement, about 5% of Republicans and 25% of independents found her favorable—but in the last two weeks, those figures have consistently been about 8% and around 40%, respectively, in YouGov polls.
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After Biden dropped out of the race, he almost immediately endorsed Harris as his successor, saying he believed picking her as his running mate in 2020 was the “best decision I’ve made” and he offered his “full support” to her as the Democratic candidate for president. In the weeks since she has become the presumptive—then formal—nominee, Harris has all but eliminated the large lead Trump built over Biden in his last weeks in the race. Harris currently holds a 2.9-point lead on Trump, according to FiveThirtyEight, with 46.6% of voters saying they would support Harris compared to the 43.8% who would support Trump.
The last time Harris had a positive average net favorability rating was July 18, 2021, when she had a +0.2 rating. Since January 2022, Harris’ net favorability has remained in the realm of -10 points with a low of around -17, according to FiveThirtyEight’s averages.
-18.2. That’s Biden’s approval rating as of Wednesday, according to FiveThirtyEight. His rating has remained almost the same since he left the race, though his most recent is a slight improvement from his -18.4 on July 21. As of Wednesday, 56.7% of people found him unfavorable and 38.5% found him favorable.
Despite losing his lead in many head-to-head polls, Trump’s approval rating has also slightly improved since Biden left the presidential race. On July 21, Trump’s approval rating awas -12, and on Wednesday FiveThirtyEight showed his average rating down a couple of points to -9.5, with 52.5% of respondents saying he is unfavorable and 43% finding him favorable.