Swing-state scorecard: Walz addition shifts rankings of Harris’s hardest battlegrounds

The 2024 presidential race that appeared headed for a GOP victory has now transformed into a dead heat since Vice President Kamala Harris replaced President Joe Biden as the Democratic presidential nominee late last month.

With the addition Tuesday of Gov. Tim Walz (D-MN) as Harris’s running mate, the newly minted Democratic ticket is operating at full-steam ahead of the Democratic National Convention in Chicago, and polls and donors are shifting in its favor.

In less than two weeks, Harris raised the record-breaking $310 million in July, while the announcement of Walz as her vice president netted the campaign another $36 million in 24 hours as the pair jetted off on a tour of the crucial battleground states. But the GOP pounced at any chance to lambaste the campaign.

Former President Donald Trump and his vice presidential candidate, Sen. J.D. Vance (R-OH), staged a two-pronged approach against Democrats.

Vance also embarked on an unofficial tour of the battlegrounds, often appearing in the same states as Harris and Walz while attacking them for ducking press scrutiny. Meanwhile, Harris and Walz took repeated jabs at the GOP ticket during the kickoff tour in Philadelphia on Tuesday.

Trump announced a surprise press conference Thursday where he, too, blasted Harris for not taking press questions and challenged the vice president to three debates. Harris only agreed to one.

After a contentious week of attacks and counterattacks, the Washington Examiner reranked the battleground states according to which would be the hardest for the vice president to win.

1. North Carolina

Popular Gov. Roy Cooper (D-NC) took himself out of the running to join Harris’s ticket, citing fears that Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson (R-NC), known for making controversial statements, would attempt to serve as governor if Cooper were campaigning out of the state.

Cooper will have his hands full trying to deliver the Tarheel State for Democrats, given that the last time it voted blue was during the 2008 election.

The Trump campaign isn’t taking the state for granted as it began ad spending last week, and Trump held his first campaign rally in Charlotte, North Carolina, three days after Biden suspended his campaign.

“Basically, she’s a very bad person, and she shouldn’t be running for president. She is a threat to democracy, a true threat to democracy. She’ll destroy our nation,” Trump told supporters.

The Harris campaign later launched a new initiative for Republicans who are backing the vice president in several battleground states, including North Carolina.

2. Michigan

Last week, the Washington Examiner ranked Michigan as the seventh-hardest battleground for Harris to win, citing a RealClearPolitics poll average that showed Harris leading Trump in the state by two percentage points and a Bloomberg News/Morning Consult survey that showed Trump trailing Harris by 11 percentage points, 53% to 42%. 

But events this week have brought back to the forefront tensions in the Democratic Party over U.S. support for Israel as it battles Hamas. The party’s progressive members have accused Israel of committing genocide against Palestinians living in Gaza.

It all came to a head during a Harris rally in Detroit on Wednesday evening when pro-Palestinian activists interrupted the event. Harris attempted to smooth out the disruption by saying, “I am speaking now.”

But after growing frustration, the vice president quipped: “If you want Donald Trump to win, then say that. Otherwise, I’m speaking.”

The crowd of supporters cheered her on as she gave a steely look.

Detroit is home to a significant number of Arab-American and Muslim voters who could organize an anti-Harris campaign if the tensions surrounding the Middle East war continue.

3. Pennsylvania

Gov. Josh Shapiro (D-PA) was the other top candidate on Harris’s running mate short list aside from Walz, but questions about his ambition may have likely cost him the job.

Nevertheless, Shapiro claimed he would campaign on behalf of the Democratic ticket to deliver Pennsylvania and its 19 electoral votes for Democrats.

“I am going to continue to pour my heart and soul into serving you every single day as your governor,” said Shapiro at the Philadelphia rally. “And I’m going to be working my tail up to make sure we make Kamala Harris and Tim Walz the next leaders of the United States of America.”

Harris’s willingness to skip Shapiro also suggests her campaign’s comfort that the state is winnable. A FiveThirtyEight poll average has Harris leading Trump, 45.5% to 44.5%, in the Keystone State. But a RealClearPolitics average shows Trump leading Harris, 48.4% to 46.6%.

Pennsylvania has received the most political ad spending of all the battleground states since Biden suspended his campaign, according to AdImpact. Spending in support of Harris reached $18.6 million, while spending in support of Trump hit $19.9 million, totaling a combined share of $38.5 million in the state over the last few weeks.

4. Arizona

In choosing Walz to join the ticket, Harris also snubbed Sen. Mark Kelly (D-AZ), although that could have more to do with Democrats not wanting to give up a coveted Senate seat as they fight to hold on to control of the Senate.

The energy propelling Harris gave some hope to the party that the sunbelt battlegrounds were now in contention. And new polling suggests they may be correct. The Cook Political Report rated Arizona as one of the three states that had changed from “Lean Republican” to a “toss-up,” a worrying sign for the Trump campaign.

The Harris campaign previously touted the endorsement of border town mayors in the state. Arizona Mesa Mayor John Giles is co-chairing a Republican task force for Harris along with former Republican state Rep. Robin Shaw.

New polling released Thursday from the HighGround Public Affairs survey found that Harris holds 44.4% support in Arizona, while Trump holds 41.6%, within the survey’s margin of error of plus or minus 4.38%. 

Harris and Walz are set to campaign in Arizona late Friday evening while Trump stumps in Montana with Republican Senate candidate Tim Sheehy, who is hoping to unseat Sen. Jon Tester (D-MT).

5. Nevada

Harris leads Trump by two percentage points, 47% to 45%, in Nevada, according to the Bloomberg poll, while the RealClearPolitics average in Nevada shows Trump leading Harris by four percentage points.

Yet, Nevada was also one of the states the Cook Political Report changed from a “Lean Republican” rating to a “toss-up.”

Seizing that momentum, Harris will make her seventh visit to the state Saturday. In a Friday memo, Dan Kanninen, the battleground states director for Harris, touted the 13 campaign offices and nearly 100 staff in the state, as well as the 600 volunteers who signed up after Biden’s withdrawal.

Nevada is the youngest and most diverse state out of all the battlegrounds, playing to the vice president’s advantage as a biracial woman.

“The first large survey of Latino voters with Harris as the presumptive nominee showed her strong support with Latino voters presents a “key weakness” for Donald Trump,” wrote Kanninen. “Harris leads Trump with Latinos by 55-37 in the battleground states and is viewed favorably by Latinos in Nevada by 44 points (69-25), the highest of any battleground state.”

6. Georgia

Georgia is the third state the Cook Political Report changed from a “Lean Republican” rating to a “toss-up.” This follows the University of Virginia’s Crystal Ball, which also moved Georgia back to the “toss-up” category, claiming Harris is performing better than Biden.

Biden won the state in 2020, breaking Republican dominance at the presidential level for the first time since 1992. As Harris crisscrosses the nation to shore up support, she can rely on aid from Sens. Jon Osoff (D-GA) and Raphael Warnock (D-GA) to help her quest to keep Georgia blue.

Trump’s repeated attacks on popular Gov. Brian Kemp (R-GA) and his wife, Marty Kemp, last week may not help him win the state as Republicans try to move the party past the tensions the two leaders hold against one another.

“Without me, he wouldn’t be governor. I got him elected. He was doing terribly,” Trump boasted at a press conference Thursday about the governor. “With that being said, I hope we can repair it, but if we don’t, the people are still the people, and they’re going to vote.”

7. Wisconsin

Harris and Trump are virtually tied in the Badger State, according to a recent Marquette University Law School poll. But in a RealClearPolitics average, Harris is narrowly leading Trump by 0.5%

At a campaign rally in Eau Claire on Wednesday, Harris and Walz addressed a crowd of 12,000 supporters. Walz honed in on his midwestern credentials. (Wisconsin was also the first campaign rally Harris attended after Biden exited the race.)

Vance and Harris had a near-encounter Wednesday when they were both at the Wisconsin airport tarmac.

“I just wanted to check out my future plane,” Vance quipped to reporters. “I also wanted to go say hello to the vice president and ask her why she refuses to answer questions from the media.”