The final New York Times/Siena College Poll for the 2024 Presidential Election which was released on Sunday shows a slight advantage for the vice president Kamala Harris on the former president Donald Trump in all but one swing state.

The poll surveyed 7,879 likely voters by telephone in the seven battleground states. Among those surveyed, the poll found Harris leading by three points in Nevada, by two points in North Carolina and Wisconsin, by one point in Georgia and had the edge in a virtual tie in Pennsylvania. Trump had the advantage in a virtual tie in Michigan and a four-point lead in Arizona. Neither candidate received more than 50 percent support in any state, continuing to reinforce the image of a close contest with no clear advantage for either candidate.

The poll was conducted between October 24 and November 2, with a margin of error of plus or minus 3.5 points within each state.

However, Harris would have more positives to draw from than Trump. Analysis of the survey by The New York Times found that recent decision-makers have come out in favor of Harris, with 55 percent of those who recently decided their vote supporting her, compared to 44 percent for Trump.

New York Times/Siena College is one of America’s most trusted pollsters. Aggregator 538 ranks it first on its list of 282 for its history and transparency. Analyst Nate Silver ranks it among the top two companies, giving it an A+ rating.

News week contacted Trump and Harris’ campaign by email for comment.

What do the 2016 and 2020 polls say?

THE The 2016 elections hurt pollsters overall, as the vast majority had shown clear tendencies for the former US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton have a healthy lead.

Many blamed then-FBI director James Comey and his announcement just days before the election to reopen an investigation into Clinton’s emails to erase what had been an otherwise healthy lead and bring the race within the margin of error.

As election day approaches, the Times had trailed Clinton with 45.9 percent support, compared to Trump’s 42.8 percent nationally.

At the same time, Siena College’s national poll of battleground states found Clinton with a seven-point advantage in Pennsylvania, and even in North Carolina and even Florida.

Pennsylvania defeated Trump, giving him a victory by 0.72 points – just 44,000 votes, roughly – as did North Carolina by 3.66 points and Florida by 1.2 points.

The failures of 2016 caused numerous the sounders adjust the way they weighted different demographics in an effort to better capture the “Trump effect” in polls. However, these changes did not prove as effective as pollsters hoped.

The 2020 Siena College Survey Revealed Joe Biden have a nine-point national advantage over Trump among likely voters. Biden then won by a margin of 4.5 points, only half of what the poll had measured.

In the 2020 Battleground Poll released on November 1 of that year, Siena College found Biden ahead by six points in Arizona, three points in Florida, six points in Pennsylvania, and 11 points in the Wisconsin.

Biden ended up winning Arizona despite broader expectations of a Trump victory, but he only eked out victory by 0.3 points, or just 10,500 votes, approximately. Trump easily won Florida by 3.5 points, and Biden took back Pennsylvania, but again by a slight margin of about 1.16 points.

Biden also ended up taking Wisconsin, but by a much smaller margin of 0.63 points.

Can we trust polls?

Polls have taken a big hit to their reputation over the past two elections, with polls indicating that Clinton would beat Trump in 2016 and that Biden had a greater advantage than he ultimately won in 2020.

“While the polls are not so accurate that one can believe they will lead to a close election, one also cannot assume that they will be wrong again, as they did in 2016 or 2020” , said Cohn, chief political analyst. for the Timeswrote Friday in an article published in Upshot.

Both of those previous polls underestimated Trump’s support, with many finding in 2016 that his supporters were less likely to express support for the highly controversial candidate.

Cohn pointed to “major methodological changes” in the polling data, noting that “many of the worst-performing pollsters of 2020 have either adopted massive methodological changes or fallen off the map.”

However, some of these changes, made to compensate for Trump’s underrepresentation, could have leads to underrepresentation of Harris instead, Cohn warned.

“It is difficult to overstate how traumatic the 2016 and 2020 elections were for many pollsters,” he wrote. “For some, further underestimating Mr. Trump could pose a major threat to their business and livelihood. For others, their status and reputation are at stake.”

He added: “If they underestimate Mr. Trump for the third time in a row, how can we trust their polls again? he continued. “It is much safer, whether in terms of self-interest or purely psychological, to find a close race than to bet on a clear Harris victory.”