‘Tightest race since 2000’: Harris-Trump showdown hits final stretch until Election Day
Saturday marks one month to go until Election Day on November 5. As the presidential campaign enters the home stretch, it remains a margin-of-error race nationally and in the seven key battleground states likely to determine the winner of the election between Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Trump. Both national party chairs are confident of their chances. “We’re playing offense right now,” Republican National Committee chair Michael Whatley said in a Fox News Digital interview earlier this week. “We feel very, very good about the map.” CHECK OUT THE LATEST FOX NEWS POWER RANKINGS IN THE 2024 ELECTION His counterpart, Democratic National Committee chair Jaime Harrison told reporters on Friday that “the enthusiasm is palatable in our party.” But Harrison emphasized that “we know that this election will come down to the margins, and we’re not taking any vote for granted.” CLICK HERE FOR THE LATEST FOX NEWS POLLING IN THE HARRIS-TRUMP PRESIDENTIAL RACE Since replacing President Biden atop the Democrats’ 2024 ticket in mid-July, Harris has enjoyed a wave of momentum and enjoyed a surge in fundraising. In the all-important cash dash, Harris and the DNC appear to hold a large advantage over Trump and the RNC. And that’s helped bolster what was already a very impressive ground game organizational advantage the Democrats held over the Republicans. “We started laying the foundation well before 2024 by investing in our ground game,” Harrison highlighted. “We have been on the ground since the earliest days of this campaign getting our message out.” The DNC chair touted that there are “more than 312 coordinated offices across the battleground states,” with “over 2,000 coordinated staff…doing the hard work on the ground.” IN BID FOR DISGRUNTLED REPUBLICANS, HARRIS TEAMS UP WITH CHENEY IN GOP BIRTHPLACE But Whatley wasn’t phased. “The Democrats have a ton of money. The Democrats always have a ton of money,” Whatley said, noting that Trump was outraised in both the 2016 and 2020 elections. The RNC chair emphasized that “we have the resources we need to get our message out to our voters and to every voter. I feel very, very comfortable about the campaign plan.” And while the Harris campaign and allied groups have outspent Trump and his aligned groups in the ad wars, Whatley pointed to the former president’s ability to capture free media. “Donald Trump is out there talking every single day to the voters in a way that only he can. He can generate news. He can go out there and generate social media hits. He can communicate directly with the American voters like no other politician of our generation, so it’s a huge advantage for us,” he said. Veteran Democratic pollster Chris Anderson, who conducted the Fox News Poll along with longtime Republican pollster Daron Shaw, said with four weeks to go, “my expectations of plausible outcomes range from a narrow Electoral College victory for Trump to a modestly more comfortable victory for Harris.” TRUMP UPS HIS ANTE IN THE 2024 FUNDRAISING FIGHT WITH HARRIS But while Harris holds a slight two-point edge in an average of the national surveys, Shaw noted that “the issue profile of this election continues to favor Trump.” Veteran political scientist and New England College president Wayne Lesperance said that “this presidential contest is shaping up to be one of the closest in history, with the results likely to be slow-coming.” And longtime Republican consultant Matt Gorman, a veteran of numerous GOP presidential campaigns, highlighted that “we’re slated for the tightest race since 2000.” “There are no more debates. There’s going to be a vacuum of news,” he said. “It’s integral the Trump campaign fill that vacuum with a message that puts Harris on the defensive.” Trump, like Biden, is a well-known commodity. But Harris, even after being in the spotlight for nearly two months, is still less well-defined. “The more voters get to know Vice President Harris, the more they like her,” Democratic strategist and communicator Chris Moyer argued. “It’s imperative that she continues to get in front of swing state voters, and she could afford to do more in the final weeks,” he offered. “She should barnstorm the key states, filling up her schedule with rallies and local interviews and off-the-record stops that produce shareable clips that bounce around social media. They’ve run a nearly perfect race to this point, but many voters still want to know more about who she is, what she believes, and what she will do as president.” With one month to go, there’s always the possibility of an October surprise that could rock the White House race. The dockworkers strike earlier this week – which closed major ports – could have wreaked havoc on the nation’s supply chain. It could have turned into an October surprise, but the strike was suspended after just two days. Hurricane Helene, which tore a path of destruction through the southeast, also made an impact on the presidential contest – and there were memories of how Superstorm Sandy rocked the 2012 White House race between then-President Obama and GOP nominee Mitt Romney. And the strife in the Middle East – between Israel, Iran, and Hezbollah, also threatens to upend the election. It’s important to note that while Election Day is a month away, in over two-dozen states, early in-person voting, absentee balloting, and voting by mail, are already underway. Get the latest updates from the 2024 campaign trail, exclusive interviews and more at our Fox News Digital election hub.
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North Carolina Sens. Tills, Budd call for military leader to oversee Hurricane Helene response
Two Republican senators are calling for the Biden administration to appoint a military leader to lead the recovery effort in the aftermath of Hurricane Helene, as some lawmakers continue to criticize the federal government’s response to the storm. In a joint statement, Republican Sens. Thom Tillis and Ted Budd, both of North Carolina, issued a joint statement Friday evening concerning the response operations. BIDEN GETS DEFENSIVE WHEN PUSHED ON WHO’S ‘COMMANDING’ HURRICANE HELENE RESPONSE “Our National Guard and local, state, and federal first responders on the ground have been working tirelessly to respond to this disaster with the resources they have,” the statement reads. “Given the unprecedented extent of the devastation and complexity of search and rescue operations, it would be helpful to assign an active-duty military leader who has extensive experience with operations of this magnitude to lead moving forward.” The Biden administration has come under for a purportedly inadequate response to the devastation left by Helene. As of Friday, the death toll in southeastern states hit hardest by the storm has risen past 224, with more than 100 dead in western North Carolina alone. BUTTIGIEG’S MESSAGE ON RESTRICTING CIVILIAN DRONES NEAR HURRICANE HELENE DAMAGE PROMPTS OUTCRY, CLARIFICATION The White House has said that Biden has coordinated the federal response, including approving emergency declarations and deploying 1,000 active-duty soldiers to support search-and-rescue efforts. More than 4,800 personnel from the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and other agencies have been deployed to North Carolina and neighboring states impacted by Helene. FEMA Director Deanne Criswell was on the ground in North Carolina on Friday, saying the military was delivering food and water to residents from distribution centers. Additionally, FEMA has shipped over 8.5 million meals, more than 7 million liters of water, 150 generators and over 220,000 tarps to aid response efforts, according to the White House. As of Friday, the federal government has provided more than $45 million in Individual Assistance to survivors impacted by the storm, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said, including in the form of one-time $750 payments from FEMA to qualified applicants in Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina and Virginia. Fox News Digital has reached out to FEMA and the White House. Fox News Digital’s Chris Pandolfo contributed to this report.