Pennsylvania voters are divided over the 2024 race, with Vice President Kamala Harris now the de facto Democratic nominee.
In the week after President Joe Biden ended his re-election campaign, Harris saw a surge in enthusiasm and poll numbers that already appear to be slowing.
The 800 Pennsylvania voters who sat in the crucial states July 23-25 indicated they favored Harris by a negligible one-point margin. That’s within the 3.46 percentage point margin of error for a head-to-head Trump-Harris matchup.
But when third party candidates are considered in the Commonwealth Foundation SurveyThe two frontrunners are neck-and-neck at 44 percent, with Democrat-turned-independent Robert F. Kennedy Jr. in second place at 6 percent.
Harris has not yet announced her running mate, but Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro is on the shortlist of three people to be the Democratic vice presidential nominee, according to Bloomberg. The others are Arizona Gov. Mark Kelly and Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz.
A pair of polls in the key state of Pennsylvania, taken after President Joe Biden ended his campaign, show Kamala Harris and Donald Trump neck and neck
All three are middle-aged or older white men, which some might consider necessary for a ticket starring a black and Asian woman.
Shapiro will be joined by Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer on Monday for a campaign stop in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania to campaign for Harris.
A separate Fox News poll also released on Friday found Trump and Harris tied in Pennsylvania with 49 percent of the vote.
The Keystone State is one of the key states to secure the 19 electors of the Electoral College in November.
Trump won Pennsylvania by just 0.7 percent in 2016, but in 2020 the state turned blue, with Biden choosing the incumbent president by a margin of 1.2 percent.
Pennsylvania is one of three toss-up states for 2024, according to the Cook Political Report. The other two are fellow Rust Belt states Michigan and Wisconsin.
If Harris chooses to run with Shapiro, it could mean a victory for him in Pennsylvania in November.
Whitmer, who was once thought to be running for president in 2024, says Harris will likely pick her running mate in the next six or seven days — just before the Democratic National Convention next month.
Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro is a leading candidate for Harris’ running mate and could help deliver the Keystone State in 2024. He campaigns in Philadelphia on Monday
Despite Shapiro’s potential to win over Pennsylvanians and Jewish voters, some may be put off by his break with Democrats and his support for private school vouchers, which would give parents public money to cover the cost of private education.
“It’s important that we lift up all of God’s children and we pay special attention to the poor children in struggling school districts,” Shapiro said in an interview with The Wall Street Journal in December 2023.
More than two dozen small groups that advocate for public education sent a letter to Harris last week urging her not to appoint Shapiro as her vice president.
“He’s far too pro-school privatization to be vice president,” said Beth Lewis, an Arizona public schools activist. “We don’t have to be soft on this issue because public education is the cornerstone of our democracy.”