Yesterday I noted a report that Democrats were “freaked out” over Hillary Clinton’s decline in the polls. Today’s news looked potentially worse this morning with the headline in The Los Angles Times: As Clinton stumbles, Trump takes an apparent slim lead in new tracking poll. The polls showed Trump leading by three points, with the poll having a three point margin of error. The key question on this poll and others showing a decrease in Clinton’s support:
What isn’t known is whether the new surveys are capturing Clinton at a low that will prove temporary, as voters react to Comey’s criticism and the renewed attention to her use of a private email server, or whether they reflect a more lasting shift that could hobble the presumed Democratic nominee for the remainder of the campaign.
NBC News has released additional battleground state polls which are more favorable to Clinton than those reported yesterday. Both candidates are unpopular in these states, with Trump being slightly more unpopular. Also of interest is that they polled with Jill Stein and Gary Johnson included. The addition of the Green Party and Libertarian Party candidates did not change the outcome in these states.
It will also be interesting to see what type of convention bounce each candidate gets. Politics By The Numbers looked at bounces and found that, while candidates generally get a bounce, there has not been a good correlation between the size of the bounce and the eventual winner.