It’s a familiar story: Following Thursday night’s debate, the beltway class is counting Joe Biden out. The data in the battleground states, though, tells a different story. On every metric that matters, data shows it did nothing to change the American people’s perception, our supporters are more fired up than ever, and Donald Trump only reminded voters of why they fired him four years ago and failed to expand his appeal beyond his MAGA base.
Here’s what else the voters saw immediately following the debate: President Biden met with grassroots supporters in Atlanta, dipped into Waffle House for some late night food and some selfies, then touched down in North Carolina where he shook every hand on the tarmac before a rally the next day with fired-up voters that highlighted the stark contrast at the center of this race. At the same time, Vice President Harris was campaigning in battleground Nevada. And our surrogates and tens of thousands of volunteers spent the week organizing and mobilizing Americans – because that is the work winning campaigns do. Every single day matters in reaching the voters who will decide this election. But for all the hand-wringing coming out of Thursday, here’s the truth: this election was incredibly close before Thursday, and by every metric we’ve seen since, it remains just as close.
Flash polls from CNN, 538, SurveyUSA, Morning Consult, and Data for Progress show what we expected: The debate did not change the horse race. This mirrors what the campaign’s internal post-debate polling showed: The president maintained his support among his 2020 voters and voters' opinions were not changed.
CNN: “An 81% majority of registered voters who watched the debate say it had no effect on their choice for president, with another 14% saying that it made them reconsider but didn’t change their mind. Just 5% say it changed their minds about whom to vote for.”
538: “The face-off doesn’t seem to have caused many people to reconsider their vote.”
SurveyUSA: Continues to show a tight race between President Biden and Donald Trump, consistent with public polling averages pre-debate.
Morning Consult: A new large-sample, independent poll has President Biden gaining 1 point post-debate, now leading 45-44.
Data for Progress: Vote choice between Trump and Biden remains largely unchanged, and Biden continues to run ahead of other Democrats in a Trump matchup.
Geoff Garin of Hart Research: “I am finishing my second battleground state poll post-debate and both surveys show the same thing: the debate had no effect on the vote choice. The election was extremely close and competitive before the debate, and it is still extremely close and competitive today.”
Following the debate, our internal dials showed President Biden led Trump on key measures of being presidential, speaking to the issues that matter, and being likable by more than 20 points. Dials showed that independent voters were turned off by Trump’s personal attacks, and had deep negative feelings when Trump talked about January 6, his support for Putin, and refusing to lay out his vision for America. Our internal poll confirmed the dials: Trump's performance left independent voters feeling less confident about his position on reproductive rights and abortion, respect for the Constitution and rule of law, and truthfulness.
Debate dials conducted by outside groups in Phoenix, Arizona largely confirm what we saw from internal dials. A few key takeaways:
“Overall, voters say that the debate for the most part didn’t change their overall outlook of either candidate.”
“Trump’s refusal to answer questions in a straightforward manner and his exaggerated boasting fed into perceptions that he cares more about himself than solving peoples’ issues.”
“Biden’s strongest moments were on matters of policy substance, and voters thought he better addressed their concerns on the issues than did Trump.”
In focus groups of voters who watched the debate, President Biden won on substance:
As one undecided voter in Warren, Michigan told CNN: “When it comes to a strong leader and what we’re looking for in a leader, I’m looking for somebody that I trust to be able to uphold policies that will protect me, and are more concerned for the general well being of everybody in the United States, which I got more from Biden considering he did a lot more talking about policies, and what he’s done and what he plans to do. Whereas on the other side from Trump, all I really heard was ‘I’ve done this and it was the best ever,’ but I never heard what it was…”
This was reinforced in a focus group too from Univision in Arizona showing undecided Latino voters that moved toward Biden following the debate
Across the battlegrounds, our state campaigns have received an influx of volunteer enthusiasm and support, which we are channeling into voter outreach:
More than three times as many people applied to work on the campaign in the 24 hours following the debate than apply on an average day.
Post-debate, across the battlegrounds, our rate of volunteer signups was more than three times as much as an average day.
In North Carolina, we had our largest event of the campaign on Friday, with thousands of people turning out to hear the president give strong and forceful remarks.
This weekend, Team Biden-Harris launched a massive mobilization blitz to engage thousands of volunteers and supporters at over 1,500 events across battleground states.
That same enthusiasm is showing up in the campaign’s fundraising: In the wake of the debate, Team Biden-Harris raised more than $27 million between debate day and Friday evening. Debate night saw three record-breaking hours for grassroots fundraising – including the hour following the debate which was the best one hour of grassroots fundraising since launch.
If we do see changes in polling in the coming weeks, it will not be the first time that overblown media narratives have driven temporary dips in the polls. In 2012, we saw media coverage of President Obama's first debate performance drive a large, but temporary, drop in his polling – driven almost entirely by fewer Democrats answering polls in the days after the debate, rather than true changes in support.
This drop in polling led to highly reactionary headlines that didn’t reflect swing voters’ true opinions:
Bottom line: Our team knows a thing or two about putting our heads down and doing the work to win hard races. This will be a very close election. It was always going to be. It will be won by breaking through and talking to voters every single day, making our case to them about just how high the stakes are and who is fighting for them. That’s what our campaign has been planning for. It’s the relentless work we’re doing on the ground to get our winning message out that makes us confident President Biden will win this race and beat Donald Trump.
