Kamala Harris has seen a surge in her poll numbers following her replacement of Joe Biden as the Democratic presidential candidate. In a recent poll by Dailymail.com, voters have shared their views on what they admire and what concerns them about the Vice President.
Survey participants were asked to describe the most favorable aspect of Harris, with the leading responses being her gender, as she is a ‘woman,’ and the fact that she is ‘not Trump.’
These prominent words emerged from a word cloud based on an online survey conducted by J.L. Partners, which included 1,054 likely voters.
The findings highlight that Harris’s gender is a significant positive factor for many American voters, despite her generally steering clear of emphasizing the groundbreaking aspect of her candidacy in a nation that has yet to elect a female president.
Additional positive descriptors from the survey include: strong, competent, presidential, friendly, and experienced.
J.L. Partners polled more than 1000 likely voters for a word of phrase that summed up what they best liked about Kamala Harris. The fact that she is a woman and not Trump came top
Conversely, when voters were asked about their main reservations regarding Harris, the word ‘liberal’ stood out prominently. Other concerns mentioned included her ‘experience,’ the ‘border’ issue, and her being a ‘woman.’
Taken overall, the word clouds show which Republican attack lines will find purchase and which will not resonate with voters.
Independents and Republicans both plump for the word ‘liberal’ while for Democrats it is ‘woman.’
James Johnson, co-founder of J.L. Partners, said there was fodder for both campaigns in the results.
‘Kamala Harris has enjoyed a honeymoon with voters since Joe Biden dropped out of the race. But our survey shows that her appeal could be limited as she comes under greater scrutiny,’ he said.
‘Voters say the best things about her are that she is a “woman” and that she is not “Trump.” But Harris had made clear that she does not want to make much of her gender, and being the candidate who is not Trump can only take you so far, as Biden discovered to his cost.
‘At the same time, Republican messaging hitting her as a liberal is finding its target. Independents see that as their biggest hesitation in voting for her.
‘Both sides will see something positive in the results, and the fact that only one in five voters say they know a great deal about Harris means they each have scope to further define in her for the electorate.’
The survey also found that 20 percent of voters believed they knew a lot about Harris. Some four percent said they knew nothing at all, and 21 percent said they knew not very much.
Voters’ biggest hesitation was that she was ‘liberal’ according to our word clouds
Democrats say their biggest hesitation is that she is a woman
Harris has enjoyed a huge bump in fundraising and a surge in the polls since Biden quit
Biden’s decision to stand aside last month has boosted Democratic fortunes.
This week, the Harris campaign brought in $36 million in the 24 hours after she announced Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz as her running mate.
And she now holds a lead in polls. A rolling average maintained by the statistics website FiveThirtyEight gives her a two-point lead over Trump.
His allies were initially delighted when Biden stood aside, expecting weeks of Democratic infighting as they squabbled over a replacement.
But Democrats settled on Harris within 24 hours, leaving the Trump campaign trying to adjust to a new opponent.
Harris is welcomed by her running mate Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, before she delivers remarks at a campaign even in Eau Claire, Wisconsin, on Wednesday
It has tried to tie Harris to the immigration crisis, labeling her the ‘border czar,’ and saying that her pick of Walz showed she was in the grip of the liberal or even ‘Hamas’ wing of her party.
This week she has been blitzing battleground states with Walz.
On Friday they were headed to Arizona, before hitting Nevada on Saturday.
In contrast Trump has been holed up at his Mar-a-Lago headquarters in Florida for most of the week, heading to the solid red state of Montana Friday to support a Republican Senate candidate.
