Thomas Coughlan: Herald Deputy Political Editor on the latest polls on the eve of the US Election

America is heading to the polls as a nation deeply divided down partisan lines. 

Kamala Harris and Donald Trump are making their final pitch to voters on the eve of election day, with latest polling showing the pair remain locked in a tight race. 

Harris has strong support from women voters, while Trump has been gaining ground with Hispanic voters, especially men. 

Herald Deputy Political Editor Thomas Coughlan told Ryan Bridge opinions are different everywhere you look. 

He says parts of each battleground state show clear preferences for either candidate. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Right, It's election day tomorrow. Everyone is excited? Well is
everyone excited? I suppose people are highly anticipating the result
of the election. That's a fair way to put it.
Thomas Cogan is the New Zealand Herald deputy political editor.
He is in Pennsylvania. Pennsylvania is the king of the swings.
So what's his pick for what is going to happen?
We'll go to I'm Live now. Hey, Thomas, Hey, Marten R.

(00:21):
Good to have you on the show. What are you feeling?
What's the vibe?

Speaker 2 (00:26):
The vibe changes wherever I go. I've been asking myself
this question since I got here. I was in North
Carolina a couple of days ago and it was feeling
very kind of trumpy. I'm in downtown Philadelphia at the moment.
That's that's always going to be pretty harris so and
it does feel like that. And then I was in
the suburbs of Philadelphia a couple of days before that,
and that was feeling a bit of a mix. And

(00:47):
all the poles are saying it's incredibly pous, and it
honestly feels that way. It feels like there is no
convincing lead right aside?

Speaker 1 (00:54):
What about this idea of polster herding. Is there any
truth in this I idea where the polsters are all
waiting their outcomes to be roughly the same, because it
does seem odd that every poll pretty much I mean,
you have that Iowa one the outline the other day,
but every pole pretty much has the neck and neck.
Shouldn't we have more?

Speaker 2 (01:11):
Right? So you mentioned it, I away, Yeah, you mentioned that,
I think the Trump by three points, and it's a
view like it's a very there's not just any polls,
it's one that's been very young. The money for presidents
there is got it wrong. The last three elections, two

(01:33):
presidential elections and then the last minimum elections are quite wrong.
They have been looking at the methodologies to improve them,
and in doing so there is a convicting to be
made that they might be updating Donald Trump argument on
the chances and we won't know the answers of that
until the results are counters. But that actually does seem

(01:55):
like a very kind of potential potential outcome to what's
going on. It just because it is really quite weird
that all these poles are clustering, and they had hundreds
of poles over here, Ryan not like us every day we.

Speaker 1 (02:08):
Have the well we pretty much have till bought Mills
and the Taxpayers Union doing us proud exactly. Hey, what
about the Houses of Congress? Who's going to get the Senate?
Who's going to get the because there was talk that
Republicans will definitely keep the Senate. Do you think that'll happen?

Speaker 2 (02:30):
It looks like a toss up at the moment. So
there are half a dozen races. I mean, in Pennsylvania
at the moment, they've got quite a contenitive Senate race.
So it honestly, they could be they could be split.
They could all go one way, they could all the
other way. Again, I'm not sure. Again is too close
to all?

Speaker 1 (02:49):
How much of this do you think will come down
to the you know, the Democrats and the Republicans getting
their base out versus those independents breaking one way all
the other?

Speaker 2 (03:02):
Well, sorry that I see.

Speaker 1 (03:05):
How much of this will come down to the Democrats
and the Republicans getting their base out versus the independence
breaking for Harris or Trump one way or the other.

Speaker 2 (03:18):
It actually it's I mean, does seem like a bit
of both. I think the Democrats are focusing on on
on trying to do a bit of both, definitely doing
the turnout game and but also trying to trying to
break independence that way, it seems like the Republicans are
just simply focusing. The Republicans have always been quite skeptical

(03:39):
of early voting, but this election they are very, very
keen to get early voting, to get early voting across,
to encourage the voters to early vote, because they don't want,
you know, if there's a mass of blood tomorrow or
a rain storm or something that keeps people away from
the polls. They want to make sure that there as
many of their voters of voter as possible so that
a free giving like that doesn't doesn't then me chances.

Speaker 1 (04:02):
Thomas, thank you very much. We'll let you get back
to the campaign. Thomas Cognan, Herald's deputy political editor with
us in Pennsylvania. For more from Early Edition with Ryan Bridge,
listen live to News Talks it Be from five am weekdays,
or follow the podcast on iHeartRadio.