Kamala Harris Still Not Connecting With Persuadable Voters: GOP Pollster

Vice President Kamala Harris continues to face challenges in connecting with the few remaining undecided — but persuadable — voters, according to GOP pollster Frank Luntz.
In an appearance on CNBC Thursday morning in the aftermath of Harris’ CNN town hall, Luntz said that Harris’s communication strategy is not resonating with those critical voters.
“That clip illustrates exactly why Harris is in trouble,” Luntz said, referring to a town hall exchange where Harris shifted focus to former President Donald Trump instead of directly addressing a question about immigration and the border wall.
“They asked her specifically, ‘Where do you stand on the wall?’ And what does she do? She shifts it right to Donald Trump,” Luntz said.
According to the Republican pollster, Harris’ best stretch came when she was making the case for herself about why she should be elected. That progress, in his view, has stalled with her increased focus on attacking former President Trump in recent weeks.
“She still hasn’t closed the deal,” Luntz added, noting that Harris has repeatedly failed to provide voters with clear, specific plans. “She hasn’t told the public, step by step, what she would do.”
In the CNBC interview, Luntz stressed that if Harris wants to win, she must offer a clear vision for what she will do as president and called her CNN town hall a missed opportunity. “She should have said, ‘I want to tell you what I’m going to do in the first hour, the first day, and the first week,'” he said. “She didn’t do any of that.”
Less than two weeks ahead of the election, Harris’ campaign is working to build on the momentum that carried her through the convention and debate, but Luntz believes the vice president’s struggles to connect with key voter demographics could pose a problem in critical swing states. He pointed out that the outcome of the election will likely hinge on how well Harris performs with key demographics in specific places: people of color in North Carolina and Georgia, union members in the Rust Belt and and Latinos in Arizona and Nevada.
“What you do with voters of color determines North Carolina and Georgia,” Luntz said. “How you do with union voters determines Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin.”
Despite these criticisms, national polls still show an extremely tight race between Trump and Harris, most within the margin of error. A recent New York Times/Siena College poll showed Harris leading former President Donald Trump nationally, with 49% of voters supporting her compared to 46% for Trump.
However, Luntz emphasized that the small group of persuadable voters— he estimated around 2 percent of the electorate—have not broken for Harris, and there are vanishingly few days remaining for her to put them in her column.
He also said that most undecided voters are likely non-voters at this point, but persuadable voters could still be swayed by Harris if she refines her messaging. “They can be moved by Harris, not by Trump,” he said.