The Harris Poll^® #71, September 29, 2004

Latest National Harris Interactive Online Poll Shows Bush with Two-Point Lead Among Likely Voters

The latest Harris Poll conducted between September 20 and 26, 2004 shows President George W. Bush with a two-point lead over Senator John Kerry among likely U.S. voters (48% to 46%). This poll was conducted online with the same methods used by Harris Interactive® to predict the 2000 elections with great accuracy. The previous Harris Poll conducted two weeks earlier, but conducted by telephone, also found the candidates running neck and neck, with Senator Kerry one point ahead of President Bush among likely voters (Bush 47%, Kerry 48%)..

While these polls show a virtual dead heat (and, of course, a "virtual dead heat" was the correct forecast of the popular vote in 2000), this latest survey by Harris Interactive finds some very peculiar things are going on.

One is that the traditional gender gap – with men leaning more toward Republican candidates and women toward the Democratic candidates – is only a very modest feature of this election, at the moment.

Another, even more surprising, finding emerges from an analysis by education. Normally Democratic candidates win substantial majorities among those with the least education – people who never went to college. Now President Bush does better among this group than he does among those with more education.

Indeed, President Bush leads Senator Kerry by nine points among those with no college education and by six points among those with some college education but no bachelor’s degree. Kerry, on the other hand, leads by five percent among those with a college degree and by fully 21 percent among those with post-graduate education.

Strange things seem to be happening, making this something of a topsy-turvy election.

 TABLE 1

Q: "If the next presidential election were held today between George W. Bush for the Republicans, John Kerry for the Democrats and Ralph Nader as an Independent, for whom would you most likely vote?"

Q: "Well, if you had to say would you lean toward George W. Bush, John Kerry, or Ralph Nader?"

Base: Likely Voters

Note: Percentages may not add to 100% because of rounding. 

Q: "If the next presidential election were held today between George W. Bush for the Republicans, John Kerry for the Democrats and Ralph Nader as an Independent, for whom would you most likely vote?"

Q: "Well, if you had to say would you lean toward George W. Bush, John Kerry, or Ralph Nader?"

Base: Likely Voters

Note: Percentages may not add to 100% because of rounding.

The Harris Poll^® was conducted online within the United States between September 20 and 26, 2004 among a nationwide cross section of 2,301 adults (aged 18 and over), 1,777 of whom are likely voters. Figures for age, sex, race, education, region and household income were weighted where necessary to bring them into line with their actual proportions in the population. Propensity score weighting was also used to adjust for respondents’ propensity to be online.

In theory, with probability samples of this size, one could say with 95 percent certainty that the results have a sampling error of plus or minus 2 percentage points of what they would be if the entire adult population had been polled with complete accuracy. The sampling error for the likely voters sample is plus or minus 2.5 percentage points of what it would be if the entire U.S. population of likely voters had been polled with complete accuracy. Unfortunately, there are several other possible sources of error in all polls or surveys that are probably more serious than theoretical calculations of sampling error. They include refusals to be interviewed (non-response), question wording and question order, and weighting. It is impossible to quantify the errors that may result from these factors. This online sample was not a probability sample.

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Q455, Q457