Right now, my spreadsheet average shows an almost identical numbers for both candidates

In other words, the popular vote would be determined entirely by turnout.

• So as it stands, both candidates are getting 90% of their own vote. 90.03 and 90.02. You couldn't be any closer, without being exactly equal.

• They are both getting between 40.6-40.7 of the independent votes. 40.63 to 40.65. Two hundreds of a difference.

• They are both rounding to getting 6% of the other side's vote. 5.65 to 6.14.

All of this is the average of the Demographics of 32 separate polls. This is the largest number of polls I have ever had in this spreadsheet, and it is crazy how everything is averaging out to be so close. But that seems to be reflective of how the electorate is right now. We are a 50/50 country, regardless of who is being put out there on either side (unless it is an old man who cannot speak coherently).

So the only reason that Harris is currently ahead by 1.85 right now is that I have the Demographics weighted to a 1.8 percent advantage for the Democrats and she holds that slight advantage of gathering 6.14% of the Republican vote versus Trump gathering 5.65 of the Democratic vote. If I weighed the turnout to be even between Republicans and Democrats, Harris would be leading by a whopping 0.17%.

Now this is the tricky part. Figuring out the voter make up. I am maintaining just under a two-point advantage for Democrats based on the average of the past two Presidential elections and some additional factors. Hillary enjoyed a 36-33 Democrat to Republican advantage, while Biden had a 37-36 advantage. One could argue that the long-standing Democratic advantage in Presidential elections waning and that I am offering them too much credit. After all the GOP lead actually had an advantage in the 2020 midterm of around three points.

Some would suggest that this is a trend. Democrats held a three-point advantage in 2016, a four-point advantage in 2018 midterms, they dropped to a one-point advantage in 2020 and fell to a three-point disadvantage in the 2022 midterms. If you average out the past four elections, you will come up with 1.25 average for Democrats with the Democrats trending down. That being said, the midterms can be a bit deceiving and generally the Party out of power will have better numbers than the Party in power. So that three point advantage in 2022 is not necessarily a precursor to where things will be in 2024. One can hope it is, and then my spreadsheet would be underestimating Trump voters over overestimating Harris voters.

What I can tell you is that the popular opinion is that this will be a fairly close turnout election year, with many pollsters even providing a small turnout advantage for the GOP based on enthusiasm and such. But I suspect that at the end of the day, we will be back to a smallish normal turnout advantage that Democrats have enjoyed for years in Presidential elections. I am suspecting it will be just under two points, simply based on the same manner I have predicted voter turnout in the past. I am never a big fan of "this is the year everything changes" because that never turns out to be true.

What I can say at this point is that unless things really change fairly drastically, on election night if you are watching exit polls, the partisan turnout will go a long way to predicting the winner of the popular vote and possibly the election.