About 3 in 10 registered voters in a new survey said Tuesday night’s presidential debate between Vice President Harris and former President Trump will help determine their vote, underscoring how high the stakes are for the first, and possibly only, debate between the two candidates.
A new NPR/PBS News/Marist poll, released Tuesday, found 30 percent of registered voters said the debate will help them a great deal or good amount in making their selection for president. Roughly 69 percent said they do not think the event will help them very much or at all with their decision in November.
A majority — 70 percent — of Americans are planning to watch the debate, pollsters found, while an additional 23 percent said they will not watch, but will closely monitor news coverage of the forum.
Plans to watch the debate was similar across party lines. According to the survey, 72 percent of Democrats, 74 percent of Republicans and 67 percent of independents said they will watch most or all of the debate.
Harris and Trump will square off on the debate stage in Philadelphia Tuesday night. The debate, hosted and moderated by ABC News, begins at 9 p.m. EDT and will run for about 90 minutes.
The event comes as the race remains tight between the two candidates. The latest poll showed the vice president with a national 1-point lead over Trump, 49 percent to 48 percent, as she has continued to narrow the gap with the former president. Of this group, just 1 percent chose another party’s candidate, and another 1 percent were undecided.
Of those who said they definitely plan to vote in the election, now less than two months away, Harris leads the former president by 3 points — 51 percent to 48 percent — pollsters found.
A polling index by The Hill/Decision Desk HQ shows Harris with a 3.2 percent lead over the former president, 49.4 percent to 48.2 percent. Surveys from critical swing states also show a very close race between the two party nominees.
The NPR/PBS News/Marist poll was conducted among 1,529 U.S. adults from Sept. 3-5. The margin of error for the overall sample is 3.2 percentage points.
