Trump's RNC polling bounce more about 'subtraction on the Biden side,' pollster suggests

President Trump's post-Republican National Convention polling bounce was particularly evident among white and suburban voters, a new Morning Consult poll shows.

Overall, the RNC helped Trump shrink Biden's previously 10-point lead to a six-point advantage, 50 percent to 44 percent. Among suburbanites, Biden led by 14 points after the Democratic National Convention (54 percent to 40 percent), but after the RNC finished, that had dwindled to a 50-42 margin. Trump also increased his lead from two points to eight points among white voters, though his already-dismal prospects among voters of color got slightly worse.

While the results are good news for the Trump campaign, they aren't necessarily that drastic in a larger context. That's because the two conventions are seemingly tied to one another — Biden received a boost in favorability ratings after the DNC, but the numbers went back down to their pre-convention standing after the RNC, which means it was mostly a wash, Morning Consult's Cameron Easley notes. Easley argues the polling suggests something similar when it comes to white and suburban voters in that it was more about Biden losing that extra jolt than Trump surging.

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

The Morning Consult poll was conducted Friday when 4,035 likely voters were surveyed. The margin of error was 2 percent. Read more at Morning Consult.