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Kamala Harris is the frontrunner among likely voters in Iowa, a state that Donald Trump won by more than eight points four years ago, according to a closely watched poll that suggests female voters in the Midwest are seeing a late surge in support for the Democratic vice president. president could cause. .

A Des Moines Register/Mediacom Iowa poll late Saturday showed Harris leading Trump in the Midwestern state by 47 percent to 44 percent just days before the election.

Iowa, which hosts the caucuses that kick off the presidential nominating process, has long been seen as a battleground state but has become increasingly Republican in recent years. Trump defeated Joe Biden there by more than eight points in 2020, and the nonpartisan Cook Political Report has classified the state as “solidly Republican” in this year’s presidential race.

But the surprising new poll will almost certainly set off alarm bells for the Trump campaign. Harris has largely focused her efforts in the latter part of the campaign on winning the so-called “Blue Wall” of neighboring Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania.

The Des Moines Register survey was conducted by veteran nonpartisan pollster J Ann Selzer, whose poll has long been viewed by both Democratic and Republican political operatives as the “gold standard” of Iowa surveys.

“It’s hard for anyone to say they saw this coming,” Selzer told the newspaper. “(Harris) has clearly jumped into a leadership position.”

The Iowa poll shows that Harris’ rise can be partly explained by an increase in support from independent women voters. The survey found Harris had a 13-point lead among all independents, and a 28-point lead among independent women in the state, with 57 percent favoring Harris and 29 percent supporting Trump.

Harris – who, if elected, would be the first female American president – ​​has explicitly reached out to female voters in the latter part of her campaign. She has emphasized her support for abortion access and reproductive rights and placed blame for the overturning of Roe vs. Wade, which established the nation’s right to abortion, on Trump.

Iowa is one of more than a dozen Republican-controlled states that now ban nearly all abortions after the sixth week of pregnancy, before many women realize they are pregnant.

National polls have consistently shown a gender gap in the electorate, with women generally saying they are more likely to support Harris and men more likely to vote for Trump.

But the Iowa poll nevertheless remains an outlier. The Financial Times poll shows Harris with a razor-thin lead of about one point over Trump in national polls.

Meanwhile, the two candidates remain locked in a statistical tie in the seven swing states — the “Blue Wall” states plus North Carolina, Georgia, Nevada and Arizona — that analysts and campaigns have identified as likely to determine who wins the White House .