Harris and Trump rush to overcome vulnerabilities in final day before election

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Subscribe to enjoy similar stories. EAST LANSING, Mich.—Kamala Harris is running against a persistent level of negativity about the direction of the country, the kind of which few incumbent party nominees survive. Donald Trump is trying to overcome high unfavorability marks and a public with entrenched opinions about him.

Harris and Trump both face historic headwinds ahead of Tuesday’s election. One of them, however, will defy the odds. “In the abstract, a normal Republican nominee right now should win this election by 10 points," said Doug Sosnik, a Democratic strategist.

“By the same token, if you had a popular Democratic nominee, he or she should easily be able to beat a guy like Donald Trump, the majority of people never supported and don’t want him back in office for another four years. But that’s not the campaign we’re dealing with." The two campaigns are vying for support—with a hectic campaign schedule in the closing moments of the race—in seven battleground states that will determine the outcome of the election. Polls show a tight race within the margin of error ahead of Tuesday’s election.

The Harris team thinks the vice president is overcoming voter concerns about the economy by presenting plans for lowering prices. Republicans are projecting confidence in Trump, though he has muddled his closing message—“Harris broke it, Trump will fix it"—with a string of off-script remarks, sometimes incendiary or filled with violent imagery. On Sunday, he suggested he wouldn’t mind someone shooting “through the Fake News" while in Pennsylvania, the same state where an attempted assassin shot him and others, and killed one rallygoer in July.