CHRIS CRUCIAL: The closest election in history? 👀

PLUS: Trump walks away from a(nother) interview

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1. Even Steven

Election day is in three weeks. And we haven’t had a race this close in a very, very long time.

Here’s the truth: The race between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump is tied.

Four examples to prove the point:

First, Nate Silver’s latest model run has Harris with a 50.1% chance of winning. 50.1%!!!

Second, the Decision Desk HQ forecast put Harris’ chances of winning at 51%.

Third, the NBC News poll released on Sunday showed the race tied at 48%. But, as Chuck Todd told me in our conversation yesterday, the actual difference between the two candidates was a total of 3(!) interviews out of 1,000 registered voters sampled. THREE!

Fourth, the New York Times polling averages in the 7 swing states show that in 5 — FIVE!! — Trump or Harris has an average lead under a point.

Harris herself acknowledged the remarkable closeness of the contest in a radio interview with Charlemagne tha God on Tuesday. “This is a margin-of-error race. It's tight. I'm gonna win. I'm gonna win, but it's tight.”

This is, without any doubt, the closest election in two decades. In 2004, George W. Bush won a 2nd term over John Kerry 286-251 while winning the popular vote by 3 million,

In 2000, Bush won 271-266 — the closest electoral college margin in modern history —even while losing the popular vote by 500,000.

But even those races don’t approximate just how close this is. Here’s the New York Times today (bolding is mine):

By our reckoning, 2004 was the last election when the polls showed a candidate leading in the pivotal states by around one point — George W. Bush’s edge in states like Ohio and Wisconsin. But even then, he had a discernible if still narrow edge in the Electoral College: John Kerry needed to sweep most of the close states to prevail. The polling couldn’t really be characterized as a tie, like the polls today.

Before 2004? There’s the 2000 election, of course, but the polls weren’t quite as close as the actual result. Looking even further back, it’s hard to find anything. There has never been an election with so many polls showing such a close race.

We are through the political looking glass here — in terms of both the closeness and uniqueness (2 assassination attempts, former president trying to win a 2nd, nonconsecutive term, first black and South Asian woman to lead a major party ticket, incumbent bowing out in late July) of the race.

Which means, well, we don’t really know what to expect between now and November 5. Anyone who says they know what’s going to happen is lying to you.

All we can do is watch the candidates, the campaigns, the polls and the early vote. And I will be here with you — doing just that — every step of the way.

If you haven’t invested in what I am doing here, I hope today is the day. It’s $6 a month or $60 for the entire year.

2. Trump backs out. Again.

Donald Trump, for the second time in as many weeks, has backed out of a planned interview.

“Well, Trump canceled, and he was going to come on,” Joe Kernen, a co-anchor of CNBC’s “Squawk Box,” said Tuesday morning.

The Trump campaign said that he had a conflict — and would instead be in Michigan on Friday.

Kernen also told viewers that the network had offered Vice President Kamala Harris an interview but that she had turned them down.

For Trump, the decision not to sit with CNBC comes hard on taking a pass on a planned “60 Minutes” interview. Harris did an interview with “60” two Sundays ago.

Trump has instead chosen to talk almost exclusively to friendly outlets — from Fox News to bro-ey podcasts. He did, however, sit down for an extended interview at the Economic Club of Chicago on Tuesday. (I am trying to get a transcript of that interview to go through it.)

Harris, on the other hand, appears to expanding the universe of media outlets she is willing to talk to. After avoiding almost any interviews over the first two months of her campaign, Harris is set for a huge sitdown with Fox News on Wednesday.

Why the change in strategy?

Trump is leaning deeper into the sort of bunker mentality that he prefers — a sense that everyone in the media is against him.

Harris has seen her momentum stall somewhat after a polling surge over the summer. And there are still a bunch of people who don’t have a strong sense of who she is. The best way to solve that problem? Interviews with the media!

3. Donald Trump hasn’t played golf in a month

Donald Trump played more than 200 rounds of golf as president. And he regularly played during the time between 2021 and 2024. It’s been an integral part of his life for a very long time.

But he hasn’t played a single round since September 15 — when a would-be assassin was apprehended several holes ahead of the former president on his Florida golf course.

And he won’t play until, at least, the general election is over in 3 weeks time — because of security concerns.

If he wins on November 5, Trump will likely push to play golf again. But can the Secret Service guarantee his safety? I asked that question — and tried to answer it — in a video today on my YouTube channel.

NOTABLE QUOTABLE

“It's the greatest job in government. You show up to the office once a month and you say, 'Let's see, flip a coin,' and everybody talks about you like you're a God.” — Donald Trump on the Federal Reserve Chair

ONE GOOD CHART

A visual history of swing states, via the Washington Post. This is awesome.

SONG OF THE DAY

The album I am most excited for this fall is “Mahashmashana” by Father John Misty. It’s out on November 22 but today he announced a North American tour — he’s coming to DC!! — and released another song off the new album “She Cleans Up.”

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