Can Kamala Harris win? Based on polling right now and the media's pervasive interference on her appalling record, she probably could. She has erased the Democratic Party’s deficits in voter enthusiasm and fundraising—for now. Yet Nate Silver tossed a hand grenade into the middle of this parade since Democrats remain behind in one crucial content: the Electoral College. 

The popular vote does not matter, and when it’s this close, and Donald Trump is the candidate—the advantage goes to the Republicans. Silver then listed scenarios that could screw over or benefit either candidate, but the fact is that Harris is getting a ‘she’s different’ bump in the polls. It’s not nearly enough to overcome Trump’s lead in the Electoral College. The former president has a 61 percent chance of winning this election. Silver then relays what factors he’s plugging into his model (via Silver Bulletin): 

…she’s a modest underdog to Trump in the Electoral College, risking a repeat of the popular vote-Electoral College split that cost Democrats the 2000 and 2016 elections. Harris isn’t unique in this regard: Biden also had a large Electoral College-popular vote gap in 2020, barely winning several tipping-point states despite winning the popular vote by 4.5 percentage points. But this is still a problem for Democrats, and we show Harris as having a slightly wider popular vote-Electoral College gap than Biden had in his version of the forecast.