Poll: Joe Biden, Donald Trump race tightens in Florida

In the latest survey of recent polling, Joe Biden is still clinging to his lead over Donald Trump.

The Democratic National Convention and choosing Kamala Harris as his running mate choice didn’t give Joe Biden a bump with Florida voters.

That’s one conclusion to be drawn from the most recent CNBC/Change Research poll, released Wednesday morning which shows that in at least one survey, Biden has lost half his lead over the last couple of weeks.

The survey, conducted from Friday to Sunday, would have encompassed the afterglow of the DNC, while not encountering counter-programming from President Donald Trump and the Republican National Convention this week.

While Biden still leads Trump, that lead has shrunk from the previous survey.

Biden’s 49% to 46% lead over the President, a three point spread, represents a three point drop from the 50% to 44% lead the former two-term Vice President had in the survey released on Aug. 12, and a return to the margin in July polling.

The momentum Trump is seeing in Florida is matched in the other five battleground states tracked in this series of polls. While Biden leads in all six states, he’s not breaking away in any of them.

The most recent polling shows Biden strongest in the upper Midwest, with a six point lead in Michigan and a five point edge in Wisconsin. In Pennsylvania, Biden enjoys the same three point edge he does in Florida. The race in Arizona has a two-point spread, and in North Carolina, Biden leads by just one point.

While Biden’s leads in Florida and the other battleground states may hearten Democrats, the Trump campaign is confident in its path forward, believing there are multiple pathways to 270 electoral votes.

“We have a quiet confidence based on our pathway. … You want optionality in politics. You want optionality when you look at the map,” campaign manager Bill Stepien told C-Span. “So we see optionality when we look at the map. We would see multiple pathways when we look at the map. And that’s what you want when you look at a campaign.”

“Optionality” aside, Florida is seen as crucial for the President’s reelection chances in November. The state’s 29 electoral votes makes it the most valuable battleground state on the map.

Florida’s heavy presence at the RNC — Lt. Gov. Jeanette Nunez and former Attorney General Pam Bondi both spoke at the convention Tuesday — demonstrates that many of the campaign’s pathways run through the Sunshine State.