US election: do polls forecast victory for Joe Biden, or Donald Trump?

Democratic contender and Republican incumbent enter the final days of the contest to win the Electoral College, and with it the race for the White House

Expectations are clouded by the pandemic, and a result in the 2016 election that surprised most

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With nine days still to go, early voting in the US election had surpassed all pre-election ballots from four years earlier. Photo: AFP

Published: 9:07pm, 26 Oct 2020Updated: 9:07pm, 26 Oct 2020

Days before the US presidential election, everyone is asking the same question: will Donald Trump be re-elected?

The November 3 election will determine not only whether Trump – a mercurial figure who has shaken up domestic and international norms – will lead the United States for the next four years, but whether the direction he has charted for the past four was an aberration or a fundamental shift for the world’s superpower.

Regardless of whether they win the popular vote – the total number of votes nationally – the victor must secure at least 270 votes to win the Electoral College, the 538 electoral votes allocated among US states based on their population.

Latest polls put former vice-president Joe Biden, the Democratic contender, in a substantial lead over Trump, a Republican. But this year’s vote has been complicated by the coronavirus pandemic, with a record number of mail-in ballots meaning results may not be finalised for days or even weeks after the election.

The memory of Trump’s upset in the 2016 election has also muddied expectations this time.

US election: do polls forecast victory for Joe Biden, or Donald Trump?

What do the polls say now?