Minnesota has long been known as a reliably blue state, having voted for every Democratic presidential candidate since 1972.

While Vice President Kamala Harris may have sought to continue the trend by picking Gov. Tim Walz as her running mate, a new poll suggests that move may have been a mistake. 

Vice president only ahead by five points

According to MinnPost, a poll carried out in Minnesota by Embold Research between September 4 and September 8 showed Harris as having 49% of the vote compared with former President Donald Trump's share of 44%.

Vice President Kamala Harris is narrowly leading former President Donald Trump 49% to 44% in Minnesota, according to a new MinnPost-Embold Research poll. 📝 @radelat https://t.co/h85Z3g5Y9o

— MinnPost (@MinnPost) September 13, 2024

Pollster Jessica Mason noted that the survey had a 2.8% margin of error, meaning that while she "would still consider Kamala to be leading this race," it could be even tighter than the survey indicates.

Embold Research's poll found that the vice president's strongest base of support is in the cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul, with 73% of residents favoring her.

Harris losing support in suburbs and rural areas

However, Harris and Trump are virtually tied in the surrounding seven-county metropolitan area. Meanwhile, Trump holds a 28% lead in the rest of the state.

MinnPost noted that Harris' numbers in the Twin City suburbs and rural Minnesota were worse than those gotten by President Joe Biden in an earlier poll conducted late last year.

In that survey, the president led Trump by eight points in the Twin City metro region while only trailing his predecessor by 20 points in the rest of the state.

The only area of improvement for Harris was in Minneapolis and St. Paul, where she managed to improve on Biden's margin by 15 points.

Independents moving towards Trump

Embold Research pollster Ben Greenfield told the website that he has seen "quite a bit of movement" among those he described as "pure independents."

"Compared to our 2023 poll, we saw those who voted for Biden in 2020 are now slightly likelier to identify as Democrats and less likely to identify as pure independents," he explained.

"The resulting pool of pure independents therefore leans a bit further to the right, which can help explain Trump's edge among this group," Greenfield went on to add.

While Minnesota has a long Democratic track record, the MinnPost noted that Trump came close to flipping it in 2016, with former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton winning by less than two points.