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ince President Biden dropped out of the race in July, there has been an increase in enthusiasm among Democratic voters. According to most polls, Harris’s (un)popularity before she ran was similar to Biden’s, with only 38% of respondents viewing her favorably. Currently, an average view of polls shows Harris holding a slim lead over Trump nationally: about 48.1% to 46.7%  (FiveThirtyEight). Since Biden's departure, Harris has raised over USD 1 billion in campaign funds, while Trump is at about 800 million. Analysts' estimates show renewed support from Latino, young and African-American voters, narrowing the Democrat poll deficits in swing states in what is known as the Sunbelt (North Carolina, Georgia, Arizona, and Nevada); however, Trump is leading overall in at least three of those states by wider margins than in the 2016 and 2020 elections. It’s worth remembering that in the 2016 and 2020 elections, state and national polls underestimated support for Trump, with some of his supporters less likely to respond to polls. As for Congress, the most likely outcome—according to analysts and observers—is a Republican Senate and a Democratic House of Representatives. Early voting has already begun in a number of states, starting with Virginia, Minnesota and South Dakota on September 20.

 

The candidates' agendas

 

While Harris has recently supported several centrist policies, in contrast to her 2020 presidential campaign, she is likely to adopt much of Biden's center-left agenda. As a presidential candidate in 2020, Harris supported a ban on fracking and the decriminalization of illegal immigrants crossing the US border. Now, as a candidate, she has changed some of her original positions, accepting fracking (also given the strong relevance of the sector in Pennsylvania, the most important of the seven states that decide the elections) and supporting the strengthening of border controls with additional funding to border agencies.

 

Harris has promised to govern with pragmatism without being a slave to ideology. She proposed an ‘America Forward’ agenda that includes tax credits to spur investments and create jobs in the industrial sector, along with investments in artificial intelligence, technological development and energy transition, in addition to the support of products made in the US. She has also said she would invest in US industrial strength to counter China’s global power, supporting USD 100 billion in tax credits to boost manufacturing by focusing on a ‘diversified’ energy mix, including oil and gas, to ensure that domestic energy production remains at record levels. The plan will be funded by a portion of the proceeds from international tax reform. Harris also plans to increase the small business tax credit from USD 5,000 to USD 50,000. Largely adopting Biden’s approach, she also proposed raising taxes on corporations and personal incomes over USD 400,000. She has placed abortion and women's rights in general at the center of her campaign, emphasizing Trump's role in solidifying the conservative majority in the Supreme Court that overturned the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision, a landmark in US abortion case law.

 

Harris has not yet embraced a foreign policy doctrine in the strict sense, but observers suggest that she will adopt an approach based on human rights and the promotion of democracy, which could lead to increased penalties for companies located in jurisdictions with authoritarian governments. As regards the migration policies, the Biden-Harris administration announced in June 2024 measures to drastically limit access to asylum seekers at the border when illegal crossings reach emergency levels, after years of record numbers of crossings. As presidential candidate, Harris has not commented on asylum policies, but she is likely to follow Biden’s lead in balancing limited access with attention to human rights.

 

A Trump victory, according to most analysts, would relaunch a domestic and foreign policy based on ‘America First’ that is less conditioned than his first term, as he is likely to choose an administration of officials even more closely aligned than in the past. In terms of fiscal policy, Trump initially proposed extending the 2017 cuts, when he made substantial changes to the rates and bases of both individual and corporate income tax, most notably reducing the top rate for corporations from 35% to 21%. He then specified that he would aim to further reduce corporate taxes to 20%. He has since expanded his calls for tax relief to include eliminating taxes on tips (a policy Harris has since adopted), welfare benefits and overtime pay, as well as eliminating caps on state and local tax deductions. Trump also said he plans to lower corporate taxes to 15% for domestic manufacturing. To finance these cuts, the United States would increase tariffs on imports, including a global tariff of 10%-20% and a 60% tariff on all Chinese imports. It remains to be seen whether Trump will raise tariffs to this level or whether he is simply using these statements as negotiating leverage. However, his statements indicate a trend towards greater protectionism in order to encourage companies to relocate production to the United States.

 

As regards the policy of sanctions, according to most observers, a Trump administration would pursue a more unilateral and transactional approach than Harris, focusing more on economic goals and less on political values. Trump could likely adopt some of the same strategies he pursued in his first term, such as withdrawing from multilateral institutions, cutting US funding for international organizations, reversing some of Biden’s environmental policies, and adopting an immigration agenda that would increase deportations of illegal immigrants.

 

 

 

 

Energy policy

Assuming the most likely scenario outlined by pollsters, with Republicans controlling the Senate and Democrats the House, it would be unlikely that a gridlocked Congress passes any meaningful policies. In fact, it is widely believed that the next president's greatest influence on green energy development will come from the handling of legislation and regulations introduced since 2021 during the Biden-Harris administration.

The laws passed during this period–the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), and the CHIPS and Science Act–have transformed US energy policy. These three laws earmarked hundreds of billions of dollars to build infrastructure, provide incentives for the production and purchase of clean energy, and fund clean energy research. None of these measures is likely to be completely repealed, as they all fund numerous projects in Republican-led states. However, implementation by the next administration will determine how effectively and rapidly these measures will stimulate the growth of clean energy.

 

If Trump wins, he is likely to focus on rolling back the most climate-related IRA measures (and therefore most polarizing), such as the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund—which provides USD 27 billion to fight the climate crisis—and the upcoming new tax on methane emissions, to come after the increase in taxes on oil and gas goods. Trump says his goal is to restore America's ‘energy dominance’ by ensuring the country has the cheapest energy and electricity in the world. He is likely to emphasize a deregulation approach, increase oil drilling on public lands, offer tax breaks to oil, gas and coal producers and speed up the approval of natural gas pipelines. Trump has expressed strong opposition to several renewable energy initiatives, arguing that the source is unreliable and expensive. He described Biden's electricity policies as “destructive to industry, jobs, pro-China, anti-American.” However, according to several studies, Republican-led states are those that have benefited most from the IRA, leading governors and citizens to evaluate it more positively. For this reason, it is unlikely that a republican administration will reverse the path created by the IRA. Trump would still significantly reduce US involvement in multilateral climate frameworks such as the Paris Agreement and future COPs.

 

Harris briefly mentioned climate change as she outlined the “fundamental freedoms” at stake in the election, including “the freedom to breathe clean air and drink clean water, and live free from the pollution that fuels the climate crisis.” As a presidential candidate in 2019, she unveiled a USD 10 trillion climate plan that included investments in renewable energy, holding polluters accountable, assisting communities affected by climate change, and protecting natural resources. As California attorney general, she prosecuted oil companies for environmental violations. As vice president, she was the deciding vote in the Senate for the Inflation Reduction Act, which allocated nearly USD 370 billion towards reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 40 percent below 2005 levels by the end of the decade.

 

If Harris prevails, analysts predict that her administration will focus on defending Biden-era rules from legal attacks and continue implementation of programs funded by the Inflation Reduction Act. It is also expected that her administration will complete unfinished greenhouse gas regulation, such as emission limits for existing gas-fired power generators. Additionally, as mentioned, Harris has made it clear that she no longer supports a ban on fracking (as stated during her short-lived 2020 presidential campaign), with her vice president Walz even explicitly advocating an ‘all of the above’ strategy. A Democratic administration would likely focus on accelerating permitting for renewable energy projects (‘permitting reform’) and introducing carbon border adjustment mechanisms, a policy tool that is increasingly gaining bipartisan support in Congress (though it remains uncertain whether it will be accompanied by a carbon pricing structure). We must consider, however, how the administration’s ability to directly influence climate policy will be weakened by the implications of the Supreme Court’s recent overturning of the ‘Chevron Doctrine,’ which limits executive power in the absence of explicit legislative mandates. That said, it is important to underline that the trend of decreasing per capita CO2 emissions in the USA is progressing decisively, with a reduction of over 30% since 1990 (-3% in 2023 alone).

 

The shadow of a contested election

 

Analysts say recounts, litigation and challenges to vote certification will likely follow the US election regardless of who wins. If Trump or Harris win, recounts are likely to occur in at least some of the swing states that will decide the election, with the final resolution possibly reaching the Supreme Court. The risk of lengthy battles over vote certification and legal challenges over election integrity appears higher if Harris wins. Trump has already laid the groundwork to challenge the results of the 2024 election and is devoting significant legal resources to preparing to take the fight before the courts. Although Trump’s claims of fraud in the 2020 election have been debunked by courts and election observers from both parties, he will likely use similar arguments as a pretext to challenge the results of the 2024 election.

 

While such challenges would ultimately be resolved through administrative and legal channels, it would delay the confirmation of the results by creating uncertainty that could last for weeks after the vote.

 

While some Democrats may object to certifying a Trump victory, the risk of significant disruptions in election administration is much lower in the event of a Trump victory. Individual Democrats could challenge the certification of Trump's victory on January 6, 2025, arguing that he is ineligible under the 14th Amendment to the US Constitution (due to his involvement in the events of the 2020 Capitol Hill insurrection), but political observers do not expect this to lead to a concerted effort to block the certification.

 

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