Kamala Harris takes lead over Trump in betting odds for the first time

A major betting platform shows Kamala Harris in the lead over Donald Trump for the first time since the vice president announced she’d thrown her hat in the 2024 presidential race.

Bets placed for Harris becoming the next US president first overtook Trump bets Wednesday afternoon on the platform PredictIt.

The current price of a Harris bet via the platform is 54 cents, while a bet for Trump costs 50 cents, as of Thursday morning.

For context, a high betting price means that the candidate has better odds, and a low price means their odds are less likely.

On other betting platforms, such as Polymarket, Trump still holds a substantial lead in odds over Harris (54 percent to 44 percent at time of writing), though the lead is fluctuating and diminishing.

Though the odds are still incredibly tight, it’s a promising sign for Democrats, as it is the first time that betting odds have favoured either Democratic candidate (Harris or Biden) over Trump since May.

The favorable Harris odds mark the first time that the VP has ever led the betting race for who will become the next US president.

PredictIt data shows that 31,375 bets were made Thursday alone for a Harris presidency, at the time of publication, compared to 25,985 for a Trump presidency.

Trump’s recent peak bet price reached 69 cents on July 15 via PredictIt, and is now down to 50 cents.

When Harris was running as Joe Biden’s VP for a second term, her odds remained low at 3 to 4 cents per bet.

However, PredictIt data shows a spike in bets for a Harris presidency after the Biden-Trump debate on June 27, with 154,000 bets placed, when alarm bells began to sound among the Democrats.

There was also an increase in Harris’ betting odds around the July 4th period, when speculation was rife about Biden’s future, prompting the incumbent president to state: “I’m not going anywhere.”

Though Biden only announced he would step down on July 21, the figures show a huge surge in people betting on a Harris presidency from July 17, with 283,000 bets placed on that day alone.

Biden’s downfall in public confidence was clearest among the betting markets, as his odds steadily plummeted following the June 27 debate and Trump’s only strengthened.

Biden had been leading by a small margin of odds in early May, PredictIt data shows, but from May 15 the tides turned in favor of Trump — and he never managed to recover the confidence of betting markets.

It is important to note that betting odds do not correlate to how people will vote, and these figures are also months out from November, with plenty of room for fluctuation. Nonetheless, betting markets can indicate the level of confidence that people have in an outcome at a given moment.

The PredictIt betting data is for the candidate who will win the Presidential election in November, described on the website as “the individual who receives a majority of the votes of the appointed presidential electors when the Electoral College votes are cast in the 2024 United States presidential election.”