Psst! The U.S. election is in 3 days. Here’s a cheat sheet | CBC News

The 2024 U.S. election is taking place Tuesday, Nov. 5. It’s been an incredibly tight race between Democrat Kamala Harris and Republican Donald Trump, with polls putting the two neck and neck. 

The campaign has highlighted the biggest issues on the minds of U.S. voters, from the cost of living to abortion rights. 

CBC News has been on the ground over the last few months, speaking with voters and campaign strategists. Here are some highlights from our coverage.

Swing states

The winner of the presidential race will be decided in the seven so-called swing states: Georgia, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Nevada and Arizona.

Alex Panetta travelled to Montgomery County, just outside Philadelphia. Once a Republican stronghold, the wealthy Pennsylvania suburb has flipped blue in recent years as its population has expanded — and Democrats are counting on the trend continuing this time around.

In Michigan, Rhianna Schmunk spoke to some Trump voters who say they dislike him as a person but are voting for him anyway. Asked why, their answers were similar: They could pay their bills easier when he was president, and they want that back. 

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Voters in seven swing states will determine the outcome of the U.S. presidential election in November. Andrew Chang breaks down each of the states in play for Kamala Harris and Donald Trump and their pathways to 270 electoral college votes.

Rhianna also went to Pennsylvania, thrown into the spotlight after Trump faced an assassination attempt there. Democratic and Republican voters in the state have different priorities, but shared a few things in common: concerns about inflation and total exhaustion with the election.

And North Carolina’s population has been diversifying over the last two decades, making it a key target for Harris and the Democrats. However, our Washington, D.C.-based correspondents Alex Panetta and Katie Simpson found that many families are like the state itself — split down the middle.  

Strategies in a tight race

In an election as close as this one, polls predict a different winner seemingly by the day. Because of that, some of the candidates’ strategies have been untraditional, as they look to target their messages to specific groups of Americans.

Trump is looking to win the votes of men who usually don’t vote, Alex Panetta reported, appearing on podcasts, talking about anything but politics, including cocaine benders and boxing. The podcasts’ massive audiences may be largely disengaged from policy announcements but are highly engaged with their favourite hosts. As one analyst put it: “This isn’t NPR.”

Meanwhile, Harris’s approach has involved reaching across the aisle, Alex wrote, courting moderate Republicans and never-Trumpers. And despite leading among women, she’s been de-emphasizing her gender, Jenna Benchetrit reported, looking to avoid replicating the mistakes of Hillary Clinton’s failed 2016 campaign. Is the strategy working? Our Toronto-based reporter Mark Gollom, who covers U.S. and international politics, looked into it.

Widening the voting base 

Why some Black voters in Detroit want Trump back in the White House

With swing state Michigan too close to call, Black voters in Detroit could help decide the 2024 U.S. presidential election, with some rallying behind Donald Trump in the traditionally Democrat-leaning community.

Despite politicians tailoring their messaging to target specific ethnic groups, no community is a monolith, and members’ priorities often change and contradict one another.

Arab American and Muslim voters helped Biden win the election in 2020, rallying behind him in the key state of Michigan. However, more than one year of Israel’s war in Gaza has spiralled into an all-out crisis, killing tens of thousands of people, and many of those same voters now feel betrayed by the Democrats. Rhianna Schmunk spoke to some of the voters who are voting third party or not at all — with a few even supporting Trump in retribution.

The Democrats are also struggling, for the third election straight, to retain Latino voters. Many told Alex Panetta they remain unhappy about pandemic-era lockdowns and violent protests, for which they blame the party. They also believe they’ve been treated like a special-interest group for too long, with messaging over-indexing on border issues and immigration.

(The Republicans, however, may now be in a similar position, after offensive jokes comedian Tony Hinchcliffe made at a Trump rally about Puerto Rico and Latinos.)

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Economy

During and after the COVID-19 pandemic, countries worldwide saw record inflation as they worked to recover from the crisis, facing supply chain issues and an increase in demand for goods. 

Now, all signs are trending toward a rebound for the U.S., with inflation dropping to a three-year low and wages increasing. However, many Americans still believe the economy to be in poor health. Crucially, they’re unhappy with the cost of living and recall struggling less during the pre-COVID Trump years.

Caroline Barghout found that voters are split on who can tackle affordability. Some blame Joe Biden’s administration — and by extension Harris — and are nostalgic for Trump-era policies, while other believe only Harris will fight for the country’s middle class.

Abortion

Ever since the Republican-majority U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022, eliminating the constitutional protection of the right to an abortion, the issue has dominated election discourse. 

More people support legal abortion in the U.S. now than in 2022, and Trump has looked to distance himself from the issue. Abortion laws have been left to the states, several of which will have abortion-related measures on the ballot on Tuesday. Jenna Benchetrit spoke to voters, along with experts and advocates on both sides of the debate in Florida and Arizona, two of 10 states where abortion is on the ballot.

Immigration

On the ground at the border wall between the U.S. and Mexico

In the middle of the night, volunteers with Green Valley-Sahuarita Samaritans headed into the Arizona desert to help migrants making the harrowing journey across the U.S. border. The group provides humanitarian aid for migrants before they’re processed by border officials. CBC Radio’s The Current joined them.

Concerns about immigration abounded this election campaign, particularly about undocumented migrants and temporary workers. 

CBC News spoke with a young woman in Arizona, whose family came to the U.S. illegally from Mexico almost 20 years ago. In that time, her family has built a business and bought a house. But she fears a Trump victory will mean the end of their lives in the country, as the former president has pledged to deport up to 11 million undocumented migrants if he is re-elected.

What else?

Missing from both campaigns? Climate change, for the most part. Despite hurricanes Helene and Milton devastating many parts of the U.S. — some regions back to back — and striking two swing states, it hasn’t been a major focus for voters. Susan Ormiston and Jill English spoke to some climate advocates, who say they understand the strategy of focusing on more on bread and butter issues during the campaign period but view it as a missed opportunity.

Some other reads: 

When will we know who won?

It could be as early as 12:01 a.m. ET on Nov. 6, as Alex Panetta reported. The popularization of mail-in voting during the pandemic has permanently changed ballot counting. And in Pennsylvania, likely the most critical state to winning the election, state law means most of its counties must have their mail-in statistics published by that time.