Senate Democrats express concern about tightness of presidential race

 Several Senate Democrats expressed concern about the tightness of the presidential race, despite Vice President Kamala Harris’ performance in Tuesday night’s debate.]

“I’m very concerned,” Sen. Tim Kaine, a Democrat from Virginia, told CNN’s Manu Raju, adding that what he learned as Hillary Clinton’s running mate in 2016 was, “you can’t win by a little. You’ve got to win by a lot.”

He added, “The electoral college/popular mismatch is getting more significant, rather than less significant,” noting that the swing states are “all very, very close,” and said that they have to win by a large enough margin that they can easily dismiss claims by former president Donald Trump that the election is rigged.

“You want to win big to overcome the electoral college effect. You want to win big so that every reasonable person knows you won, and his lonely complaints about, that he should have won are really just lonely,” said Kaine.

Sen. Cory Booker, a Democrat from New Jersey, also said that he is concerned about the closeness of the race. “This race is going to come down to, you know, just a few 1,000 votes probably,” he said.

“Everybody is all hands-on deck. Everybody is. We have a campaign that’s not taking any vote for granted,” he added.

What the latest polling shows: Harris averages 49% support across recent polls while Trump stands at 48%, according to the latest CNN Poll of Polls. That average suggests no clear leader in the race just eight weeks until Election Day.

The CNN Poll of Polls is an average of the six most recent non-partisan, national surveys of registered or likely voters that meet CNN’s standards and ask about a 2024 presidential general election between Harris and Trump.

Meanwhile, CNN polls across six battlegrounds found Georgia and Pennsylvania are key toss-ups.