Michigan Swing State Betting Odds: Harris Favoured To See Off Trump

UK betting sites believe the key swing state of Michigan will back Kamala Harris for president in the 2024 US election despite Donald Trump being within two points of her in the polls.

Michigan has 15 electoral college votes that both Harris and Trump are scrambling to secure. 

This is a must-win state for the Democrats if they are to win the election, while the Republicans can probably still pass 270 votes even without Michigan.

Joe Biden won the state by almost three percentage points in 2020 but the latest polls suggest this is a neck-and-neck race between Trump and his new adversary Harris.

New betting sites are keeping note but so are punters. They are largely siding with Harris right now, which is forcing her odds to sink lower and lower as we inch towards the election.

Make no mistake, Michigan is not a foregone conclusion. The state has leaned towards the Dems in all but one of the last eight elections – but the fact Michiganders voted for Trump in 2016 means these 15 electoral college voters are very much in play.

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Michigan Election Odds

Latest Michigan Election Betting Odds

Boylesports think Harris is a strong bet at 4/7 to win Michigan. Those odds carry a 63.6% implied probability, which far outstrips her poll numbers.

Meanwhile, Bet365 have Trump out at 6/4, which is 23.6% behind Harris in terms of probability.

Now, this probability gap between the polls and the odds is worth looking at. How can the bookies provide such a difference in the odds, when the polls suggest Michigan is a close state?

Well, much of it has to do with bettors and where their loyalties lie. Bookmakers shift their prices depending on the polls and betting activity. Around 64% of all swing state bets for Michigan back Harris to win. Her odds are being depressed on betting apps.

Likewise, the one-third of bets on Trump isn’t enough to prevent his odds from inflating as wide as they have done.

It’s possible that bettors see Trump’s high price and jump on it, knowing that it will fall the closer we get to the election. Or they might view Harris as a dead-cert to win the state and back her even more enthusiastically, which would only reduce her odds further.

Either way, the market will only move now if there is a big push in betting activity, or if the polls dramatically change.

Who Will Win Michigan?

All this brings us back to the big question: who will win Michigan's crucial 15 electoral college votes? It was for so long a Democrat state until Trump came along eight years ago.

Now, Michigan is up for grabs. The Dems know they need to win here, as they do across the Rustbelt. Polling suggests that Harris will probably fare better in these northern swing states, while Trump should claim the bulk of the southern swing states.

Michigan is a particularly close one to call because of the Democrats’ reputation within the state. It has a large Arab American population that many pollsters believed would back away from Harris’ campaign over Israel’s conflict in Gaza.

However, the growing dissent of the Biden administration isn’t harming Harris as much as anticipated. The bigger concern for many young voters is the possibility of Trump returning to power.

If we want a good gauge of where Michigan may vote this autumn, it’s worth looking at the state’s race for the US Senate between former Republican Representative Mike Rogers and Democratic Congresswoman Elissa Slotkin.

The Dems are winning in the polls by around five points but Rogers has Trump’s endorsement. No wonder, then, that this seat is still considered a toss-up.

Harris vs Trump is the same. The VP might be leading the polls right now but that doesn’t stop Michigan being a toss-up for the election. There might only be a few thousand votes in two or three counties that swing the entire state.

There are 12 ‘pivot counties’ in MI that tend to flip every few elections. They account for around 15% of the state population. It is places like Saginaw County, Eaton County and Macomb County that could swing the state one way or the other. 

In turn, they could end up deciding who is the next President of the United States.