This week, Americans will decide whether Kamala Harris or Donald Trump will become the next US president in a hotly contested race defined by a handful of critical issues, from war in the Middle East to abortion, immigration and the economy.
The choice for voters between the Democratic Vice President and the Republican ex-president could not be starker.
The closing days of Trump’s campaign has featured sudden and chaotic moments reminiscent of his previous tenure in the White House, when he would declare policy proposals unexpectedly online, mostly on Twitter.
In a post on X, formerly Twitter, Robert F Kennedy Jr said Trump would push to remove fluoride from drinking water on his first day in office if elected president, saying he wanted to “Make America Healthy Again”.
Trump told NBC News on Sunday that he had not spoken to Kennedy about his fluoride proposal but that it “sounds OK to me. You know it’s possible”. Trump has said Kennedy would “have a big role in healthcare” if he wins the election on Tuesday.
Kennedy has a long history of sharing baseless theories about the impacts of man-made chemicals in the environment, and has been a leading promoter of debunked conspiracy theories about vaccines. His remarks over the weekend underscored concerns by many experts of Kennedy potentially having influence over US public health.
The Democrats view the Republicans’ comments on health policies as a political gift, as their party typically enjoys more support on healthcare issues. According to a recent health policy survey by KFF, a majority of voters (53 per cent) said they they trust Harris more to handle the issue of abortion compared with Trump (34 per cent) and she has a nine-point lead on healthcare costs, another one of her strongest policy positions.
Here’s what you should know about where Trump and Harris stand in key policy areas.
Economy
The economy is consistently among the top issues for US voters. An October snapshot from Pew Research Center found 74 per cent of Americans said they were very concerned about the price of food and consumer goods, while 69 per cent said the same about housing costs.
Harris has pledged that a priority from day one would be to reduce food and housing costs for working families. She has promised to help first-time homebuyers, and provide incentives to increase housing supply. She has also said she will move to ban grocery price-gouging.
Among Trump’s economic pledges is a promise to “end inflation and make America affordable again”. The former president has said he would deliver lower interest rates – though this is not directly within his control – and that he would ease the pressure on housing, at least in part by, he claims, deporting some undocumented immigrants and preventing others from getting mortgages.
As well as promising “large tax cuts for workers”, Trump has said he will launch a home-building programme on federal land, and lower energy costs by expanding US energy production via oil-drilling in areas including the Arctic wilderness.
Immigration
Immigration is a central issue to the 2024 campaign, with particular focus on the US’s southern border with Mexico. Trump has attacked Harris as a “failed border czar”, and the issue is seen as one of her weaknesses after Joe Biden gave her the brief of dealing with “root causes” of immigration via Central America in 2021.
A record number of people crossed into the US from Mexico at the end of last year but the numbers have since fallen. During the campaign, Harris has toughened her stance on immigration and highlighted her experience taking on human traffickers as a prosecutor in California.
A bipartisan border security bill which she backed, aimed at cutting border crossings, was rejected twice this year by Republicans in the Senate. In March she announced more than $1bn would be spent on dealing with the causes of migration and creating economic opportunities in Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador, bolstering the total funding for the programme to $5.2bn since 2021.
Harris, whose parents are immigrants from Jamaica and India, has supported paths to citizenship for undocumented migrants, as well as decriminalising border crossings and providing taxpayer-funded healthcare to people crossing the border without papers.
For Trump, a firm stance on migration has been central to his political identity ever since his 2016 election-winning campaign. The former president has shown no signs of changing that, claiming recently that it is the top issue facing the US – despite polls showing the economy is top priority.
He has already outlined proposals to deport 15 million to 20 million undocumented migrants as part of what he called the “largest deportation operation in American history”, vowing to “seal the border and stop the migrant invasion.” Completing a wall along the US-Mexico border would be a core component of that effort, as well as increasing enforcement.
Foreign policy
Despite her insistence on Fox News that a Harris presidency “will not be a continuation of Joe Biden’s presidency”, the Democratic contender is likely to continue the current administration’s position on conflicts in the Middle East, as outlined broadly in the Democratic Party Platform published in August.
The key difference could be that the Vice President could take a firmer stance on holding Israel to account for its actions in Gaza, Lebanon and Iran than Biden has.
She has repeatedly said Israel “has a right to defend itself” but that “how it does so matters”, and has voiced support for a two-state solution as well as reiterating calls for a ceasefire from March until as recently as October, adding that “this war has to end”.
A 30-day timeline reportedly given to Israel by US officials last month, to allow more humanitarian aid into Gaza or risk reduced military backing would run past the 5 November election – meaning that should she be president-elect by the end of that window, sticking to that warning would be a choice Harris would be faced with.
The timing has led to claims it is simply a ploy to assuage the fears of Arab-American voters in the key swing-state of Michigan while also trying to keep pro-Israel voters onside. Regardless, it means a decision over whether, and how much, to pull back from the US’s close ally could be one of the first tasks for a new president when elected.
Trump, meanwhile, has claimed the events of 7 October last year “would never have happened” had he been in office and describes himself as the “best friend that Israel has ever had”.
The former president could therefore be more likely to clamp down on Iran and its proxies in the region while offering more support to Israel.
In Europe, Harris has supported the Biden administration’s stance on Ukraine, which has involved sending the country billions in military aid during its war against Russia. She has given no indication that her position on that matter will change if elected, vowing to support Ukraine “for as long as it takes”.
Trump, on the other hand, has already pledged to cut aid for Ukraine and has repeatedly said he could settle the years-long conflict in 24 hours if he is elected. His vice-presidential pick, JD Vance, has also been an outspoken critic of US military assistance for Kyiv.
A core pledge on Trump’s website reads: “Prevent world war three, restore peace in Europe and in the Middle East, and build a great iron dome missile defense shield over our entire country – all made in America.”
Regarding fears of a potential Chinese invasion of Taiwan, during a recent interview, Harris declined to “get into any hypotheticals” as to whether the US would intervene with military force if such an event were to happen, but added that her administration would maintain Washington’s “one China” policy while “supporting Taiwan’s ability to defend itself.”
Her Republican counterpart pointed to what he called his “very good relationship” with Chinese leader Xi Jinping when claiming that China would not launch an invasion of Taiwan if he wins the election.
Abortion
Harris has made the issue of abortion central to her campaign, speaking out on restrictions to abortion access and the Supreme Court decision to strike down Roe v Wade, while advocating for legislation to allow reproductive rights nationwide.
She has been more outspoken on the topic than Biden, and made history this year when she became the first sitting American president or vice president to visit a health centre that provides abortions.
Trump – who, in his previous presidential term, appointed three Supreme Court judges who proved pivotal in overturning the constitutional right to an abortion – has changed his position somewhat since that landmark 2022 ruling, more recently arguing that each state should come up with its own regulations and promising repeatedly that he would not sign a national abortion ban into law if he is elected.
He said this month that some states were being “too tough” on abortion rights and that some measures had to be “redone.” He has also recently described himself as the “father of IVF”, while his wife Melania Trump, made a public break from the party in her new book, saying she supported a woman’s right to choose.
The Republican Party’s 2024 platform said it “proudly stands for families and life”, adding that states are free to pass laws protecting rights to life. The document did not go so far as to explicitly mention embryos or foetuses, but it did not support abortion rights either.
Climate change
Destruction caused by Hurricanes Helene and Milton, which struck Florida, Georgia and North Carolina recently, have put climate change and the environment in the spotlight.
Harris is perceived to be tougher on oil than Biden, and her stance on fossil fuels puts her to the left of him politically. While she was California’s attorney general, she sued fossil fuel firms, prosecuted a pipeline company over an oil leak, and investigated Exxon Mobil Corp for misleading the public about climate change.
Before becoming Vice President she opposed offshore drilling and fracking and called for federal legal action against the fossil fuel industry, as well as co-sponsoring the Green New Deal, a policy paper advocating an economic overhaul to address climate change.
Harris introduced a climate equity bill with Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, which seeks to rate how environmental laws impact lower-income areas.
When she ran for president four years ago, she outlined a $10trn climate plan for net zero emissions by 2045.
As vice-president, Harris helped pass an Inflation Reduction Act which has directed hundreds of billions of dollars into renewable energy as well as electric vehicle tax credit and rebate programmes.
However, she has walked back her opposition to fracking, leaving her open to criticism from environmentalists.
Trump rolled back hundreds of environmental protections during his four years in the White House, including protections for federal waterways and limits on carbon dioxide emissions from vehicles and power plants.
In this campaign, he has vowed to expand US oil drilling in the Arctic and has flip-flopped in his stance on electric vehicles, vowing to cut regulations and overturn targets encouraging the switch.
The former president has voiced his opposition to offshore wind farms.
During the Republican convention he pledged to lower the cost of energy, saying he would “drill, baby, drill” for oil and gas. “We will do it at levels that nobody’s ever seen before,” he added.
