Vice President Kamala Harris has officially taken over as the Democratic hopeful for the 2025 presidency, replacing current President Joe Biden. Her camp is also taking a slightly different tactic to that of Biden, deciding to brand her opponent Donald Trump and his running mate JD Vance as just plain “weird.”

Harris doubled the Democrats’ odds of winning when she took over

Harris’ simple tactics seems to be working so far, as the gap between the Democrats and Republicans continues to close, according to the polls. She has shortened the gap to Trump both nationwide and in key battleground states. In fact, Harris doubled the Democrats’ odds of winning when she took over according to sportsbooks, shifting from 18% to 38%.

Bettors are gambling on the election in droves, mainly through crypto prediction platform Polymarket. Gamblers have staked $445m on the election so far. Total betting volume on Polymarket surpassed $1bn in July, a record for the platform and up from $672.9m in June. For comparison, July 2023 saw only $283.2m in betting volume.

Polymarket is not actually available to US consumers, although it is understood that many use VPNs to wager on the site. The site has more than 1,000 markets.

Harris is now at odds of +163, while Trump is still leading the way at -144. Gamblers have wagered $55.4m on Trump to win on Polymarket, while Harris has $39.9m behind her.