Three new polls released in the final days of early voting show Senator Raphael Warnock (D-GA) a little ahead of Herschel Walker, although Walker is within the margin of error in two of the three polls.
Emerson College found Warnock ahead, 49 percent to 47 percent, with 4 percent undecided out of 888 very likely voters and those who already voted. That poll has a 3.2 percent margin of error and was conducted November 28 through 30 on behalf of The Hill. SurveyUSA found Warnock at 50 percent to Walker’s 46 percent and 4 percent undecided out of 1,214 likely voters. The poll has a 3.6 percent margin of error and was conducted November 26 through 30 on behalf of WXIA-TV. Both polls were published Thursday.
On Friday, CNN published the results of a SSRS poll finding Warnock at 52 percent and Walker at 48 percent among 1,184 likely voters, with a 3.8 percent margin of error. That poll was conducted from November 25 through 29.
In the SurveyUSA poll, undecided voters lean towards Walker; if their 4 percent is assigned to follow their leaning, Walker gets 47 percent while Warnock only gets 50 percent. In the Emerson Poll, Warnock and Walker split the undecided voters, getting 51 and 49 percent respectively when undecided voters are allocated.
Emerson also looked at supporters’ demographics, finding that voters over 50 prefer Walker by 55 percent, while voters under 50 prefer Warnock by 55 percent.
The runoff has seen record levels of early voting and an earlier start to voting in Democrat-favoring counties.
“The early vote breaks for Warnock by about 29 points, 63 percent to 34 percent, whereas those who have yet to cast their ballot break for Walker by eight points 52 percent to 44 percent,” Emerson College Polling Executive Director Spencer Kimball said in the poll’s release.
The Emerson poll also detected pessimism among some Republicans.
Kimball said, “Despite the ballot test being well within the poll’s margin of error, a Walker win would surprise the majority of voters. About one in five Republicans expect their nominee to lose. This reflects a significant shift since the last pre-general election poll earlier this month, where voters were nearly 50-50 if Warnock or Walker would win.”
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Eric Burk is a reporter at The Virginia Star and The Star News Network. Email tips to [email protected].
Photo “Raphael Warnock” by Reverend Raphael Warnock. Photo “Herschel Walker” by Herschel Walker. Background Photo “U.S. Capitol” by Thomas Lin.
