Dem
47
GOP
53
We have not done a Political Bytes for a couple of weeks, and things are really getting backed up. We'll probably have a long one next week, or maybe two entries next week. For now, since we're not yet to the point of doing daily polling updates, we thought we'd do a polling-themed Political Bytes:
U.S. Senate, North Carolina: This is the state where the Democrats must be jumping for joy. There have been two polls of the race in the last month; the one from The New York Times/Siena has former governor Roy Cooper (D) leading former RNC Chair Michael Whatley (R) by 7 points, 50% to 43%. And the one from YouGov/Catawba College has Cooper up by a staggering 14 points, 48% to 34%.
Our Take: Because North Carolina is populous and because it has several expensive media markets, it is famously expensive to mount a Senate campaign there. In fact, this race is projected to be the most expensive Senate race in U.S. history, with $600 to $800 million expended. If correct, that would easily shatter the current record, the $472 million spent in Georgia in 2022. At a certain point, and that point may soon arrive, the people who run the GOP should seriously think about abandoning Whatley and directing that money elsewhere, because they have so many tough races this year.
U.S. Senate, Texas: There have been two nonpartisan polls in the last month here, and they both make clear that this race is going to be competitive. A2 Insights says that state Rep. James Talarico (D) leads Texas AG Ken Paxton (R), 48% to 46%. The recent NYT/Siena poll says it's tied at 47%. So, both are statistical dead heats. Meanwhile, three of the four aggregators (with RealClearPolling the exception) have Talarico with a slight lead, between 0.4% and 0.9%. RCP, which favors a Republican-leaning poll sample, has Paxton up by 0.6%.
Our Take: We don't know what will be decisive here, but we do know that: (1) The Texas GOP has been giving Talarico all it's got, with slurs on his religiosity, gender identity, etc., and his numbers are not being affected and (2) Talarico still has the war chest he built up while Paxton was spending every dime to defeat Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) in the GOP primary.
U.S. Senate, Ohio: Another burgeoning barnburner. There were two nonpartisan polls in June; NYT/Siena says that Sen. Jon Husted (R-OH) has a 3-point lead over former Sen. Sherrod Brown (D), 50% to 47%. And Fabrizio Ward/Impact Research/AARP have a mirror image, with Brown up 3, 48% to 45%. The four main aggregators all have Brown leading, from 0.6% (RCP) to 2.6% (270toWin).
Our Take: The Republicans should think about redirecting some of that NC money to Texas and Ohio. That said, those are also very expensive states in which to mount a campaign (as is Florida, which could be another problem state for the GOP if Alex Vindman gets the nomination).
Governor, Ohio: The same pollsters that checked in on the Senate race also took a look at Ohio's gubernatorial race. NYT/Siena has Vivek Ramaswamy (R) and Amy Acton (D) tied at 47%. Fabrizio Ward/Impact Research/AARP has Acton up 47%-44%. The aggregators all have Acton leading, by anywhere from 1% (RCP) to 3% (Decision Desk HQ).
Our Take: We take note of this race, in particular, because there's a good chance the outcome here will correlate with the outcome in the state's U.S. Senate race.
Declaration of Independents: The percentage of Americans who identify as independent has been growing in recent years and, according to a poll from CNN, independents are now close to half of the voting public (47%, to be precise). The majority of the increase to 47% is due to people leaving the Republican Party.
Our Take: Independents, at least the ones who aren't R/D masquerading as I, tend to vote against the party in power, especially when the president is unpopular, as the current one certainly is. Also, people who are pointedly leaving the Republican Party are certainly not sure things for the GOP
Cambié de Opinión (I Changed My Mind): A very clear trendline this year has been Latino voters (mostly men) jumping ship on the S.S. Trump. A recent UnidosUS poll affirms that. According to that pollster's numbers, 25% of Latino Trump voters say they would not vote for him again if given the chance. On the generic House ballot, nationwide, 54% of Latino voters favor the Democrats, 27% favor the Republicans, and 19% are undecided.
Our Take: The state where this really matters is Texas, because the gerrymandering there was built on 2024 numbers. The generic House ballot there is nearly identical the national one; 54% Democrats, 28% Republicans, 18% undecided. Trump's disapproval there, among Latinos, is 67%. At this point, Gov. Greg Abbott (R-TX) has to be at least a little nervous that his huge gerrymander will turn into a huge dummymander.
That clears the decks of the interesting polling news we've put aside. We looked to see if we could find any good polling news for the Republicans, and there really isn't any, other than "In states where Republicans should win in a walk, like Alabama and West Virginia, the Republican candidate looks to be safe." Although even then, there was a partisan poll of Mississippi that put Scott Colom (D) within three points of Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith (R). We very seriously doubt that's correct, but if Mississippi somehow really is in play, then every GOP seat is in play. (Z)