A new poll points to challenges for Harris and Trump in ‘toss-up’ Georgia
A new poll released Thursday showcased the tight race between former President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris in Georgia as the fight for the battleground state heats up.
The poll, commissioned by the AARP, pegged Trump at 46% and Harris at 44% — within the margin of error of 4 percentage points. About 7% of those surveyed back a third-party candidate, and an additional 3% are undecided.
Conducted by the bipartisan team of Fabrizio Ward & Impact Research, it’s one of the first public polls of Georgia since President Joe Biden withdrew from the race in July and Democrats rallied around Harris. It involved 1,384 likely voters.
“Georgia is again a toss-up state, and you’ve got two different races happening: one among white voters and one among Black voters,” said Bob Ward, one of the pollsters. He laid out a unique dynamic among older voters.
“The older you get, the more Republican you tend to be,” he said of white respondents. “The opposite is true among Black voters — the older Black voters get, the more loyal they are to Harris. We haven’t seen that in other battleground states where seniors are more in play.”
The poll also underscores why senior Republicans cringed when Trump revived his feud with Gov. Brian Kemp at his Saturday rally. The governor is the most popular politician in the poll, with 61% of respondents approving of his job performance, compared with roughly one-third who don’t.
Some other takeaways:
- Trump’s support from Republican respondents is slightly higher than Harris’ from Democrats, though Harris has a 5-point lead with independents who were surveyed. Both have similar approval and disapproval ratings.
- There’s a split over U.S. Sen. JD Vance, Trump’s running mate. Older respondents tend to have more negative views of the Ohio Republican.
- About half of those surveyed gave Democratic U.S. Sens. Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock positive job performance reviews, though Warnock has a slightly higher disapproval rating.
- Kemp’s ratings are stronger among those surveyed who are older than 50, and the intensity spikes higher among those older than 65. Support for Ossoff and Warnock is strongest among respondents under 50.
- Georgians have a dim outlook. Just 28% of those surveyed think the country is headed in the right direction, and two-thirds are worried about their personal financial situation.
- Among respondents older than 50, nearly two-thirds cited an economic issue — inflation, jobs or Social Security — as one of their top issues. Trump has a roughly 19-point lead among this group.
- About 11% of those surveyed who are over 50 are persuadable, and they’re more likely to be moderate or independent. They say inflation is their top factor in November, followed by immigration and Scoial Security.
About the Author
Greg Bluestein is the Atlanta Journal Constitution's chief political reporter. He is also an author, TV analyst and co-host of the Politically Georgia podcast.
