Republicans Lead in Most Georgia Races: AJC Poll Newsmax
By Charlie McCarthy | Tuesday, 20 September 2022 01:14 PM EDT
Republican Herschel Walker and Democrat Sen. Raphael Warnock are virtually tied in Georgia's U.S. Senate race, and GOP candidates lead in all other state November contests, according to a new Atlanta Journal-Constitution poll.
Walker (46%) leads Warnock (44%) slightly, the AJC reported Tuesday, though the margin of error is 3.3 percentage points.
Another 3% indicate they’ll back Libertarian candidate Chase Oliver, while 7% are undecided.
The AJC survey found that every other statewide Democrat candidate faces a sizable deficit heading into Election Day.
In the Georgia gubernatorial race, the poll found that Republican Gov. Brian Kemp leads Democrat Stacey Abrams 50% to 42%. Kemp, who's seeking a second term, leads Abrams among men 54% to 39%, while the two candidates are deadlocked among women voters.
About 80% of Black voters say they're backing Abrams and 10% support Kemp. The Democrat likely needs to push her number above 90% to win in November, the AJC said.
The survey results said a majority (54%) of voters approve of how Kemp is handling his job as governor.
The AJC survey also found that Republican nominees for lieutenant governor, attorney general and secretary of state had double-digit leads over their Democrat challengers.
Republican Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, in his reelection bid, holds a 50%-31% advantage over Democrat state Rep. Bee Nguyen.
Raffensperger, who refused then-President Donald Trump's call to overturn the 2020 presidential election in Georgia, is getting 20% of Democrats and more than one-third of independents in addition to 80% Republican support.
Other findings that indicate the elections in Georgia might bode well for the GOP are that 51% of likely state voters want the Republican Party to win control of Congress, and 70% say the country is on the wrong track.
President Joe Biden’s job approval rating among Georgia voters is 37%, the AJC poll found – a percentage unchanged since the newspaper’s July survey.
The survey found that some voters are not guaranteed to vote for a particular party up and down the ticket.
For example, one woman from Villa Rica, Georgia, said she definitely will vote for Kemp but she remains undecided about the Senate race.
"I don't have a preference in the Warnock race," Jenna Fortner told the AJC. "I am not a fan of Warnock because I think he’s spending too much money, but I need to do more research about Walker."
The poll was conducted Sept. 5-16 by the University of Georgia’s School of Policy and International Affairs among likely voters.