The latest Emerson College poll dropped on Friday morning and showed that the race for Pennsylvania’s U.S. Senate seat continues to get closer, while the chase for the governor’s chair remains at double digits.
The Democratic candidates – John Fetterman for Senate and Josh Shapiro for governor – continue to remain the favored choices of the respondents, although the lead is dwindling for the lieutenant governor and remaining solid for the Attorney General.
Fetterman’s lead over Republican candidate Mehmet Oz is just two points at 45-43 with eight percent indicating they were undecided and five percent selecting another option. Fetterman, the former mayor of Braddock, has held the lead in all 23 polls since the primary but five of the six most recent surveys have placed the margin between 2-4 points.
Spencer Kimball, Executive Director of Emerson College Polling, said, “There is a gender divide in the race for US Senate: men break for Oz over Fetterman by six points, while women voters break for Fetterman by seven.”
Voters were asked about two focal points of the Pennsylvania Senate campaigns: Fetterman’s recent stroke and Mehmet Oz’s longtime New Jersey residence. Regarding Fetterman’s stroke, 59% of voters say it makes no difference on their vote, 27% say it makes them less likely to support Fetterman, and 14% say it makes them more likely.
Regarding Oz’s New Jersey residence, 47% say it makes no difference, 39% say it makes them less likely, and 14% say it makes them more likely to support Oz.
Shapiro holds a 10-point advantage over GOP opponent Doug Mastriano, 51-41, with two percent opting for another candidate and seven percent indicating they were undecided. The Pennsylvania Attorney General has crossed the 50-percent threshold in each of the five most recent polls, while Mastriano, a state senator from Franklin County, has averaged just 39 percent.
Sixty-one percent of those surveyed expected Shapiro to come away victorious.
Click here to see the PoliticsPA list of all polls and a moving average for the Senate and Governor’s races.
Loading ...
3 Responses
Basic math here. Oz is trying to earn some swing votes in the suburbs, and Mastriano is making no such effort with his “base only” campaign. Also it helps (and just my opinion on this one), that Shapiro is a bit more well-rounded candidate, and a product of the “purple suburbs” that will decide the race.
Momentum against Fetterman should be concerning, but with crazy man Mastriano running, and Oz being from NJ, I wonder if the moderate GOP turnout will be tepid.
Emerson is well respected pollster. The Shapiro race is going to be a big spread beyond 10 points. Abortion rights, incompetent political skills of Mastriano and Shapiro not getting credit for being very good at running a statewide race. Everyone forgets he was the only Dem Statewide row officer to win last cycle. It’s a perfect storm of a political incompetent, Senator Mastriano and a talented statewide candidate, Atty Gen Shapiro.