The former president has less than six months until the 2024 general election Donald Trump and incumbent Senator Bob Casey maintain a point advantage over your opponents in the table the latest findings of the Muhlenberg College Public Opinion Institute.
In the poll, conducted over a 10-day period beginning April 15, 417 registered voters shared their thoughts on a variety of topics, from presidential and U.S. Senate races to candidate favorability to issues facing the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.
Trump has a slim three-point lead over them President Joe Biden in a direct match at the level of 44-41%. This margin is within +/-6% of the survey’s margin of error. When Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is included as an option, Biden and Trump are tied at 35%, and RFK receives support at 18%.
Casey, a three-term Democratic incumbent, is leading the Republican challenger Dave McCormick by four points, at 45-41%, with eight percent uncertainty.
President
Biden’s best results were among respondents with a four-year degree, as 51% said they would support him. On the other hand, only 1 in 3 people without a college degree said the same. Among 18-29-year-olds, Biden overtook Trump (45-42%), while women supported the president by just one percentage point (43-42%).
Trump’s top performers were men (47%), people without a 4-year degree (49%), and people aged 50-65 (51%). Among people of color, he was 12 points behind Biden (45-33%).
None of the main presidential candidates can say that they are perceived positively. Only 36% of respondents view Biden in a positive airy, while 57% view him unfavorably. The good news for the 46th president is that the -21 result is two points higher than Muhlenberg’s December poll (36-57%).
Trump’s numbers also increased, from -23 to -16. 39% of respondents evaluate the 45th president positively, while 55% have a negative opinion.
Biden’s support rose slightly to 35 percent from 34 percent in the last poll. Even though more than a third approve of his performance, just 33% believe he deserves re-election.
In our average of 18 polls conducted since the beginning of the calendar year, Trump has the slimmest lead of just 0.2 percentage points over Biden, helped in part by a 2.2-point lead in the average of the last five polls (47.7%-45.5%). ).
US Senate
Casey’s numbers were above 50 percent for voters of color (55%), college-educated people (53%), and seniors over 65 (54%). She has a seven-point advantage over McCormick among women (46-39%) and a slight advantage among men (45-43%).
McCormick’s strength in this poll is based on white voters (45-43%), those without a 4-year degree (43-40%), 30-49 year olds (45-40%), and independents (39-37%). ). %).
Casey is a net +6 in favorable views (39-33%), with 1 in 5 unsure how they feel about the Democrat’s three-year term. One in 12 respondents said they had not heard of the Scranton resident.
McCormick, the former CEO of Bridgewater Associates, has almost the same number of options: 28% are favorable, 26% are unfavorable and 29% are unsure. Seventeen percent said they did not know McCormick, who spent his youth in Bloomsburg.
In our average of 12 polls conducted since the beginning of the calendar year, Casey has a 6.6-point lead over his GOP opponent, although McCormick has trailed over the last five points, losing by an average of 5.2 points (46.2-41.0%).
Governor
Governor Josh Shapiro he continues to receive praise for his work performance – after almost a year and a half, 64% approve of his work. This number is 13 points higher than in Muhlenberg’s December survey. Shapiro also saw his disapproval percentage drop two points from 21 to 19%.
Fairness of elections
The good news is that over 55% of respondents agreed with the statements that:
- final 2020 election results accurately reflected how Pennsylvanians voted (58-41%)
- Pennsylvania’s 2020 elections were conducted fairly (59-40%)
- Joe Biden received the most votes in the Pennsylvania presidential election (56-43%)
- there was widespread voter fraud in Pennsylvania during the 2020 presidential election (43–56%)
The bad news is that more than 2 in 5 respondents are still unsure whether the election was secure. Men outnumbered women (48-39) in their level of confidence in widespread voter fraud. This number increases between those with (36%) and without a 4-year degree (48%). 75% of Trump voters in 2020 said there was fraud, compared to just 15% of Biden voters.
Nearly 3 in 4 people believe they will employ paper ballots in the future, and 84% have a good feeling about electronic voting systems. However, when it comes to absentee ballots, just 57 percent are somewhat or very somewhat confident that using them will allow for an precise vote count.
Republicans still have work to do when it comes to convincing their supporters to employ no-excuse absentee ballots, as just 26 percent of Trump voters in 2020 are confident about using them.
Various
Voter suppression tops the list of the greatest threats to the Commonwealth’s assurance of secure and fair elections in 2024. Nearly a third of respondents identified the greatest threat as preventing citizens from participating in voting, and a quarter identified voter fraud. One-fifth of respondents said they used absentee ballots, and 13% expressed concerns about foreign interference in the election.
The report includes the results of a telephone survey of 417 registered voters in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania conducted April 15-25, 2024. Respondents were interviewed in English on both landline (82) and cellphones (335). With a randomly selected sample of respondents, the margin of error in the surveys is +/- 6% at a confidence level of 95%.
