Trump Leads Clinton in Georgia by Four Points
New polling from Opinion Savvy shows Republican Donald Trump leading Democrat Hillary Clinton by 4.3 percentage points, just outside the poll’s margin of error of 4.1%. In the Senate race, Republican incumbent Johnny Isakson leads Democrat Jim Barksdale by 12.9 points, but hasn’t yet managed to break the 50% mark needed to avoid a runoff.
Trump has the support of 46.3% of likely voters, followed by Clinton with 42.0%. Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson has the support of 10.1% of likely voters, including 24.7% of those under age 30. 1.7% remain undecided. In the senate race, Isakson is favored by 47.0% of likely voters, Barksdale stands at 34.1%, and Libertarian candidate Allen Buckley has 5.9% support. 13.1% remain undecided in the Senate race.
Those supporting Trump were asked if they agreed with his belief that Russian president Vladimir Putin was a “strong leader.” 39% strongly agreed and 41% somewhat agreed with Trump, while 8% somewhat disagreed and 2% strongly disagreed. Clinton supporters were asked who should replace her should her current illness force her to drop out of the race. 58.5% thought that the replacement should be Joe Biden, while 28.5% said Bernie Sanders should take over. 4.0% wanted someone else, and 9.0% were undecided.
The poll was taken on September 14th for TV station Fox 5 in Atlanta. You can view the crosstabs here.
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Jon Richards
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Trump Supporters for most of the campaign: “The polls are rigged!”
Trump supporters now that he is ahead: “See, the polls say he is ahead, like we knew all along!”
Hillary supporters for most of the campaign, ‘The polls are great, gonna be a landslide’!
Hillary supporters now that she has A> passed out, B> called 50% of Trump supporters irredeemable deplorables, and C> Powell added to the ongoing emailgate, ‘We always knew this race would tighten up…speaking of race, did you know Trump is racist?’
All respect to Jon. Hillary has no chance in GA. None.
Isn’t that only 12.9% down for Barksdale there? Not sure it makes much of a difference, but it is still within the undecided percentage.
Correct. It was an editing error which we regret, but blame others.
Would be interesting to see what the polling numbers are in Gwinnett County (where Obama got 45% in both 2008 and 2012, well above traditional Republican numbers in that county) and in several metro Atlanta State House districts, like House District 80 in Brookhaven area (Taylor Bennett) and adjoining House District 81 (Scott Holcomb)…Clinton probably wins metro Atlanta (now 29 counties), as Obama did in 2008 and (very narrowly) in 2012, but probably not by enough to offset Trump’s margins in rural Georgia and the smaller cities.
The easiest way to break down Georgia is in three parts: First, Atlanta proper and its biggest inner suburbs: Fulton, Cobb, Dekalb, and Gwinnett. In a Presidential year, Fulton, Cobb, Dekalb, and Gwinnett collectively have 1.4 million voters, about 1/3 of the state’s total. Second, you have the broader Atlanta metro-area, including the above four counties, but also including the outer suburbs and exurbs. Together, these 30 counties make up about 59% of the state’s vote total despite being less than the 20% of Georgia’s counties. Finally, you have the rest of the state. This includes Democratic leaning areas like the mid-size cities of Macon, Columbus, Savannah, Athens, and Augusta, as well as the rural Black Belt that stretches across the southwest and middle of the state, and Republican leaning areas like the rural farmland and mountain communities in the South and North of the state, respectively. Together, this makes up about 41% of the statewide total vote.
What’s interesting about 2016 is what’s changed from when Georgia was last a Swing State. In the 1992 and 1996 elections, the Clinton Campaign fought hard for Georgia, narrowly winning it in 1992 and narrowly losing it in 1996. Here’s how the vote broke down across the three parts.
1992:
Fulton-Dekalb-Cobb-Gwinnett: Clinton: 46.34 Bush: 41.6% Perot: 11.7% (Clinton +38,942)
ATL Metro Area: Clinton: 43.06% Bush: 43.54% (Bush +5,937)
Rest of State: Clinton 43.95% Bush: 42.13% Perot: 13.65% (Clinton +19,714)
TOTAL: Clinton: 43.47% Bush: 42.88% Perot: 13.34% (Clinton +13,714)
1996:
F-D-C-G: Clinton: 50.22% Dole: 44.34% Perot: 6.5% (Clinton +47,916)
ATL Metro: Clinton: 45.74% Dole: 47.6% Perot: 5.6% (Dole +23,404)
Rest of State: Clinton: 45.96% Dole: 46.31% Perot: 7.28% (Dole +3,590)
TOTAL: Clinton: 45.84% Dole: 47.02% Perot: 6.37% (Dole +26,994)
While Perot’s ability to siphon off White voters certainly helped the Clinton campaign, what’s just as striking is Clinton’s strength in the rest of the state outside of Atlanta. In 1992, it provided his margin of victory. In both elections, President Clinton did better outside the Atlanta region than he did statewide. Meanwhile, the Metro Atlanta region, while still something of a swing area, leaned slightly Republican.
So what’s changed in Georgia?
Looking at recent electoral results in Georgia, it’s possible for Sec. Clinton to win, but to do so, she’d need to really win the Atlanta metro. In the longer term, I’m confident that Georgia will be the next in the VA/NC Southern swing state move, because ATL and its inner suburbs are slowly becoming the next Northern VA–growing bigger than the rest of the state is and growing more solid Dem. These are Atlanta proper and the most immediate suburbs. Traditionally, Republican Cobb and Gwinnett were the major GOP vote banks that balanced out solid Democratic Dekalb and lean Democratic Fulton. As such, their collective impact on the statewide vote was marginal. That’s stopped being the case over for F-D-C-G over the last two election cycles:
2000: Dem +28,731 (D 50.0 R46.9)
2004: Dem +44,032 (D 51.5 R47.7)
2008: Dem + 270,415 (D 59.7 R 39.3)
2012: Dem + 221,616 (D 57.9 R 40.8)
There is a slight back sliding from ’08-’12, but in ’08 the Obama campaign somewhat contested the state and aired ads while in ’12 they didn’t spend a dime. How did this happen? Fulton and Dekalb have gotten more Democratic, going from counties Democrats won by 20 and 40 points respectively to ones they win by 30 and 60. But the bigger story has been the shift in Cobb and Gwinnett, places that Bush won by 25 and 30 points respectively into places McCain and Romney won by 10. Even in 1992 and 1996, while competitive in the state and with Ross Perot on the ballot to win some whites, President Clinton lost Cobb and Gwinnett by 20 and 25 points respectively to President Bush and Sen. Dole. And in 2012, Pres. Obama still improved his standing in Gwinnett by another point and shrank the Republican margin there by another 2,000 votes despite regressing statewide. Basically, the influx of minorities to the counties and the decline in the Republican party’s standing among educated suburbanites has led to the rug being pulled out of their old suburban base area.
In the broader metro Atlanta area, the margin’s been cut back too, even as it still includes GOP strongholds like Cherokee (Romney +56,660 in 2012), Forsyth (R+51,309) and Hall (R+33,429)–exurbs that have been booming in population and voting more for the GOP:
2000: Rep + 93,094 (R 52.9 R 43.9)
2004: Rep + 233,972 (R 55.8 D 43.5)
2008: Dem + 48,835 (D 50.55 R 48.4)
2012: Rep + 28,863 (R 50.0 D 48.7)
So, the Dems have turned Metro Atlanta’s inner suburbs into a vote source, and have cut Metro Atlanta into pretty much 50-50. So why do they still lose? Well, the big shift from 2000 on is that the end of the last of the Yellow Dog Dems means they get slaughtered in the rest of the state. Where President Clinton was able to get nearly 46% of the vote outside of Atlanta, currently Democrats are lucky to get 40-42%, meaning they lose this by 15-20 points. And unlike the Democratic recovery in Atlanta over the last two cycles, Democratic nominees in rural areas are still losing by as bad as Al Gore did, and that shows no sign of changing.
2000: Rep + 119,865 (R: 57.1 D 41.7)
2004: Rep + 314,133 (R: 61.0 D: 38.5)
2008: Rep + 253,142 (R: 57.3 D: 41.7)
2012: Rep + 277,895 (R: 58.2 D: 40.7)
If Sec. Clinton is going to win Georgia, she needs to make up something like 260,000+ votes in the Metro Atlanta area. Is that possible? Sure, if Trump is radioactive to the kind of GOP women and educated business class Republicans in those areas. Basically, she’d have to win the Atlanta Metro/Exurbs 56-44 to make up a 260,000 vote gap in the non-Atlanta parts of the state. That’s doable, but by no means easy. But I wouldn’t be surprised if there’s another suburban county or two that hasn’t gone red since Carter ’76 that goes blue this time or she pulled over 60% in F-C-D-G.