North Carolina has been a close race in the past two Presidential and that trend is continuing.
Public Policy Polling found in a survey released Thursday that Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton remain dead even at 43 percent, with Libertarian Gary Johnson at four percent, Green Party candidate Jill Stein at two percent and seven percent undecided.
Trump leads Clinton 48 percent to 46 percent in a head to head match up and Republicans lead 47 percent to 45 percent on the generic Presidential ballot. Johnson, even at four percent, is clearly hurting Trump. Sixty-four percent of Johnson supporters say they would choose Trump over Clinton if they had to choose between the two.
There is not a lot of evidence that Republican voters in North Carolina have any desire to dump Trump. He currently has a 72 percent favorability rating among voters in his party. He leads Clinton 85 percent to six percent among GOP voters in the full field compared to the 89 percent to six percent advantage a generic Republican Candidate has among GOP voters in the state.
According to the results of the polls, Clinton may have more work to do in unifying the party in North Carolina. Clinton leads 79 percent to 12 percent among Democrats where Trump has an 85 percent to 6 percent lead in his party.
Among Democrats and Independents who have a favorable opinion of Bernie Sanders she is getting 74 percent of the vote to 11 percent for Trump, five percent for Stein, four percent for Johnson and four percent are undecided.
If Clinton could win over just half of those holdout Sanders fans it would take her from the current 43 percent to 43 percent tie to a 48 percent to 43 percent lead in North Carolina.
Trump recently talked about how voters do not want a third Obama term, but in North Carolina (where Obama won in 2008 and lost in 2012) Obama leads Trump 49 percent to 48 percent in a head-to-head match up asking voters who they would rather have as President.
The same question was asked in Virginia last week and Obama had a 52 percent to 41 percent lead over Trump.
Testing for potential running mates for Clinton and Trump the poll continues to find that the Vice President pick has little bearing on the race.
The poll found that if Clinton picked Elizabeth Warren as her running mate, Trump leads 48 percent to 46 percent head-to-head. If Trump were to pick Richard Burr as his running mate, Trump leads 47 percent to 46 percent. Neither hypothetical moves the needle by more than a point.
Looking at the US Senate race, the poll finds Richard Burr with a narrow lead over Deborah Ross 40 percent to 37 percent, with libertarian Sean Haugh at five percent.
The poll finds that Burr is unpopular with only 30 percent approving of the job he’s doing compared to 40 percent who disapprove. However, Ross is an unknown with 62 percent of voters not having any opinion about her.
Voters of North Carolina appear open to the idea of replacing Burr but do not know enough about Ross yet to decide if she is the correct choice.
The poll also surveyed the public on the gun issues that the senate voted on this past week. 85 percent of voters in the state support background checks on all gun purchases, to only nine percent who oppose it.
For Republicans 82 percent support expanded background checks, 91 percent for independents and 84 for Democrats.
On the issue of barring those on the terror watch list from purchasing guns, 81 percent of voters support the legislation compared to nine percent oppose. There’s 89 percent support from Independents, 79 percent support from Republicans and 78 percent support from Democrats.
PPP director Tom Jensen wrote that he believes these issues play well for Ross along with the Supreme Court Vacancy.
According to the poll, 56 percent of voters in North Carolina think there should be hearings on Merrick Garland’s nomination, to only 24 percent who are opposed.
There’s strong support from Democrats where 69 percent are in favor compared to nine percent opposed and for Independents where 56 percent are in favor compared to 25 percent opposed.
Republicans are more divided where 39 percent of Republicans are in favor and 42 percent are opposed.
The poll found that voters, by a 19-point margin, are less likely to vote for a Senate candidate opposed to hearings on Garland’s nomination.
The poll also asked voters on increasing the minimum wage to at least $10 an hour. It found that 73 percent of voters support a minimum wage increase, compared to the 14 percent who think the wage is acceptable and nine percent who think it should be eliminated altogether.
There is 87 percent support from Democrats, 74 percent from Independents and 53 percent from Republicans on this issue.
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