First Public Poll for the Virginia 2021 General Election Finds Democrats Leading, But By Narrow Margins

The Republican and Democratic nominees for Virginia’s November 2021 elections have now been selected, yet to date, there have been exactly zero polls of the general election contest, other than an “internal” for Republican Glenn Youngkin’s campaign, carried out by the former (right-wing) pollster for Ted Cruz’s presidential campaign. That “poll” had Terry McAuliffe up 48%-46%, but regardless of the results, I’d take that one with a huge grain (pillar?) of salt! Other than that, as Chaz Nuttycombe explained a few weeks ago, as part of his effort to raise enough money to conduct a non-partisan/neutral poll:

“With the important elections here in the Commonwealth of Virginia this Fall, it’s surprising that there has not been any general election polling conducted for hypothetical matchups between the candidates thus far. CNalysis wants to change that!”

Compare this to four years ago, when by this point here had already been more than a dozen general election polls.  Huge dropoff. Fortunately, Chaz and CNalysis were able to raise the $5,500 they needed to conduct that poll, in conjunction with JMC Analytics. The results just came out…and here they are!

• “49% of respondents approved of President Biden’s job in the White House so far, 44% disapproved, and 7% had no opinion.”  (Note: This suggests that the poll had a  Republican-leaning sample, as Biden’s approval ratings are much higher than that – 53.3%-40.7% (+12.5 points) in FiveThirtyEight’s national polling average, which Virginia should be very close to. Also note that Wason Center’s February poll had Biden’s approval at 57%-36%, or +21 points, so this is much lower than that…)
• “Governor Northam’s approval was lower than President Biden’s, with just 45% of respondents approving of his job performance, 44% disapproving, and 11% having no opinion.” (This also seems very low. For comparison, Wason Center’s February poll had Northam’s approval at 54%-40%, or +14 points, so this is much lower than that…)
• “In the race for Governor, former Governor Terry McAuliffe (D) had 46% of respondents say they planned on voting for him, while 42% plan to vote for former Carlyle Group CEO Glenn Youngkin (R), with 12% of respondents undecided. This gives McAuliffe a 4 point lead in the race for Governor.”  (That seems too low.)
• “In the race for Lieutenant Governor, 42% of respondents planned on voting for Delegate Hala Ayala (D), while 36% of respondents planned on voting for former Delegate Winsome Sears (R), with 22% undecided. This puts Ayala at a 6 point lead in the race for Lieutenant Governor.” (This seems reasonable.)
• “In the race for Attorney General, incumbent Attorney General Mark Herring (D) netted the support of 45% of respondents, while Delegate Jason Miyares (R) earned 38%, with 17% undecided. This gives Herring a 7 point lead in the race for Attorney General.” (7 points seems reasonable for this one.)
• “In the House of Delegates generic ballot, 44% of respondents chose Democrats in their district election, with 43% aligning with the Republicans, and 14% undecided. This gives Democrats a 1 point lead in the race for the House of Delegates popular vote.” (Also seems very low.)

Anyway, the bottom line is that we should just assume this race will be close and act accordingly…take nothing for granted and make sure we don’t turn this state over to a bunch of Trump Republicans who will work to undo all the progress we’ve made the past couple years in Virginia!