A new poll found former President Trump leading President Biden by 3 points in Virginia — a state Biden easily carried in 2020.
The poll from Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU) — Wilder School found Trump with 39 percent of support while Biden received 36 percent, according to a press release shared with The Hill. Biden’s support dropped 6 percentage points since the poll was last taken in December, while Trump’s support remained the same.
The poll noted that the difference between Biden’s support and Trump’s support is within the margin of error for the poll but shows more respondents shifting toward Trump in the state. Another 9 percent of Virginians said they would vote for independent candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr., 2 percent said they would vote for Jill Stein and 1 percent said they would vote for Cornel West.
Three-quarters of Democrats polled said they would be voting for Biden, while 82 percent of Republicans said they would be backing Trump. Six percent of respondents from each party said they would be supporting Kennedy.
Twenty-seven percent of independent voters also said they would be voting for Kennedy, according to the poll.
The poll also found that Biden’s support among Black residents in the state has dropped since December. Forty-six percent of Black Virginians said they would vote for Biden, which is a 21-point drop from the 67 percent who said they would in the last poll.
The Washington Post first reported on the poll.
The poll was conducted from June 24 to July 3 among 809 adults in Virginia. It has a margin of error of plus or minus 4.8 percentage points.
Biden won Virginia in the 2020 election by 10 percentage points over Trump, and the state is viewed as a must-win for the incumbent this cycle. The new poll from VCU was released after a poll from The New York Times/Siena College, conducted July 9-12, showed Biden leading Trump by just 3 points in Virginia.