The races for president and U.S. Senate are virtually tied among likely Pennsylvania voters, according to the latest poll by the state’s most veteran polling group.
Former President Donald Trump led Vice President Kamala Harris, 50% to 49%, according to the Franklin & Marshall College poll.
Sen. Bob Casey led former hedge fund manager Dave McCormick by 49% to 48%.
Trump and McCormick are Republicans, Harris and Casey are Democrats.
The F&M poll surveyed 583 likely voters and 794 registered voters overall between Oct. 9 and 20. This poll marks the pollster’s first that screened for likely voters — people who say they're likely to vote.
It has a margin of error of plus or minus 4.3 percentage points for registered voters, meaning each percentage could be up to that many points higher or lower. The margin of error for the likely voter results is plus or minus 5 points.
Other recent polls that also include likely voters show a similar result. Overall, the poll-tracking RealClearPolitics average has Casey up by 1.9 percentage points as of Wednesday afternoon.
Without screening for likelihood of voting, the race remains roughly the same as last month — Harris up 49% to 45% both months, Casey up 48% to 41% versus 48% to 39% last month.
Especially in tight elections, voter turnout matters. It matters more this time for Casey if he’s to win a fourth term and Harris if she’s to win a first, poll director Berwood Yost said.
Harris and Casey have advantages among registered voters but must turn them into actual votes, he said.
“The thing I'm trying to do is make sure people understand that there are different ways of characterizing this race,” Yost said.
For Casey, his race’s closeness this late differs from his three previous elections.
“Casey is running in the worst electoral environment that he's run in as a Democrat, and he's facing the best funded and the highest quality candidate he's ever run against,” Yost said.
The F&M poll also asked voters "the most important problem facing Pennsylvania." Almost a third of registered voters said the economy/finances rank as the most important issue, almost exactly the same as the F&M poll last month.
