A new poll shows former President Trump leading President Biden in Virginia by three percentage points as Republicans look to flip the state after Biden trounced Trump by 10 points in the Old Dominion State in 2020. Virginia has voted for Democrats in each presidential election since President Barack Obama’s first campaign for the White House in 2008.
The new Virginia Commonwealth University-Wilder School poll shows Biden dropping from the 42% support he enjoyed in the last VCU-Wilder poll, released in January, to 36%.
Trump was unchanged at 39%, with the poll suggesting a dip in support for Biden, rather than any substantial gains for Trump.
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Still, the poll bodes well for the Trump campaign and raises more concern for the Biden camp, who have been battling calls from within their own party for the president to drop out of the race following his disastrous debate performance on June 27. The VCU-Wilder poll was conducted between June 24 and July 3, so some of the polling was done in the wake of that debate.
Biden’s job approval stood at 36% in the poll, while 58% disapproved. Respondents rated the "rising cost of living" as the top issue in the race, followed by women’s reproductive rights and immigration.
More than half of Virginia voters, 52%, see illegal immigration as a major problem. Democrats largely consider it to be a minor problem, 56%, while 86% of Republicans and 47% of Independents consider it a major problem.
The 46th president continues to leak support from the Black community. Forty-six percent said they would vote for Biden, down from 67% in the last VCU-Wilder poll, while 13.7% said they would vote for Trump.
The VCU-Wilder poll consisted of telephone interviews with 809 Virginia adults ages 18 and older, with about a third conducted on landlines and the rest on cellphones. It has a 4.8-point margin of error.
Virginia, which is home to many who work in neighboring Washington, D.C., has not been considered a battleground state in the 2024 election, but recent polling indicates that it could play out to be a tighter than anticipated race.
A Fox News poll published in June shows Trump and Biden with 48% support each in a deadlocked match-up in the Old Dominion State. However, a New York Times-Siena College poll conducted in Virginia July 9-12 showed Biden leading Trump by three percentage points — 48 to 45 — among likely voters.
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Republican Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin has previously said that Virginia "is in play" and could deliver a win to Trump come November.
"I think Virginia is in play. Let's just remind ourselves - Joe Biden won Virginia by 10 points in 2020. I ended up winning by two the next year. What we've demonstrated is commonsense conservative policies work, and Virginians appreciate that," Youngkin said in an interview with radio host and Fox News contributor Guy Benson in May.
The governor reiterated those comments in a Fox News Digital interview in June.
Back in 2020, Biden won the state by 10 points over Trump. During the 2016 election, when former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton faced off against Trump, the Democratic Party also claimed victory over Virginia, with Clinton earning 49.8% of the vote to Trump’s 44.4%.
Youngkin captured the governor's office in 2021, thanks in part to Trump's backing.
However, the VCU-Wilder poll found Virginians’ approval of Youngkin down from 54% in January to 50% in the new poll, while his disapproval jumped from 36% to 39%.
Meanwhile, Virginians support incumbent Sen. Tim Kaine, a Democrat, over Republican challenger Hung Cao, by 49% to 38% respectively.
The poll also found that 53% of Virginia voters said they were less likely to vote for Trump because of his conviction in New York with 34 counts of falsifying business records in the first degree.
Another 31% said they were more likely to vote for him after the convictions. Among independents, 45% said the convictions made them less likely to support Trump while 25% said they were more likely.
Fox News’ Emma Colton, Paul Steinhauser and Matthew Reidy contributed to this report.
