Iowa poll shows tighter race for Trump than 2016
DES MOINES, Iowa – Four years after Republican Donald Trump decisively won Iowa and the presidency, the state appears to be a toss-up as he seeks reelection this November, a Des Moines Register/Mediacom Iowa Poll shows.
Trump carried Iowa by 9 percentage points in the 2016 race against Democrat Hillary Clinton. But today, the Register’s Iowa Poll shows the president leading former Vice President Joe Biden by 1 point – 44% to 43%.
The poll of 674 likely voters was conducted June 7-10 by Selzer & Co. of Des Moines. Its margin of error is plus or minus 3.8 percentage points.
The results, which come in the midst of a pandemic and widespread civil unrest, are among a wave of polling that indicates an increasingly unstable electoral map for Trump. States like Iowa that were expected to be safe territory for the president after clear wins in 2016 now appear to be battlegrounds in 2020.
“I think it’s obviously nothing that Joe Biden should take for granted, because he’s not leading,” said pollster J. Ann Selzer. “But if the election were held today, Biden has a far better shot than anybody thought.”
The president’s reelection campaign booked more than $400,000 worth of television advertising in Iowa from early May to early June, according to the adtracking firm Advertising Analytics. During that same time frame, the Lincoln Project, which is airing ads against the president, booked about $150,000 worth of television time.
The president’s Cabinet has also spent time in Iowa. Last month, Vice President Mike Pence visited Des Moines and Urbandale to meet religious and agricultural leaders. Pence will return to Iowa on Tuesday, and Department of Energy Secretary Dan Brouillette will be in Ames on Wednesday.