Poll: Biden leads Trump by 6 points in Wisconsin
UW survey also shows him up in Mich., Penn.
MADISON – Democrat Joe Biden led GOP President Donald Trump in Wisconsin and two other battleground states in a poll released Monday by the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Biden was ahead of Trump 49% to 43% in Wisconsin, 47% to 43% in Michigan and 50% to 41% in Pennsylvania, according to the survey by UW-Madison’s Elections Research Center.
Trump won all three states in 2016, when Democrats wrongly presumed they provided a “blue wall” that would go to Hillary Clinton.
The poll came out just as one was released by CBS and online polling firm YouGov that showed similar results. In that survey, Biden led Trump 48% to 42% in Wisconsin and 49% to 43% in
Pennsylvania. (That poll did not include Michigan.)
On Tuesday, Marquette University Law School will release its latest poll of how the presidential candidates are faring in Wisconsin.
The UW-Madison poll was conducted July 27 to Aug. 6 by YouGov in conjunction with the Wisconsin State Journal. It has a margin of error of plus or minus 5 percentage points. YouGov conducted online interviews with registered voters from an opt-in panel, which was weighted for gender, age, race and education level.
Among registered voters who said they were certain to vote, Biden did even better. He led 52% to 44% in Wisconsin, 50% to 45% in Michigan, and 52% to 42% in Pennsylvania.
In the three states, 55% of voters said they were more concerned about how the coronavirus pandemic was affecting people’s health than the economy, while 45% said they were more concerned about the economy. Those who worried more about health tended to support Biden, while those who worried more about the economy tended to support Trump.
Asked who they blamed for the virus, 41% said Trump, 35% said China and 13% said another entity.
Fifty-six percent of respondents in Wisconsin said they were dissatisfied with Trump’s handling of the protests over George Floyd, the Black man in Minneapolis who died after a white police officer kneeled on his neck.
Biden fared well among younger and better educated voters, the poll found. Trump did better with older voters and those will less education. White voters were nearly evenly split over the two candidates, while Black voters supported Biden by a lopsided margin (83% to 7%).
Trump had an advantage with men, while Biden had a much bigger advantage with women. In Wisconsin, Trump led men by 8 points (52% to 44%), but Biden led women by 19 points (54% to 35%).
The poll also found 53% of Wisconsin survey-takers approved of the job Democratic Gov. Tony Evers is doing. Fortyeight percent disapproved.
Evers’ approval rating was in line with those of Democratic Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer and Democratic Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf.