Biden was backed by 46 percent of respondents to the Georgia poll, which was conducted by SurveyUSA and Atlanta’s 11 Live News. Trump was supported by just 44 percent of respondents, while 6 percent said they remained undecided and 4 percent said they would vote for another candidate.
Trump won Georgia by a significant margin of just over 5 percent during the 2016 presidential election. Republicans have carried the state in every presidential election going back to 1992, when the voters there chose former Democratic President Bill Clinton over former President George H. W. Bush.
Notably, more respondents to the new Georgia poll had a favorable view of Trump than Biden, despite more saying they’d support the Democratic candidate. Only 36 percent of respondents said they had an “extremely favorable” or “favorable” view of Biden. Meanwhile, 43 percent said the same of Trump, with 29 percent saying their view of the president was “extremely favorable.”
Other recent polls have shown Trump trailing Biden in the southern state as well. A survey conducted by HIT Strategies at the end of July showed the Democratic challenger ahead of the Republican incumbent by 4 points—or 44 percent to 40 percent. The former vice president also narrowly led the president by 1 point in a poll carried out by YouGov in late July—with Biden backed by 46 percent compared to Trump’s support from 45 percent of voters.
But polling analysis site FiveThiryEight still shows Trump with a narrow lead on average, with 46.2 percent support compared to Biden’s 45.7 percent. The website aggregates recent polls, taking into account their quality, sample size and recency to formulate its averages.
Trump campaign officials have consistently dismissed polls showing the president trailing his Democratic rival. They have argued that pollsters are generally biased against the president and Republicans, while also pointing to the results of the 2016 election.
Most polls ahead of the last presidential contest suggested former Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton would win, but Trump pulled off a series of wins in key battleground states—propelling him to victory in the Electoral College.
National polls, as well as surveys in battleground states, continue to show Biden in the lead, however. The current Real Clear Politics average of national polls shows the Democratic contender ahead by an average of 7.2 points nationwide. The site’s polling averages out of Florida, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin—key swing states—show Biden ahead by a range of 4 points to more than 6 points.
