BETHLEHEM, Pa. — Five days after former President Donald Trump survived an attempt on his life in western Pennsylvania, a new poll shows him expanding his lead on President Joe Biden in the Keystone State.
According to the Emerson College poll conducted earlier this week and released Thursday, Trump leads Biden by a 5-point margin (48% to 43%) in a head-to-head matchup and a 6-point margin (46% to 40%) when third-party candidates are included.
This poll comes roughly one month after a Marist College survey showed Trump with just a 2-point lead over Biden head-to-head.
The Emerson poll, sponsored by Democrats for the Next Generation, surveyed 1,000 voters in Pennsylvania and six other swing states: Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina and Wisconsin.
Pennsylvania appears satisfied with their choices for president in this poll, as only 6.3% of them said they would support a candidate other than Trump or Biden when given the chance — the smallest share of all swing states surveyed.
Nationally, the Emerson poll found that 46% of registered voters support Trump, 42% support Biden, while the remaining 12% remain undecided.
The poll notes that Biden’s support has dropped nationally by 2 percentage points since early July — perhaps in the wake of Biden’s poor debate performance and Trump’s assassination attempt.
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But Spencer Kimball, executive director of Emerson College Polling says only time will tell what specifically is driving this trend.
“Recent polling shows Biden losing support more significantly than Trump gaining it since the attempted assassination,” Kimball said in a statement. “This raises questions about whether Biden’s decline is still influenced by the debate or if Trump has reached his support ceiling.”