YouGov surveys conducted October 17 – 28 in Virginia and New Jersey show Democrats leading in both gubernatorial races, by 14 percentage points and 9 points, respectively.
Virginia
In Virginia, Democrat Abigail Spanberger heads into the final weekend of the campaign for governor with a substantial lead among likely voters over Republican Winsome Earle-Sears. On an initial vote preference question, 55% favor Spanberger, 41% Earle-Sears, and 4% are undecided.
In a state closely divided along party lines — 32% of likely voters identify as Democrats and 31% as Republicans — Spanberger’s lead results from drawing a slightly larger share of Democrats (97%) than Earle-Sears does among Republicans (92%) and holding a big lead among Independents (58% to 34%).
The survey shows Spanberger with a modest lead among white voters (51% to 46%) and much bigger margins among Hispanics (61% to 24%) and Black voters (81% to 17%).
When counting undecided voters by which candidate they’re leaning toward, the Spanberger lead widens slightly, to a 57% to 42% margin.
New Jersey
The race for governor is closer in New Jersey. Among likely voters, Democrat Mikie Sherrill holds a 51% to 42% lead over Republican Jack Ciattarelli, with 1% favoring other candidates and 5% undecided.
As in Virginia, the Democratic candidate, Sherrill, wins a slightly higher share of Democrats (96%) than the Republican — Ciattarelli — does among Republicans (93%). But unlike in Virginia, in New Jersey the Republican candidate holds a narrow advantage (44% to 43%) among independents. Also unlike in Virginia, Democrats outnumber Republicans in New Jersey — by 34% to 29% among likely voters.
When tabulated by race, the New Jersey results look a lot like those from Virginia: Sherrill leads narrowly among white voters (49% to 45%), but by much wider margins among Hispanics (59% to 32%) and Black voters (74% to 18%).
Sherrill leads by 54% to 44% when counting undecided voters’ preferences.
— Carl Bialik and David Montgomery contributed to this article
See the results for these YouGov polls in New Jersey and Virginia
Methodology: The polls in both states were conducted online from October 17 – 28, among 1,179 likely voters in Virginia and 1,153 likely voters in New Jersey, all recruited by sending text messages. The sample was weighted according to gender, age, past election turnout, in-state geography (using each state’s current voter list) and imputed education, race, and 2024 vote choice. In New Jersey, party registration also was used; in Virginia, modeled party support was used instead. Turnout probabilities based on self-reported vote likelihood were assigned to each person in the sample and the product of the base weight and turnout probability was used to obtain results for likely voters. The margin of error for the overall sample in each state is approximately 4 percentage points.
Image: Getty (Win McNamee / Staff)
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