AUSTIN (KXAN) — With less than four weeks to go until early voting begins in Texas, a new poll shows the race for president remains tight.
Former President Donald Trump has a slight edge over Vice President Kamala Harris in a new Emerson College/The Hill poll, funded by Nexstar Media, released Thursday. The poll shows 51% of respondents said they would support Trump if the election were held today, while 46% said they would support Harris. Three percent said they were undecided or would support someone else.
The poll is a modest one-point improvement for Trump since the last Emerson/The Hill poll, released earlier this month. In that poll, Trump led Harris 50% to 46%.
The Emerson College Polling/The Hill poll of 950 likely voters was conducted between Sept. 22 and Sept. 24, 2024. The margin of error is 3.1 percentage points. Poll respondents were contacted either by cell phone via MMS-to-web text or via an online panel.
There are significant differences in candidate preference based on voters’ race and ethnicity. Harris leads with Black and Hispanic voters by 79-point and 13-point margins, respectively, while Trump leads among white voters by a 31-point margin.
“There is also a gender divide on the presidential ballot test,” said Spencer Kimball, executive director of Emerson College Polling. “Women break for Harris by six, while men break for Trump by 19.”
No matter which candidate they support, voters expect the race to be tight. Fifty-one percent of respondents said they expect Trump to win, while 49% expect Harris to win.
The race for U.S. Senate in Texas is similarly close. According to the poll, 49% of voters support incumbent Republican Ted Cruz, while 45% support Democratic challenger Colin Allred. Six percent are undecided in that race.
Both Cruz and Allred increased their share by a point since the previous ECP poll earlier this month.
Immigration was named the top issue for about a third of poll respondents (32%), ahead of the economy (27%), abortion access (11%), threats to democracy (9%), education (6%) and healthcare (5%).