NC governor’s race: More polls show Stein with double-digit lead over Robinson
Welcome to the governor’s race edition of our Under the Dome politics newsletter. I’m Dawn Vaughan, The News & Observer’s Capitol bureau chief. Election Day is two weeks from Tuesday, and early voting is already underway to elect the next governor of North Carolina.
Two new polls released this past week are the latest to show the gap between Democratic nominee Josh Stein and Republican nominee Mark Robinson in the double-digits.
Stein, the state attorney general, and Robinson, the lieutenant governor, had been in a close race earlier in the election year, with Stein’s lead growing over the summer after more attention on Robinson’s position on abortion. Then the gap widened after the damaging CNN KFile report linking Robinson to a series of offensive posts on a pornographic website. Robinson denies making the posts and filed a lawsuit in Wake County court this past week. But polls of likely voters have him losing by a significant margin.
Quinnipiac Poll
The latest Quinnipiac University Poll, released on Wednesday, shows Stein with a 12-point lead over Robinson. The poll shows Stein with 52% of the vote to Robinson’s 40%. Three third party candidates’ support was at 2% for Libertarian Mike Ross, 2% for Green Party candidate Wayne Turner and 1% for Constitution Party candidate Vinny Smith.
The poll was conducted Oct. 10-14, of 1,031 likely voters. The margin of error is plus-or-minus 3.1%.
Carolina Journal Poll
The Carolina Journal Poll, which is part of the conservative John Locke Foundation, released a new poll on Thursday with Stein leading Robinson by 13.5 points.
Stein is polling at 49.3% compared to Robinson’s 35.8% in the Carolina Journal poll.
That’s a drop of 3.4 percentage points for Robinson since their September poll, before the CNN report and the mass resignations of top campaign and lieutenant governor’s office staff in the wake of the allegations.
In the October poll, Ross has 2.5%, trailed by Turner and Smith with less than 1% each. Another 11% of people surveyed were undecided.
Both the Carolina Journal and Quinnipiac polls showed Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump in a tight race within the margin of error.
“The road to the White House continues to run through the Old North State in the 2024 presidential election, with Trump and Harris locked in a statistical tie. But what’s equally interesting is the state’s long-standing pattern of ballot-splitting,” Carolina Journal publisher and John Locke Foundation CEO Donald Bryson said in the poll announcement.
“North Carolina has split parties on the gubernatorial and presidential tickets in six of the last nine elections,” Bryson said.
John Locke Foundation used Cygnal Polling of 600 likely voters Oct. 12-14, with a margin of error of plus-or-minus 3.99%.
Robinson lawsuit
As I mentioned above, Robinson filed a lawsuit this week against CNN for defamation, as well as a pornography store worker, Louis Love Money, who was part of a separate news story from The Assembly about Robinson having been a frequent customer at the adult video store when he was working at Papa John’s.
My colleague Kyle Ingram covered Robinson’s press conference about the lawsuit filed in Wake County Superior Court. Robinson’s attorney is Anthony Biller, who was retained by the Binall Law Group, based in Virginia.
Money, the second subject of the lawsuit, already filed a motion to dismiss. CNN had not as of Friday afternoon. Robinson’s complaint includes a demand for a jury trial.
Stay informed about #ncpol
Don’t forget to follow our Under the Dome tweets and listen to our Under the Dome podcast to stay up to date. Our new episode posts Monday morning, and I’m joined by my politics team colleagues Kyle Ingram and Avi Bajpai to talk about what the first day of early voting showed as well as all the recent presidential campaign visits to North Carolina.
We also have an Under the Dome: Live! event on Monday, Oct. 21, when we will record the podcast in front of an audience. I’ll be interviewing N.C. Central University political science professor Jarvis Hall as part of an election preview. It starts at 11:30 a.m. on Monday in the School of Education Auditorium on the NCCU campus in Durham. Register online.
You can sign up to receive the Under the Dome newsletter at newsobserver.com/newsletters. Want your friends to get our email, too? Forward them this newsletter so they can sign up. You can also email me questions you may have about the governor’s race at dvaughan@newsobserver.com.
This story was originally published October 20, 2024 at 5:00 AM.
.jpg)