Another on of these polls, another close result.
Colin Allred
Incumbent Republican Pete Sessions and Democratic challenger Colin Allred are in a dead heat in the much-anticipated race for Dallas County’s 32nd Congressional District.
According to a New York Times/Siena College poll completed Monday night, Sessions leads Allred 48 to 47 percent, with 5 percent of those surveyed undecided. Pollsters talked to only 500 potential voters, so the margin of error is plus or minus 4.8 percent. The Dallas Morning News is part of the New York Times’ effort to make the political polling process more transparent.
“Our poll result is about what was expected. But remember: It’s just one poll, and we talked to only 500 people,” an introduction to the results state. “Each candidate’s total could easily be five points different if we polled everyone in the district.”
[…]
The poll shows 52 percent disapprove of Trump’s performance, while 44 percent approve and 5 percent don’t know.
Trump endorsed Sessions earlier this month, while former President Barack Obama is backing Allred.
Potential voters overwhelming rejected Trump’s tariffs on steel and aluminum by a 50 percent to 39 percent margin, with 11 percent undecided, the poll revealed.
[…]
The incumbent has campaigned heavily on the 2017 tax cuts pushed by Trump and approved by Congress. To that point, the polls reveals that 53 percent in the district support the tax cuts, compared to 39 percent that disapproved and 8 percent that didn’t know.
Perhaps even more significant for Sessions, 54 percent agree that Trump’s policies have made their economic situation better. And the nomination of Judge Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court was supported by a 50-41 percent margin.
Sessions is hoping voters feel good about Republican policies and Trump’s judicial appointments.
Those surveyed were nearly equally divided over which party should control the U.S. House, with 48 percent favoring Democrats and 47 percent wanting Republicans to maintain control. Six percent were undecided.
The 32nd Congressional District still leans Republican. The outcome of the race could be decided by a base fight in a county dominated by Democrats. Those Democrats hope Rep. Beto O’Rourke of El Paso, in a close Senate race against incumbent Republican Ted Cruz, will help the entire ticket.
But the poll shows that Cruz and O’Rourke could have similar coattails. O’Rourke was favored by a 48-47 percent margin, reflecting the overall competitiveness in the congressional district.
See here and here for previous “live poll” results, from CDs 07 and 23, and here for the full NYT writeup. An internal poll released in August had it as 47-45 Sessions, while Patrick Svitek tweeted about just-released PPP results that had Allred leading 47-42 and Lizzie Fletcher leading 47-45 in CD07. The disconnect between the disapproval of Trump and the approval of the tax cuts and Brett Kavanaugh could be a sign that people want to exert a counter-force on Trump even if they like some of the things he’s done, a sign that one side or the other is over- or under-performing in the district, or just random noise. Far as I know, these are the only live polls planned for Texas. I wish they’d dip down into some of the second-tier races – I’d kill to see what they might find about CD31, or CD22, or CD21 – but we should be happy we got this much.
Pretty close race. Allred has to gotv in the corridor of the district going up 75 on the east side all the way into East Richardson and Garland and over to the white rock area. Sessions support is in the park cities, preston hollow, and rowlett/sachse/wylie. I think Allred has the organizational edge but it’s close.