Monday, Mobile, AL Fox affiliate WALA released the findings of a new poll showing former Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice Roy Moore maintaining an 11-point lead over former Clinton U.S. Attorney Doug Jones in the race for the Yellowhammer State’s U.S. Senate seat.
The telephone survey from Strategy Research included responses of 3,000 registered voters throughout the state and reflected a similar finding of a poll the same firm released last week on the race.
According to Fox10TV.com, the poll had a margin of error of plus or minus 3 percent and including the following findings:
- 32% of those surveyed said they would typically vote in a Democrat primary; 61% said they would usually vote in a Republican primary; 7% said they were independents or don’t vote in party primaries.
- Of those who said they were certain to vote, 52% said they would vote for Republican Roy Moore; 41% said Democrat Doug Jones; 7% said they were undecided.
- Among those who usually vote for a Democrat, 88% said they would vote for Jones, 6% for Moore and 6% were undecided. 78% of likely Republican voters said they would vote for Moore, 12% said they would vote for Jones and 10% were undecided.
According to Strategy Research’s Jon Gray, the number showing the breakdown among GOP voters could be cause for concern.
“This 10 percent undecided of Republicans bothers me as well,” Gray said to Fox10’s Bob Grip. “This 12 percent though — everybody wants to talk about Republican defectors and this is important to understand. If you’re a voter at home and you don’t understand why people are talking about this is a tight race, this is your number right here. This 12 percent — this is telling people that there’s 12 percent of Republicans that don’t want to vote for Judge Moore for whatever reason.”
“That looks like a big number, but if you remember — we had 6 percent of the Democrats said they weren’t going to vote for Jones,” he continued. So it’s really only a 6 percent difference between the two … and that’s not enough to sway this election. Now, if you add in the undecideds, and all of a sudden you’re looking at somewhere close to 22 percent of the Republican Party not supporting their nominee — that could be a problem and that’s why people are saying this race needs to be watched.”
Early polls conducted days after Moore defeated Luther Strange in a GOP primary runoff had the contest at six and eight points. However, a recent Fox News poll had the Jones-Moore match-up tied at 42 percent each.
The election to fill the seat formerly held by Jeff Sessions will be held on December 12.
Follow Jeff Poor on Twitter @jeff_poor