A generic Republican candidate shows a slight five-point lead against a generic Democrat, shrinking four points since the previous week, in the latest Rasmussen Reports poll released Friday.

As the Republicans look to retake control of Congress in the 2022 midterm elections only 143 days away, the most recent Rasmussen Reports survey showed that 46 percent of likely U.S. voters would elect a Republican, compared to the 41 percent who said they would vote for the Democrat.

Only four percent said they would vote for some other candidate, and the other nine percent said they were not sure. However, the GOP’s lead shrunk by four points from the previous week when the lead spread nine points, 48 percent to 39 percent.

Rasmussen noted that in June 2018, before the Democrats took the House for the first time in eight years, they only had a four-point advantage on the generic congressional ballot.

Additionally, June 2018 was slightly up from May 2018, when the Democrats only had a one-point advantage on the generic congressional ballot. That June, the Democrats held a four-point advantage of 45 percent to 41 percent.

Plus, as the 2018 November midterm election neared, the margins between the Democrats and Republicans came extremely close — Republicans had 46 percent to 45 percent for Democrats.

In this poll, the Republican Party has a heavy advantage (14 points) with independents over the Democrats. With the voters not affiliated with either major party, 42 percent said they would vote for the GOP candidate, while only 28 percent said they would vote for the Democrat candidate.

Additionally, 21 percent of black voters and 44 percent of other minority groups said they would vote for the Republican candidate if the election were held “today.” For Democrats, 62 percent of black voters and 37 percent of other minority groups said they would vote for them.

Furthermore, the voter intensity for both parties is nearly equal, with 87 percent of Republican voters saying they would vote for their own party’s congressional candidate and 84 percent of Democrats saying the same thing.

The Rasmussen Reports survey was conducted from June 12 to 16 and questioned 2,500 likely U.S. voters. The survey had a two percent margin of error and a 95 percent confidence level.

Jacob Bliss is a reporter for Breitbart News. Write to him at jbliss@breitbart.com or follow him on Twitter @JacobMBliss.