23-05-2025
Spanberger leads Earle-Sears in latest pair of Virginia polls
ROANOKE, Va. (WFXR) — The election that will determine Virginia's next Governor is less than six months away and two polls released Thursday provided an update on where things are trending.
The latest polls from Roanoke College and Pantheon/HarrisX both show Democratic candidate Abigail Spanberger ahead of Republican nominee and current Lieutenant Governor Winsome Earle-Sears.
The Roanoke College poll puts Spanberger's lead at 17 points, with 28 percent of voters still undecided.
But Spanberger has just four points of separation in the Pantheon/HarrisX poll.
Virginia Tech political science professor Dr. Karen Hult said the discrepancy is not that shocking.
'Some of it has to do with the fact that they're very different polls in terms of how they identify people to ask questions of,' she said.
But Hult and Liberty University professor of Government Aaron S. Van Allen feel differently about which margin reflects a more accurate picture.
'I was a little taken back by a 17-point spread,' said Van Allen. 'I think based on some of the data that I've seen, that may be a little bit high.'
Van Allen projected a margin within the range of four-to-seven points, but Hult disagrees.
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'I would be inclined to think at this point that the Roanoke College poll is closer to what I think may well be going on,' said Hult.
The Roanoke College poll says one-in-five people do not feel like they know enough about the two candidates to make a decision yet.
Meanwhile, the Pantheon/HarrisX poll identified strong partisan bases for each candidate, with 91 percent of Democrats supporting Spanberger, and 92 percent of Republicans backing Earle-Sears.
Van Allen said those numbers point to the role of independent and undecided voters in determining this race.
'Those are big numbers,' he said. 'Any time that you get 90-plus percent of folks that are saying, 'I'm definitely voting for this person,' that means those voters on the fringes, or those independent voters, they're going to be the final nail in the coffin so to speak in making that decision.'
Hult and Van Allen are watching voter perception of Republican leadership as well.
Both of the latest polls offered different numbers, but similar conclusions, on approval ratings for President Donald Trump and Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin.
Roanoke College had the Governor's approval rating at the lowest mark any of their polls had showed so far, at 46 percent. Meanwhile, the President was down to 31 percent approval.
The Pantheon/HarrisX poll had higher approval for both with Youngkin at 54 percent and Trump at 44 percent.
But both Hult and Van Allen agree that confidence in Republican leadership has dipped, and that could impact the race for Governor.
'President Trump's approval levels have been declining nationally relatively recently,' said Hult. 'And to some extent because of the nationalization of politics, one would expect then that Governor Youngkin's would go down as well.'
'I think that voters are ultimately going to have to decide with whom are they aligning with more,' said Van Allen. 'Are they going to align Winsome Earle-Sears more so with Governor Youngkin or are they going to align her more with President Trump.'
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