Trump builds leads in Florida, Ohio in new poll

A new CNN/ORC poll released Wednesday shows Donald Trump opening leads over Hillary Clinton in the key battleground states of Florida and Ohio. Clinton enjoyed a significant post-convention bump earlier in the summer, leading Trump in Florida by 7 points in one July poll, but this latest survey shows Trump ahead among likely voters in the Sunshine State, 47 percent to 44 percent. In Ohio, Clinton led Trump by 4 points in a poll last month, but now she lags behind with just 41 percent to his 46 percent support. Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson, meanwhile, pulls 6 percent in Florida and 8 percent in Ohio.

In both polls, Trump's lead narrows when the pool is widened to include all registered voters; among those respondents, Trump is ahead in Ohio 43 percent to 39 percent, but Clinton leads in Florida 45 percent to 44 percent. The margin of error among the smaller pool of likely voters for both states is 3.5 percentage points.

After these latest numbers, Talking Points Memo predicts Florida will break for the GOP this fall. But as Geoffrey Skelley from the University of Virginia Center for Politics points out: "The race has vacillated between larger and smaller Clinton leads. Is this a Clinton valley, a new normal, or [the] start of a Trump breakthrough?"

The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up