Democrats hoping for a great blue wave in 2018 just got a bit of good Christmas tidings. A generic-ballot poll conducted by SSRS for CNN and released Wednesday shows Democrats holding their biggest polling lead yet, with 56 percent of registered voters saying they'd favor the generic Democrat in their district and just 38 percent saying they'd favor the Republican in next year's midterms.
Not only that, but CNN's numbers also found that voters who favor Democrats are more enthusiastic about voting in 2018 than are voters who lean right. Just 32 percent of GOP-leaning registered voters said they were either extremely or very enthusiastic about casting their ballot, compared to 48 percent of Democratic-leaning voters.
The last time CNN asked registered voters about a generic-ballot congressional race, the Democrats' lead was just 11 percent. And Wednesday's 18-point advantage is an increase even from the day's other good news for the Democrats: An NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll released earlier Wednesday found voters favoring a generic Democrat over President Trump in a hypothetical 2020 presidential race by a 16-point margin.
Overall, the RealClearPolitics average of generic 2018 polls shows Democrats with a 12.5-point advantage over Republicans.
CNN's poll sampled 1,001 adults over the phone via live interviewer. It was conducted between Dec. 14-17 and has a margin of error of 3.8 percentage points. See the full results here.