Former president Donald Trump is leading his opponent, President Joe Biden, in six out of seven key swing states, according to the latest Wall Street Journal poll, as voters are becoming increasingly dissatisfied with the incumbent’s job performance.
Released Tuesday night, the poll shows Trump outperforming Biden by a range of two to eight points in Pennsylvania, Michigan, Arizona, Georgia, Nevada, and North Carolina on a hypothetical ballot that includes third-party and independent candidates such as Robert F. Kennedy Jr. In Wisconsin, however, Biden holds a three-point lead over Trump.
All seven battleground states, which account for 93 electoral votes out of the necessary 270, were crucial to the outcomes of the 2016 and 2020 presidential elections.
When the hypothetical ballot is narrowed to the presumptive Republican and Democratic nominees, Trump leads Biden by one-to-six points in the six swing states, with the two being tied in Wisconsin. Neither candidate has a majority in any state in either the multiple-candidate ballot or head-to-head matchup, although Trump came close to surpassing the 50-percent mark in North Carolina.
In 2020, Biden won Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Georgia, Arizona, and Nevada, but Democratic margins in these states have been slipping since the last election. North Carolina was the only state of the seven to back Trump four years ago. Now it seems voter support in most of these states has flipped in Trump’s favor.
The president’s unfavorable job reviews outweigh the favorable by 16 points or more in every state in the Journal survey. On the other hand, Trump’s net negative rating in Arizona stands at just one point.
Trump beats his opponent on the economy and immigration by 20 points, while Biden maintains a 12-point lead on abortion — an issue the Biden campaign is expected to continue emphasizing in the months ahead. Physical fitness and mental acuity also play a role in the public’s opinion of both nominees, with 48 percent preferring Trump over Biden (28 percent) on the issue of who is best equipped to do the job.
The economy is the topmost concern for voters this election cycle, with roughly 35 percent of respondents to the new poll saying the economy and inflation are most important, up from 19 percent in a national survey conducted by the Journal in February. In six of the seven swing states (with the exception of Wisconsin), 60 percent or more say the strength of the economy is either not so good or poor.
While views of the national economy are pessimistic, voters generally don’t view the respective economies in their home states the same way. North Carolina, for example, sees 66 percent of respondents viewing the state’s economy positively compared to 33 percent viewing it negatively. These numbers are reversed when respondents were asked to rate the national economy.
Both Republican and Democratic pollsters, who conducted the survey last month, agree that the economy is a major issue for swing-state voters this year. Tony Fabrizio, a Trump-aligned Republican, said these voters feel overwhelmed by “economic malaise . . . like a wet blanket that sits over everything.” Michael Bocian, a Democrat, said the problem for Biden is that he isn’t receiving credit for positive feelings about the economies in swing states.
“Whether they can take advantage of that opportunity—not make people feel everything’s going great, but better than they’re currently feeling—I think is a big challenge in front of them,” Bocian said.
In December, Trump led Biden by a margin of four-to-six points depending on whether third-party and independent candidates were included. This was the first time the former president beat the incumbent in the Journal‘s national polling ahead of the 2024 election.