Latest Christopher Newport University poll in Virginia: Trump trails by a steady margin
Christopher Newport University released the results of a new poll, in which respondents from Virginia were asked for whom they will vote: Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton.
Historically, Virginia has been a battleground state, in which neither of the two major parties has had overwhelming support to clinch that state's electoral college votes. Hence, forecasts here are of particular interest.
Christopher Newport University poll results
Of those who replied, 48.0% said that they intend to vote for former First Lady Hillary Clinton, whereas 38.0% said that they would give their vote to billionaire Donald Trump.
The poll was carried out between September 15 and September 23. The sample size was 1003 likely voters. There is a sampling error of +/-3.9 percentage points. Considering this error margin, the gap between both candidates is statistically significant.
Putting the results in context
Individual polls should be regarded with caution, because they may contain large errors. Rather than relying on results from single polls, the best practice is to consult combined polls or, even better, the combined PollyVote forecast that incorporates different methods and data.
For the following comparison, we convert Trump's and Clinton's raw poll numbers into two-party vote shares. This yields figures of 55.8% for Clinton and 44.2% for Trump. On April 3 Clinton obtained only 55.7% in the Christopher Newport University poll and Trump obtained 44.3%.
Results vs. other polls
An average of recent polls in Virginia has Clinton at 54.0% of the two-party vote. This value is 1.8 percentage points lower than her respective numbers in the Christopher Newport University poll. This deviation is within the poll's margin of error, which means that the poll is not an outlier.
Comparison to the combined PollyVote
The current PollyVote predicts Clinton to gain 51.5% of the two-party vote in Virginia. Hence, Polly's combined forecast is 4.3 points below her polling numbers. The PollyVote forecast is thus outside the poll's sampling error.