Voters in most Southern states expected to back GOP in midterms: poll

Voters in most Southern states are expected to back Republican candidates in the upcoming midterms, according to a new NBC News/SurveyMonkey online poll. 

The poll found that respondents in most Southern states are more likely to support a Republican for Congress than the nation as a whole, with 48 percent of Southerners saying they would vote for a GOP candidate if the midterms were held today compared to 43 percent that would back Democrats.

{mosads}Forty-nine percent of poll respondents from across the country as a whole would vote for a Democratic candidate if the elections were held right now while 42 percent would vote for a Republican, according to NBC.

The NBC/SurveyMonkey poll surveyed voters in Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas and Virginia. 

The only Southern state where voters were more likely to back Democrats was Georgia, where 47 percent of voters surveyed said they would vote for a Democrat. Forty-three percent said they are backing Republicans. 

The poll found the Georgia gubernatorial race at a tie, with 43 percent of respondents saying they would vote for Brian Kemp (R) and 43 percent backing Stacey Abrams (D). Fourteen percent of the voters surveyed reported they are undecided. 

Voters in most Southern states also reported higher approval ratings of the president than the rest of the country. Fifty-two percent of Southern voters said they think the president is doing a good job while forty-nine percent disapprove. Fifty-four percent of voters nationally disapprove of President Trump. 

Georgia is again an outlier among Southern states, with 54 percent of Georgians disapproving of Trump. 

The NBC News/SurveyMonkey polls were conducted from Sept. 9-24, with a national sample of 8,898 registered voters and a regional sample of 2,655 registered voters. The margin of error for the regional sample is plus or minus 2.8 percentage points, while it is 1.4 points for the national sample.