Governor races

Poll: Clinton leads Trump by 7 points nationwide

Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton boasts a 7-point edge over Republican Donald Trump in the race for the presidency nationwide, according to a new poll.

Clinton leads Trump, 36.6 percent to 29.6 percent, in the survey from the right-leaning Red Oak Strategic released on Wednesday.

{mosads}Libertarian presidential nominee Gary Johnson ranks third, with 9.8 percent, while 23.9 percent chose “other” or “don’t know.”

Pollsters found 61.2 percent of respondents are likely voters, with 53.7 percent saying “very likely” to go to the polls and 7.5 percent “somewhat likely.”

Red Oak Strategic conducted its latest sampling of 926 likely voters via online interviews using Google Consumer Surveys from Aug. 3 to 9. It has a 3.3 percentage point margin of error.

Google Consumer Surveys collects data through survey boxes that appear online before someone can read a news article.

It also utilizes an application in the company’s Android operating system that provides credits for the Google Play store if users answer questions.

The Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post have both used Google’s tools for political polling this presidential election cycle.

The Independent Journal Review, a right-leaning news website, has also struck a longer-term partnership with the tech giant.

Online polling such as Google Consumer Surveys have long faced skepticism, however, as most rely on self-selecting groups of respondents.

This method makes obtaining a representative sample difficult, as some groups are less likely to have internet access.

Several polls released this week have shown Clinton pulling further ahead of Trump as their fight for the White House heats up.

A Bloomberg Politics survey also released Wednesday, for example, finds Clinton up 6 points on the GOP presidential nominee nationwide.

A Monmouth University poll out Monday, meanwhile, has the Democratic presidential nominee with a 12-point advantage over Trump nationwide.

Clinton leads Trump by about 8 points nationwide, according to the latest RealClearPolitics average of polls.