Sen. Bob Casey (D-Pa.) leads Republican David McCormick by nearly 10 points in a hypothetical general election match-up, according to poll results released Tuesday.
The Emerson College/The Hill poll found Casey, the incumbent who has served in his Senate seat since 2007, with about 49 percent support to McCormick’s 39 percent, while 13 percent were undecided. A comfortable lead over McCormick with independents contributes to Casey’s overall margin; the incumbent is winning by 21 points among them, 48 percent to 27 percent.
McCormick is a former hedge fund CEO who previously ran for Senate in 2022, narrowly losing the Republican nomination to Mehmet Oz. He is likely to win the GOP nomination for Senate this year and face off against Casey.
Pollsters found both candidates have about even net favorability ratings. Casey was viewed favorably by 50 percent of respondents and unfavorably by 42 percent, while McCormick was viewed favorably by 38 percent and unfavorably by 32 percent.
But Casey has an advantage in name recognition, with 30 percent of respondents saying they have not heard of McCormick while only about 8 percent said the same about Casey.
Casey’s highest levels of support come from voters with a postgraduate degree, at 60 percent, and from voters whose highest level of education is an associate or bachelor’s degree, at 50 percent.
The poll also found former President Trump narrowly leading Biden in the key swing state by 2 points, 45 percent to 43 percent, with 12 percent undecided. The result is an improvement for Biden from the poll taken last month, which found him trailing by 7 points.
Trump’s lead expands to 5 points when independents Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Cornel West and Green Party candidate Jill Stein are included. The former president receives 42 percent in this hypothetical, while Biden gets 37 percent, Kennedy 8 percent, West 2 percent and Stein 1 percent.
The poll was conducted Feb. 14-16 among 1,000 registered voters and has a margin of error of 3 percentage points.