Democrat Angela Alsobrooks has a 5 percentage point lead over Republican Larry Hogan in Maryland’s U.S. Senate race, but she’s still unknown to a third of likely voters, a new statewide poll shows.
Hogan is still as popular as he was during his two terms as governor. While a fifth of Democrats say they will vote for him, he will have to convince a larger share of them in a Democratic-heavy state in November to win, poll director Patrick Gonzales said.
“When a Republican wants to win at the state level in Maryland, it always comes down to basic math,” Gonzales wrote in a statement announcing the results of his state poll. “Can Hogan steal 30% of the Democratic vote to secure victory on November 5?”
The poll of 820 likely voters was conducted Aug. 24-30 by Gonzales Research & Media Services in Annapolis. The margin of error is plus or minus 3.5 percentage points.
The survey was conducted among voters in Maryland just after the Democratic National Convention, where Alsobrooks, a staunch ally of Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris, delivered a prime-time speech.
This follows another recent poll of voters, mostly 50 and older, conducted by Impact Research and Fabrizio Ward, which found the race to be neck-and-neck among that age group, which is most likely to vote. There are also indications that Hogan will need to keep up his performance, as Alsobrooks is increasingly raising his profile among voters through ads in the final two months of the race.
According to the Gonzales poll, 40% of voters have a favorable view of the Democratic governor of Prince George’s County, while 34% do not recognize her name.
Ten years after Hogan first became governor, nearly everyone has an opinion of him. Half of all voters view him favorably, while 19 percent view him unfavorably and 29 percent are neutral. His appeal is similar among Democrats, Republicans and independents, or when broken down by race and gender, the poll found.
The poll showed that Alsobrooks is ahead 46% to 41% in the head-to-head matches, with 11% still undecided.
About 82% of Republicans said they would support Hogan, 2 percentage points more than former Republican President Donald Trump among Maryland Republicans surveyed in the same poll before the presidential race.
Hogan also leads among independent voters, 41% to 31%. His 21% support from Democrats is “not bad,” though Hogan would need to outperform Democrats by about 10 percentage points to win, Gonzales said.
Hogan is seeking to become the first Maryland Republican elected to the U.S. Senate since 1980. The outcome of the race could determine which party holds the majority in the narrowly divided Senate.
The winner will succeed retiring Democratic Senator Ben Cardin.
