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Poll: Democrats lead in Battleground Senate Races

But presidential race is nearly tied in Colorado and Pennsylvania

Democrat Katie McGinty, seen here campaigning in Pine Grove Mills, Pa., in August, leads incumbent Sen. Patrick J. Toomey by 3 points, a new poll shows. (Tom Williams/CQ Roll Call)
Democrat Katie McGinty, seen here campaigning in Pine Grove Mills, Pa., in August, leads incumbent Sen. Patrick J. Toomey by 3 points, a new poll shows. (Tom Williams/CQ Roll Call)

Democrats Katie McGinty of Pennsylvania and incumbent Sen. Michael Bennet of Colorado lead in new polls in Senate races in their respective states. 

McGinty has a 3-point lead over incumbent Republican Sen. Patrick J. Toomey, 49 percent to 46 percent among likely voters in a CNN/ORC Poll. Bennet maintains a much larger advantage in the Colorado race, 53 percent to 43 percent over GOP challenger Darryl Glenn. 

[Can Toomey’s Presidential Non-Answer Hold?]

But in the presidential race, just 1 point separates Democrat Hillary Clinton and Republican Donald Trump in those states in four-way races with Libertarian Party nominee Gary Johnson and Green Party candidate Jill Stein. In Colorado, Trump leads Clinton 42 percent to 41 percent while in Pennsylvania, Clinton edges the real estate mogul, 45 percent to 44 percent. 

Both states are shaping up to be key battlegrounds in the presidential election as the findings are well within each poll’s 3.5-point margin of error. 

Clinton holds strong leads in both states among white college graduates — 11 points in Pennsylvania and 16 points in Colorado. White non-college graduates favor Trump by 19 points in Pennsylvania and by 22 points in Colorado. 

Both states are about evenly split over who would be better prepared to handle terrorism, but Clinton holds an 8-point edge in Colorado on handling immigration.

The CNN/ORC polls were conducted by telephone from Sept. 20-25. The Colorado poll interviewed 784 voters likely to vote in November, while 771 likely voters were surveyed in Pennsylvania. The polls’ margin of error was 3.5 percentage points in each state.

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