Republican candidate Burt Jones has widened his lead in the race for lieutenant governor, according to a new poll by The Atlanta Journal Constitution.
Jones, a state senator from Jackson who’s been endorsed by former President Donald Trump, received support from more than 43% of those polled. Democrat Charlie Bailey, an attorney who lives in Atlanta, received support from about 33% of those polled. Ryan Graham, a Libertarian and Atlanta resident who works in software development, got the support of almost 8% of those polled.
About 16% said they were undecided.
The poll of likely voters was conducted Sept. 5-16 by the University of Georgia School of Public and International Affairs. It has a margin of error of 3.3 percentage points.
Support for Jones has increased since the last AJC poll conducted in July, when about 41% of voters polled said they planned to vote for the Republican candidate. Bailey’s support has dropped since July, when about 36% of those polled said they would vote for the Democrat. Graham’s support has increased by a percentage point since July.
Jones was part of a phony slate of GOP presidential electors designed to help Trump’s failed effort to overturn Joe Biden’s victory in the 2020 presidential election.
The three men are vying for the office currently held by Lt. Gov. Geoff Duncan, who is not seeking reelection.
Jones led with men and women who were polled, receiving about 46% and 44%, respectively. Among racial groups, most white voters polled said they would support Jones while most Black voters said they planned to support Bailey. Each received support from about 61% of those polled in those demographics. About 13% of white voters polled said they were still undecided, while about 23% of Black voters said they did not yet know who they would support in November.
Each candidate also got the bulk of support from his party. About 83% of voters who identified as Republican said they would support Jones, and about 74% of Democrats said they planned to vote for Bailey. About 36% of voters polled who identified as independents said they would support Graham, the most of any of the candidates.
While all but about 8% of Republican voters polled said they knew who they were going to support in November, about 19% of Democrats and nearly 29% of independents said they were undecided.
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