UT Tyler/Dallas Morning News poll shows Abbott with growing lead over O’Rourke
Poll shows candidate sharing name of former Texas governor causing confusion among voters
TYLER, Texas (KLTV) - A newly-released UT Tyler/Dallas Morning News poll shows Gov. Greg Abbott has a growing lead over Democrat Beto O’Rourke. The survey, conducted Jan. 18 - Jan. 25, also shows each are likely to win their respective primaries.
The poll shows Abbott gaining five points since the last UT Tyler/DMN poll in November, although UT Tyler political science professor Dr. Mark Owens points out neither candidate has more than 50 percent.
When looking at the primaries, both O’Rourke and Abbott have a similar majority. But when looking specifically at the Republican primary, a virtually unknown candidate is polling just as high and even higher than some of the most vocal GOP contenders. His name? Rick Perry. Not former Texas Gov. Rick Perry, but a computer engineer from Springtown with the same name. A follow-up question about why the voters liked Perry indicates he’s already being confused with the former governor - with 39 percent saying his “experience” is the attribute they like most over the other candidates.
“There is some confusion that exists,” Owens said.
And in the hotly contested Republican primary for Texas Attorney General, incumbent Ken Paxton is polling below what he need to avoid a runoff, while East Texas congressman Louie Gohmert came in third.
To see the results from the full survey of Texas voters, click here.
Methodology
The Dallas Morning News/UT-Tyler Poll is a statewide random sample of 1,082 registered voters conducted between January 18-25. The mixed-mode sample includes 276 registered voters surveyed over the phone by the University of Texas at Tyler with support from ReconMR and 806 registered voters randomly selected from Dynata’s panel of online respondents. The margin of error for a sample of ### registered voters in Texas is +/- 3.0 percentage points, and the more conservative margin of sampling error that includes design effects from this poll is +/- 3.5 percentage points for a 95% confidence interval. The online and phone surveys were conducted in English and Spanish. Using information from the 2020 Current Population Survey and Office of the Texas Secretary of State. The sample’s gender, age, race/ethnicity, education, metropolitan density and vote choice were matched to the population of registered voters in Texas. Visit http://www.uttyler.edu/politicalscience/pollingcenter for more information about our current and previous studies.
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