Poll: Democrat Bredesen leads GOP’s Blackburn by 5 points in Tennessee Senate race

Former Tennessee governor Phil Bredesen (D) holds a 5-point lead over Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) in the state’s Senate race, according to a new CNN poll conducted by SSRS.

The survey found that 50 percent of likely voters favor Bredesen, while 45 percent back Blackburn.

Bredesen and Blackburn are vying for Sen. Bob Corker’s (R-Tenn.) seat. Corker has been especially critical of President Trump throughout his presidency, and CNN notes that approval ratings of the president may play a role in the Senate race.

According to the poll, 92 percent of state voters who disapprove of the president favor Bredesen, who was governor of Tennessee from 2003 until 2011. 

{mosads}Bredesen’s favorability among voters may be another factor in November’s general election, pollsters noted. Bredesen currently has a 52 percent favorability rating, with just 24 percent of registered voters viewing him unfavorably.

Meanwhile, Blackburn is viewed favorably by 41 percent of voters and viewed unfavorably by 39 percent of voters.

The survey comes about a week after a Fox News poll found that Blackburn led Bredesen by 3 points.  According to the RealClearPolitics average of polls, which was last updated on Sept. 11, Blackburn had a lead of roughly one-third of a percentage point.

Tennessee hasn’t voted a Democrat into the Senate since Al Gore in 1990, and Trump carried the state by 26 points in the 2016 election. 

The CNN survey was conducted among a population of 1,001 adults between Sept. 11 and Sept. 15. The margin of error is 3.8 percentage points.