Internal Democratic poll shows tight race in key Texas House district

The race between Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas) and former Texas state Sen. Wendy Davis (D) is growing tighter, according to a new internal poll from Davis’s campaign released exclusively to The Hill.

The survey, conducted by Garin Hart Yang Research Group, showed Roy with 46 percent support and Davis close behind at 45 percent support. Former Vice President Joe Biden leads President Trump in the district by three points, 50 percent to 47 percent, according to the findings. 

The poll comes after Davis outraised Roy, a freshman congressman, by more than $850,000 in the second quarter of the year. Davis raised $1.4 million during the period and has $2.8 million cash-on-hand. Roy raised $544,407 in the same period and has $1.7 million cash-on-hand.

Larry Sabato’s Crystal Ball at the University of Virginia Center for Politics moved the race from “leans Republican” to “toss-up” on Thursday. The nonpartisan Cook Political Report also moved the race from “lean Republican” to “toss-up” last week. Additionally, Cook moved Texas’s 3rd, 6th, and 25th districts from “solid Republican” to “likely Republican.”

The races are an example of how the Lone Star State could be in play for Democrats in 2020.

A survey from Quinnipiac University Poll released on Wednesday showed Trump and Biden locked in a tight race in Texas, with Biden at 45 percent support and Trump at 44 percent support.

The same Quinnipiac survey also showed low approval for the Republican handling of the coronavirus in the state as cases skyrocket. Forty-seven percent of Texas voters polled said they approve of Gov. Greg Abbott’s (R) response to the outbreak, down from 56 percent in a similar Quinnipiac poll conducted in early June. Meanwhile, 45 percent of Texas voters said they approved of Trump’s handling of the virus, while 52 percent said they disapproved. 

The poll from Garin Hart Yang Research Group was conducted July 14-17 among 550 likely general election voters in Texas’s 21st Congressional District. The survey’s margin of error is plus or minus 4.25 percentage points.