Schiff 56%, Garvey 33%
A new Emerson College Polling/Inside California Politics/The Hill survey of California voters finds 59% of voters support Vice President Kamala Harris for president in 2024, while 35% support former president Donald Trump. Two percent support someone else and 4% are undecided. When undecided voters are asked which candidate they lean toward, Harris’ overall support increases to 61%, and Trump to 37%.
“Since the September California poll, the margin between Trump and Harris has stayed the same at 24 points,” Spencer Kimball, executive director of Emerson College Polling, said. “Including who undecided voters are leaning toward, Harris’ 61% is slightly underperforming Joe Biden’s 2020 vote, of 63.5%, and Trump’s 37% is slightly overperforming his 2020 vote, of 34.3%.”
In the U.S. Senate Election between Democratic Congressman Adam Schiff and former Dodger and Republican Steve Garvey, Schiff leads 56% to 33%, with 11% of voters undecided.
Governor Gavin Newsom holds a 43% approval rating, and 46% disapproval rating. President Biden holds a 46% approval among California voters.
A majority of California voters (61%) have a favorable view of Kamala Harris, while 39% view her unfavorably. Thirty-five percent view Donald Trump favorably, while 65% have an unfavorable view of the former president.
The top issue for California voters is the economy at 31%, followed by housing affordability (19%), healthcare (10%), education (10%), and crime (8%).
A majority of California voters (56%) have considered leaving the state due to the cost of living, while 44% have not.
- 37% of voters have made tradeoffs between paying for food or utilities in the past month; 63% have not.
- 35% have made tradeoffs between paying for food and housing in the past month; 65% have not.
- 26% have made tradeoffs between paying for food and prescription medications in the past month, while 74% have not.
Seventy-seven percent of voters are confident that votes across California will be accurately counted in the 2024 presidential election, while 23% are not confident.
- 94% of Democrats are confident that votes will be counted accurately, compared to 54% of Republicans, and 70% of independents.
California voters were asked about multiple proposed policies to address immigration at the United States border with Mexico, and whether they would better or worsen the situation.
Forty-one percent think increasing deportations of people in the country would make the situation better, while 36% think it would make the situation worse; 23% think it would have no impact. A majority (63%) think creating more opportunities for people to legally immigrate to the US would better the situation, while 24% think it would make the situation worse; 13% think it would have no impact.
Methodology
The Emerson College Polling/Inside CA Politics/The Hill California survey was conducted October 12-14, 2024. The sample of likely voters, n=1,000, has a credibility interval, similar to a poll’s margin of error (MOE), of +/- 3 percentage points. The data sets were weighted by gender, education, race, age, party registration, and region based on 2024 likely voter modeling. Turnout modeling is based on voter registration and election data.
It is important to remember that subsets based on demographics, such as gender, age, education, and race/ethnicity, carry with them higher credibility intervals, as the sample size is reduced. Survey results should be understood within the poll’s range of scores, and with a confidence interval of 95% a poll will fall outside the range of scores 1 in 20 times.
Data was collected by contacting an online panel of voters provided by CINT and a list of registered voters via Interactive Voice Response (IVR). The survey was offered in English.
All questions asked in this survey with the exact wording, along with full results, demographics, and cross tabulations can be found under Full Results. This survey was funded by Nexstar Media.
