Since Kamala Harris became the Democratic nominee for president, polls have shown a tight race in North Carolina.
But those same polls have shown a huge gap in the governor’s race, with Democratic attorney general Josh Stein holding sometimes double-digit leads against Republican lieutenant governor Mark Robinson.
The most recent poll is from High Point University.
It shows Harris leading Trump in North Carolina 46 to 45.
But that same poll shows Stein with a 14-point advantage over Robinson, 48 to 34.
Other polls have shown a similar dynamic: A statistically tied presidential race, and Stein holding large leads.
Martin Kifer, who leads High Point’s survey research center, said he expects the governor’s race to get closer as Election Day approaches. That’s what happened when governor Roy Cooper won reelection.
"If you go back to 2020—granted we had an incumbent and governor Cooper was relatively popular at that point and so forth—but the polls looked similar to what we are seeing now," he said.
That is, Cooper with massive leads over former Republican lieutenant governor Dan Forest - sometimes as large as 19 percentage points in one poll.
Cooper ended up winning just by four and a half percentage points.
