A new internal poll released by the campaign of gubernatorial candidate Dr. Scott Jensen shows the Republican challenger is four percentage points behind Governor Tim Walz in the general election race.
Walz leads Jensen 49.8 percent to 45.6 percent, according to the poll.
“This is a four-to-six point race and it will be until four-to-six weeks out (from election day) when I think it will start to break,” said WCCO Radio political analyst Blois Olson.
Inflation is the top issue for those polled, but a “women’s right to choose” and crime/public safety were statistically tied as the second most important issue for voters. The poll found 48 percent of Minnesotans believe the state is headed in the wrong direction.
Jensen told Vineeta Sawkar Monday on the Morning News that he is “gratified” by the poll results and that the campaign wanted to conduct a poll to “check” the race themselves. In June, a Change Research poll had Jensen within two percentage points of Walz.
The poll also revealed that Jensen is still relatively unknown with over 44 percent of Minnesotans saying they’ve never heard of Jensen or have no opinion. That stands at 6.3 percent for Walz.
“I think we can move them in our direction,” Jensen said.
The poll was commissioned by the Jensen campaign and conducted by polling company Cygnal, which “serves GOP campaigns, committees, caucuses and center-right public affairs issue efforts with forward-thinking polling,” according to its website.
The poll was conducted with 500 likely general election voters over the phone. It has a margin of error of 4.34 percent. Despite the poll being commissioned directly from a campaign, Olson said the results “hold up.”
“It shows what we expect,” Olson said, later adding, “whether it’s a DFL campaign or a Republican campaign, they want to know the best information possible so they want to make sure the poll is accurate as best as they can tell.”
The poll also found President Joe Biden’s favorability is -13 percentage points and that the DFL holds a two percentage point lead over the Minnesota GOP in a generic Congressional ballot.
Walz and Jensen will participate in the "Minnesota Governor Candidate’s Forum" on Wednesday, Aug. 3, at 10:30 a.m. in Morgan, MN. The even will be livestreamed on WCCORadio.com and will be re-broadcast on-air at 6 p.m.