NBC Montana/Strategies 360 poll shows extremely tight Montana races
In Missoula County, workers mailed roughly 77,000 ballots to registered voters. So far, the elections office received 11,000 back. Photo: NBC Montana
MISSOULA, Mont. — A new exclusive NBC Montana/Strategies 360 poll shows very close Montana races less than two weeks before Election Day.
Strategies 360 conducted a mixed-mode survey of 500 likely November 2020 voters in Montana. Interviews were conducted Oct. 15-20. A combination of landlines, cellphones, and voter file-based online interviews via text message were used to ensure greater coverage of the population sampled.
The margin of error for a survey of 500 interviews is 4.4% at the 95% confidence interval. The margin of error is higher for subsamples. Other sources of error not accounted for by the stated statistical margin of error include, but are not limited to, question wording, question order, coverage bias, and response bias.
61% of poll respondents said they already voted in this election.
45 Montana counties chose to go forward with mail ballot elections and, as of Thursday morning, 289,422 mail ballots had been returned, 45% of the amount that were sent out.
In the presidential race, Republican President Donald Trump received 51%, leading Democratic former Vice President Joe Biden by 8 points. 3% went to Libertarian candidate Jo Jorgensen. 4% answered other or undecided.
In the heated U.S. Senate race, incumbent Republican Sen. Steve Daines leads challenger Gov. Steve Bullock by 1 point, 48% to 47%, with 5% undecided.
The U.S. House race proves to be just as close, with Kathleen Williams and Matt Rosendale tied at 46% with a higher percent of respondents undecided at 8%.
Rep. Greg Gianforte leads Lt. Gov. Mike Cooney by 7 points in the race for governor, 48% to 41%. 7% of respondents were undecided. Libertarian candidate Lyman Bishop took 4%.
The survey asked respondents about the race for the superintendent of public instruction. Democratic challenger Melissa Romano is in the lead with 41% over Republican incumbent Elsie Arntzen at 39%. Libertarian candidate Kevin Leatherbarrow received 5%.
Click here to view topline document and click here to view crosstabs document.