The race for the 8th Congressional District — a battleground contest that could help decide which party controls the U.S. House — is tied about a month out from Election Day, according to a new poll released Wednesday.
Forty-four percent of likely voters surveyed backed Democratic U.S. Rep. Yadira Caraveo, and 44.2% supported her challenger, Republican state Rep. Gabe Evans, according to the poll. It was conducted by Emerson College Polling in recent days for sponsors that included Fox31/Channel 2 in Denver. Nearly 12% of respondents were undecided.
The poll surveyed 525 likely voters in the district between Sunday and Tuesday. It has a margin of error of plus or minus 4.2 percentage points. Emerson College is a national firm with a top-10 rating by data analysis site FiveThirtyEight, out of more than 280 rated pollsters.
The results confirm what’s been known about the district — it’s a virtual tossup — since its creation more than two years ago in Colorado’s most recent round of redistricting. Its tight reputation even predated Caraveo’s narrow initial win in 2022. But the Emerson poll is the first public poll of the race since the spring.
Given Republicans’ razor-thin majority in the U.S. House, the fate of the 8th District — which captures most of the suburbs north and northeast of Denver as well as Berthoud and Greeley — could help determine which party holds the chamber’s gavel come January.
“Republicans break for Evans, 86% to 10%, Democrats support Caraveo 87% to 4%, while independents are more split, breaking in the favor of Evans, 43% to 35%,” said Spencer Kimball, the executive director of Emerson College Polling, in a press release announcing the results. “Hispanics break for Caraveo, 42% to 33%, while white voters are split: 47% support Evans and 46% Caraveo.”
The poll did not ask voters about two minor-party candidates on the ballot, Chris Baum of the Approval Voting Party and Susan Patricia Hall of the Unity Party.
Millions of dollars have poured into the Caraveo-Evans race, which the Cook Political Report rates as a toss-up. Forty-three percent of respondents in the Emerson poll had a favorable view of Caraveo, versus 40% with an unfavorable view. Evans clocked a 49% favorable and 33% unfavorable rating.
Seventeen percent of respondents had never heard of Caraveo, versus 18% for Evans.
The economy was the top concern for the poll’s respondents, with 27.9% saying it was the most important issue affecting Colorado. That was followed by a virtual tie between housing affordability (21.1%) and immigration (21%) as the runner-up top concern. Threats to democracy came a distant fourth, at 8.9%. Abortion — a key issue nationally — trailed further, with just 2.5% of respondents listing it as Colorado’s biggest issue.
The race thus far has focused heavily on immigration, with many of Evans’ ads and attack lines hammering the Biden administration’s record on border security and seeking to tie Caraveo to it. Caraveo has sought to insulate herself from those criticisms by touting her support for a bipartisan border security bill and by joining a small group of House Democrats in backing a Republican resolution that condemned Vice President Kamala Harris, their party’s presidential nominee, over immigration.
Kyle Saunders, a political science professor at Colorado State University, said the poll’s cross-tab data “tells us a lot about what’s going to be coming in the next 30 days, with regard to campaign strategy, with regard to the ads you’re going to see on television.” They show that voters concerned about the economy and immigration tended to support Evans, while those concerned about housing affordability leaned heavily toward Caraveo.
“This could come down to 500, 1000 voters,” Saunders said, noting the high share of voters who were still undecided — including among those who list the economy, housing and immigration as their top issues.
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