Rubio leads Demings by 6 points in new Mason-Dixon poll

Marco Rubio has maintained his lead over Val Demings in Florida’s U.S. Senate race, a poll released Tuesday finds.

The Mason-Dixon Polling & Strategy survey showed Republican U.S. Sen. Rubio with 47% of the vote and U.S. Rep. Val Demings, D-Orlando, with 41%. Another 10% were undecided.

The margin of error in the poll is 3.5%. The survey was taken of registered and likely Florida voters from Sept. 26 to 28.

“Despite millions of dollars spent on advertising by both campaigns, little seems to have changed since February when Rubio led 49%-42%,” wrote Mason-Dixon director Brad Coker.

Rubio’s edge in the poll comes from unaffiliated voters, who gave him 44% of their support compared with 39% for Demings. Rubio also received an advantage from the usually Democratic-leaning Hispanic vote, which was tied at 45% for both candidates.

Both Rubio and Demings had good favorable ratings, but Demings had a higher percentage of respondents who were either neutral or had not heard of her. Rubio was seen as favorable by 48% and unfavorable by 39%, while Demings had a 33% favorable rating, 29% unfavorable, 22% neutral and 16% without recognition.

Rubio was ahead of Demings in all regions except the Democratic stronghold of South Florida, including her home region of Central Florida. Rubio led her in the Orlando area by 46% to 42%.

Rubio also led men by 15 points while Demings led with women by just 3.

Democrats also have to contend with President Biden’s low popularity in the state, which has also gone unchanged since February.

Biden had 42% approval and 54% disapproval in the state, a slight bump us over his 40% approval and 55% disapproval earlier this year but within the margin of error.

Complete election coverage can be found at OrlandoSentinel.com/election.