Democrats lead Virginia’s House ballot by 20 points

State Navigate re-interviewed past Virginia poll respondents October 17-20. Among 863 likely voters, the generic U.S. House ballot is 59% Democratic and 39% Republican, with 3% undecided.

Election date: November 3, 2026
Field dates: October 17-20, 2026
Sample: 863 likely voters
Margin of error: +/- 3.3 points

If every district swung the same

Three baselines, one statewide margin: D+19.9. The briefing applies the same swing to every district using the 2022 congressional lines. These are hypothetical scenarios, not district polls or forecasts.

2022 U.S. House baseline

9 D2 R

Statewide D+3.6 to D+19.9
Every district +16.3 points toward D

District	Leading party	Lead (points)
District 1	Democratic	3.3
District 2	Democratic	12.9
District 3	Democratic	50.9
District 4	Democratic	46.3
District 5	Democratic	1.0
District 6	Republican	12.7
District 7	Democratic	21.0
District 8	Democratic	65.1
District 9	Republican	30.4
District 10	Democratic	22.8
District 11	Democratic	50.0

2024 U.S. House baseline

9 D2 R

Statewide D+3.8 to D+19.9
Every district +16.1 points toward D

District	Leading party	Lead (points)
District 1	Democratic	3.3
District 2	Democratic	12.3
District 3	Democratic	56.2
District 4	Democratic	51.0
District 5	Democratic	1.1
District 6	Republican	12.2
District 7	Democratic	18.7
District 8	Democratic	63.8
District 9	Republican	29.1
District 10	Democratic	20.7
District 11	Democratic	49.9

2025 governor baseline

8 D3 R

Statewide D+15.4 to D+19.9
Every district +4.5 points toward D

District	Leading party	Lead (points)
District 1	Democratic	7.0
District 2	Democratic	12.1
District 3	Democratic	48.4
District 4	Democratic	46.0
District 5	Republican	2.7
District 6	Republican	12.2
District 7	Democratic	19.8
District 8	Democratic	64.9
District 9	Republican	31.9
District 10	Democratic	25.0
District 11	Democratic	51.8

Democratic marginRepublican margin

A 59% to 39% Democratic lead

The generic U.S. House ballot includes voters who have already cast a ballot. Most voters express a definite preference: 54% are definitely Democratic and 34% definitely Republican.

Response	Share
Democratic candidate	59%
Republican candidate	39%
Don’t know	3%

The Democratic lead is widest among younger voters

Voters under 45 back the Democratic House candidate 72% to 22%. The lead is smaller among voters ages 45-64, at 53% to 44%, and those 65 or older, at 52% to 47%.

Group	Democratic	Republican
Under 45	72%	22%
45-64	53%	44%
65 or older	52%	47%

Voters split sharply by education

Voters with at least a four-year degree favor Democrats 71% to 27%. Those without a four-year degree favor Republicans 51% to 45%.

Group	Democratic	Republican
Four-year degree or higher	71%	27%
No four-year degree	45%	51%

Trump’s net approval falls to -29

Trump receives 35% approval and 64% disapproval, compared with 42% and 57% in the April referendum poll. The detailed responses show 60% strongly disapprove.

Response	Share	Change since April 2026
Strongly approve	25%	-6 points
Somewhat approve	11%	+0 points
Somewhat disapprove	4%	+0 points
Strongly disapprove	60%	+7 points
Don’t know	1%	+0 points

More than a third say they have voted

36% of likely voters report already voting, compared with 28% at the same point last year. The briefing’s final early-vote scenarios span 51% to 56%; these are illustrative projections of vote timing.

Observation	Share
October 17-20, 2025 poll	28%
Final 2025 result	43%
October 17-20, 2026 poll	36%
Projected final 2026	51-56%

Early voters give Democrats a 44-point lead

Among those who say they have already voted, Democrats lead 72% to 28%. Among those yet to vote, it is 51% to 44%. The 2025 rows show actual governor results; the 2026 rows show House preferences reported in this poll.

Group	Democratic	Republican
2025 governor, early	62%	38%
2025 governor, Election Day	54%	46%
2026 House poll, already voted	72%	28%
2026 House poll, not yet voted	51%	44%

Most recontacted voters stayed on the same side

Compare the same 697 respondents’ October 2025 governor choice with their October 2026 U.S. House preference, using likely-voter weights. 94.4% stayed on the same party side; 2.3% crossed between parties.

Response	2025 governor	2026 U.S. House	Change	Printed count, October 2025	Printed count, House now
Democratic side	58.1%	59.1%	+1.0 points	307	312
Undecided	2.0%	1.6%	-0.4 points	11	8
Republican side	39.9%	39.4%	-0.5 points	211	208

The attorney general comparison shows more movement

Of 697 recontacted October 2025 respondents, 77 changed sides or moved into or out of undecided between their attorney general choice then and their House preference now. Within this smaller group, the weighted Democratic share rose from 13.9% to 77.6%. These are the movers, rather than the full electorate.

Response	2025 attorney general	2026 U.S. House	Change	Printed count, October 2025	Printed count, House now
Democratic side	13.9%	77.6%	+63.7 points	8	47
Undecided	25.8%	12.1%	-13.7 points	16	7
Republican side	60.3%	10.3%	-50.0 points	37	6

53% identify with or lean toward Democrats

The weighted likely-voter sample is 53% Democratic, 39% Republican, and 8% neither party when leaners are included. This describes party identification, rather than the House ballot.

Response	Share
Democrat	53%
Republican	39%
Neither	8%

Response rates differ by a few points

Among previous respondents who were texted again, 31.3% of Democrats and 29.2% of Republicans responded. The chart also shows the demographic-adjusted estimates: 32.6% and 27.8%, respectively. These are response rates among people contacted, rather than vote shares.

Response	Raw	Adjusted	Change
Democrat	31.3%	32.6%	+1.3 points
Independent	28.4%	29.3%	+0.9 points
Republican	29.2%	27.8%	-1.4 points

Team notes and analysis

The following analysis from the State Navigate polling team examines these results.

Chaz Nuttycombe on early vote

The early vote is very Democratic

About a third of likely voters in our poll (36%) tell us they've already voted, and they back Democrats for the U.S. House 72% to 28%. Those who haven't voted yet are much closer: 51% to 44%, with 4% undecided. Virginia saw the same pattern last fall, when Abigail Spanberger won early ballots by 24 points (and mail ballots by 55) and ballots cast on Election Day by 8, but the gap in our poll is wider. A growing share of the Democratic lead on the generic ballot is already banked.

Chaz Nuttycombe on early vote turnout

Early voting is running ahead of last year's pace

At the same point in the calendar last year, our first October 2025 statewide poll (fielded October 17-20, 2025) found 28% of likely voters had already voted. Early ballots, in person and by mail, ended up at 43% of the 2025 vote, about 1.48 million of the 3.43 million cast for governor. This year, 36% of the voters in our poll say they've already voted, 8 points higher. If early voting keeps growing at last year's rate from here, it would end at about 56% of the vote; if it only holds that 8-point lead, about 51%. Either way, Election Day, provisional ballots included, shrinks from 57% of the vote in 2025 to somewhere between 44% and 49%. That matters for Republicans, who do better on Election Day: if early ballots break by the same 24 points they did for Spanberger, Republicans would need to win Election Day by roughly 25 to 31 points just to tie statewide. Winsome Earle-Sears lost Election Day by 8, and the voters in our poll who haven't voted yet lean Democratic by 7.

Chaz Nuttycombe on Trump voters

A quarter of Trump voters who now disapprove of him are voting Democratic

25% of likely voters who recall voting for Donald Trump in 2024 but now disapprove of the job he's doing are backing the Democratic candidate for the U.S. House; 60% are sticking with Republicans and 15% are undecided. The split depends on how strongly they disapprove: those who strongly disapprove back Democrats 55% to 22%, while those who only somewhat disapprove are mostly staying with Republicans (90%). The group is growing. Among the same voters, Trump's approval with his 2024 voters has slipped from 93% when they last took our survey to 88% now, so about one in nine Trump voters disapproves of him today. They're still only about 5% of the electorate, and Trump voters as a whole back House Republicans 94% to 3%, but every one of them who crosses over comes straight out of the Republican column.

Chaz Nuttycombe on independents

Independents are where the undecideds are

Only 3% of likely voters are undecided on the generic ballot, and most of them are independents. True independents, who don't lean toward either party, are 8% of the electorate but 62% of the undecideds. Independents back Democrats 59% to 21%, with 21% still undecided, and they aren't warm to the President: 17% approve of the job Donald Trump is doing. The undecided independents are a small group (18 respondents), so we wouldn't read much into how they'll split, but they're the only real pool of persuadable voters left in this poll.

Chaz Nuttycombe on young voters

Young voters are the biggest swing, and the least likely to have voted yet

Voters under 45 have moved more than any other group since our first October 2025 poll: they backed Abigail Spanberger by 26 points then and back Democrats for the U.S. House by 48 now. Part of that is who's showing up. As we're seeing in early voting across the country this year, younger Republicans are lagging: 29% of Democrats under 45 in our poll say they've already voted, compared to 12% of Republicans under 45 (among voters 45 and older, it's 53% to 29%). Nearly all of them say they'll vote, but for now voters under 45 are 36% of those who haven't voted yet and only 20% of those who have. Whether younger Republicans close that gap by Election Day is one of the biggest open questions in this race.

Chaz Nuttycombe on party ID

Democrats are losing the label, not the voters

Among the same respondents, net party ID with leaners has held steady since their first poll, D+14.4 both times, but without leaners it slipped from D+10.4 to D+9.0. The difference is in how people describe themselves, not how they vote: fewer call themselves Democrats outright, and the share who call themselves independents (including leaners) rose from 32% to 35%. Hardly anyone switched parties, less than 1% in either direction, and most of the Democrats who dropped the label now say they lean Democratic.

Chaz Nuttycombe on nonresponse

No Republican nonresponse bias

We can test this directly because every person texted had answered one of our earlier Virginia polls, so we know the party, 2024 vote and Trump approval of the people who did not answer as well as the people who did. In the final data, 932 of the 3,101 people we texted answered (30.1%). Republicans and Democrats answered at nearly the same rate: 29.2% of Republicans texted and 31.3% of Democrats, a raw gap of 2.1 points. Within each text send the gap is smaller still, +0.1 points on Friday's first text, -0.8 on Saturday's second and -1.7 on Monday's third, and Republicans were texted in exact proportion to their share of the frame at every send (44% of the Monday list, 44% of the frame). Adjusting for demographics with a logistic regression widens the Republican-minus-Democrat gap to -4.9 points (95% interval -8.5 to -1.4), because Republicans in the frame are older and whiter and such people usually answer at higher rates. That figure moved from -2.4 on Saturday, when G. Elliott Morris ran the same check on our file and found no partisan gap beyond sampling noise, to -4.9 in the final data, and the reason is who we targeted on the last day: Monday's third text was aimed at the groups our sample was short of, non-college, Black and Asian respondents and voters in under-represented districts. That changes who the regression compares Republicans against; it is not Republicans declining to answer. The test that matters for recall bias is flat: among people who recalled a Trump vote, those who strongly approve, somewhat approve and disapprove of him answered at statistically indistinguishable rates (p = 0.52), so disapproving Trump voters are not going quiet. The demographic skew in who answers is handled by the weights; there is no partisan skew left for them to miss.

The group chart reports independents at 58% Democratic and voters under 45 at D+50; the attributed analysis reports 59% and D+48 respectively. Both source representations are retained.

Explore all results

Explore every figure from the briefing, including demographic comparisons, matched respondents, party identification, and response-rate diagnostics.

Where our likely voters come from

863 likely voters, weighted. PDF page 1.

Earlier survey	Weighted share	Weighted voters
Statewide, October 17-20, 2025	28%	244
Statewide, October 26-28, 2025	30%	257
Referendum, April 10-13, 2026	39%	334
HD-64, HD-73 and HD-86, October 2025	3%	27

Generic U.S. House ballot

If the election for your U.S. House of Representatives race were held today, which candidate would you vote for? Includes early voters’ reported choice.

863 likely voters, weighted. PDF page 2.

Response	Share
Democratic candidate	59%
Republican candidate	39%
Don’t know	3%

Generic U.S. House ballot, by strength

863 likely voters, weighted. PDF page 2.

Response	Share
Definitely Democratic	54%
Probably Democratic	5%
Don’t know	3%
Probably Republican	4%
Definitely Republican	34%

President Trump job approval

863 likely voters, weighted. PDF page 2.

Response	Share	Change since April 2026
Approve	35%	-7 points
Disapprove	64%	+7 points
Don’t know	1%	+0 points

President Trump job approval, in detail

863 likely voters, weighted. PDF page 2.

Response	Share	Change since April 2026
Strongly approve	25%	-6 points
Somewhat approve	11%	+0 points
Somewhat disapprove	4%	+0 points
Strongly disapprove	60%	+7 points
Don’t know	1%	+0 points

The generic ballot by group

863 likely voters, weighted. PDF page 3.

Group	Democratic	Republican	Margin	Respondents
All likely voters	59%	39%	D+20	932
Harris voters	99%	Not labeled in PDF	D+99	464
Trump voters	3%	94%	R+91	387
Third party / did not vote	63%	21%	D+42	72
Democrats, with leaners	99%	Not labeled in PDF	D+98	433
Independents	58%	21%	D+37	101
Republicans, with leaners	Not labeled in PDF	95%	R+92	398
Men	54%	43%	D+11	494
Women	62%	36%	D+26	429
Under 45	72%	22%	D+50	162
45-64	53%	44%	D+9	389
65 or older	52%	47%	D+5	381
Four-year degree or higher	71%	27%	D+44	576
No four-year degree	45%	51%	R+6	356
White, four-year degree	67%	32%	D+35	450
White, no four-year degree	35%	63%	R+28	268
Nonwhite, four-year degree	81%	14%	D+67	126
Nonwhite, no four-year degree	70%	23%	D+47	88

Where the electorate has moved since 2025

863 likely voters, weighted. PDF page 4.

Group	2025 governor margin	2026 House margin	Swing	2025 n	2026 n
All likely voters	D+13	D+20	D+7	694	932
Democrats, with leaners	D+95	D+98	D+3	305	433
Independents	D+55	D+37	R+18	61	101
Republicans, with leaners	R+90	R+92	R+2	328	398
Harris voters	D+94	D+99	D+5	330	464
Trump voters	R+89	R+91	R+2	314	387
Men	D+4	D+11	D+7	337	494
Women	D+22	D+26	D+4	357	429
Under 45	D+26	D+50	D+24	156	162
45-64	D+5	D+9	D+4	297	389
65 or older	D+9	D+5	R+4	241	381
White	R+3	D+5	D+8	555	718
Black	D+71	D+72	D+1	75	102
Four-year degree or higher	D+20	D+44	D+24	443	576
No four-year degree	D+4	R+6	R+10	251	356
Under $50,000	D+16	D+6	R+10	81	126
$50,000 to $99,999	D+3	R+2	R+5	155	188
$100,000 to $149,999	D+21	D+35	D+14	135	218
$150,000 or more	D+18	D+34	D+16	227	334
Already voted	D+29	D+44	D+15	212	317
Not yet voted	D+8	D+7	R+1	482	615

Early voting is ahead of last year’s pace

863 likely voters, weighted. PDF page 5.

Observation	Share
October 17-20, 2025 poll	28%
Final 2025 result	43%
October 17-20, 2026 poll	36%
Projected final 2026	51-56%

Early voters are much more Democratic

863 likely voters, weighted. PDF page 5.

Election and voting period	Democratic	Republican	Margin
2025 governor, early	62%	38%	D+24
2025 governor, Election Day	54%	46%	D+8
2026 House poll, already voted	72%	28%	D+44
2026 House poll, not yet voted	51%	44%	D+7

Who has already voted

863 likely voters, weighted. PDF page 5.

Share of each voting group who are…	Voted: 2026	Voted: 2025	Change	Not voted: 2026	Not voted: 2025	Change
Democrats, with leaners	65%	54%	+11 points	46%	46%	+0 points
Republicans, with leaners	29%	36%	-7 points	44%	44%	+0 points
Independents	6%	9%	-3 points	9%	9%	+0 points
Recall voting Harris	66%	62%	+4 points	46%	47%	-1 points
Recall voting Trump	26%	35%	-9 points	46%	42%	+4 points
Age 65 or older	47%	38%	+9 points	24%	20%	+4 points
Under 45	20%	22%	-2 points	35%	39%	-4 points
Women	55%	51%	+4 points	50%	52%	-2 points
Four-year degree or higher	53%	64%	-11 points	51%	55%	-4 points
Black	22%	18%	+4 points	16%	18%	-2 points
Voted in all of the last 4 generals	68%	64%	+4 points	56%	46%	+10 points

2022 U.S. House baseline

863 likely voters, weighted. PDF page 6.

District	Leading party	Lead (points)
District 1	Democratic	3.3
District 2	Democratic	12.9
District 3	Democratic	50.9
District 4	Democratic	46.3
District 5	Democratic	1.0
District 6	Republican	12.7
District 7	Democratic	21.0
District 8	Democratic	65.1
District 9	Republican	30.4
District 10	Democratic	22.8
District 11	Democratic	50.0

2024 U.S. House baseline

863 likely voters, weighted. PDF page 6.

District	Leading party	Lead (points)
District 1	Democratic	3.3
District 2	Democratic	12.3
District 3	Democratic	56.2
District 4	Democratic	51.0
District 5	Democratic	1.1
District 6	Republican	12.2
District 7	Democratic	18.7
District 8	Democratic	63.8
District 9	Republican	29.1
District 10	Democratic	20.7
District 11	Democratic	49.9