Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro leads Republican challenger Stacy Garrity by 25 percentage points in a new survey of likely voters, a snapshot taken about a month before the general election. The survey does not predict the result of the Nov. 3 vote.
The Quinnipiac University poll, released Wednesday, found 59% support for the Democratic incumbent and 34% for Garrity. Libertarian Ken Krawchuk received 2%, while 5% did not choose a candidate. Quinnipiac said this was its first Pennsylvania likely-voter poll of the 2026 election cycle, so it should not be directly compared with earlier surveys of registered voters.
Independents favor Shapiro
Among likely voters who identified as independents, 62% supported Shapiro and 23% backed Garrity. The poll found 95% of Democrats supporting Shapiro. Among Republicans, 79% backed Garrity and 17% supported Shapiro. Those subgroup results have larger sampling uncertainty than the statewide estimate; Quinnipiac said subgroup margins of error are available on request.
Shapiro's job approval stood at 63%, with 30% disapproving. Fifty-five percent of likely voters viewed him favorably, compared with 22% who viewed Garrity favorably. A larger share, 44%, said they had not heard enough about Garrity to give a favorable or unfavorable view.
The survey also asked which party respondents wanted to control the U.S. House. Fifty-four percent chose Democrats and 39% chose Republicans. That is a preference among Pennsylvania voters, not a forecast of the national House result or a district-by-district election estimate.
Data centers and methodology
On a separate state issue, 64% of respondents said artificial-intelligence data centers in Pennsylvania would do more harm than good, while 24% said they would do more good than harm. Views differed by party: 80% of Democrats and 72% of independents chose more harm, while Republicans were nearly split, 40% more harm to 44% more good. The question asked for an overall judgment about costs and benefits, not about a specific project.
Quinnipiac surveyed 1,159 Pennsylvania likely voters Oct. 1-5 using live interviewers calling randomly generated landline and cellphone numbers. It reported a statewide margin of sampling error of plus or minus 3.9 percentage points, including the design effect. The sample was weighted for demographic traits, party identification benchmarks and the 2024 presidential result. As with any poll, sampling error is only one source of possible inaccuracy, and voter preferences can change before Election Day.
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