By Thérèse Boudreaux
The Center Square

A new poll shows faint warning signs for Republicans ahead of the 2026 midterm election, with Independent voters currently favoring Democratic candidates by nine percentage points.

The Center Square Voters’ Voice Poll, conducted by Noble Predictive Insights, surveyed 2,565 registered voters from Oct. 2-6, 2025.

The poll sample included 978 Republicans, 948 Democrats, and 639 Independents, of which 262 lean toward neither major party. The poll weighted each party independently and has a 2% margin of error.

When asked who they would vote for if congressional elections were held today, 45% of voters chose the Democratic candidate, 43% the Republican candidate, and 10% remained unsure.

While Republicans and Democrats predictably stuck with their party’s candidate for the most part, Independents showed a clear preference for the Democratic party. Only 25% chose the Republican candidate, while 34% chose the Democrat and 31% felt unsure.

Noble Predictive Insights CEO Mike Noble said the poll shows Republicans are “not in a terrible spot” leading up to the midterms, but they “have a little work to do.”

Voters who are Republican, male, white, millennials, college educated, financially prosperous, have children under 18, and live in rural areas are the most likely to approve of how Trump is handling his job.

White voters are significantly more likely to support a Republican candidate, with 54% doing so, versus 11% of Black voters. Only 23% of Hispanic or Latino voters chose the Republican candidate and only 28% of those identifying as another race.

A sharp gender divide of 13 percentage points persists, but with interesting implications. While 50% of males and 37% of females chose the Republican candidate, a larger portion of females than males remains undecided – 13%, the equivalent of the gender gap difference.

This means that if Republicans are able to win over all the undecided female voters, the party would garner equal support from both genders, provided that male support does not change.

The poll also showed that younger voters continue to skew left, with 57% choosing the Democratic candidate. Voters older than 29 slightly favored the Republican candidate, with seniors leaning Republican the most at 47%. Roughly 10% of voters in all age demographics remain unsure.

Lower income voters favor Democrats as well, with half choosing the Democratic candidate, compared to only 38% of voters making $100,000 or more annually. The numbers suggest that Republicans should refocus on cost of living rather than more removed issues like trade deals and energy production, Noble said.

“Pocketbooks, inflation, housing affordability, jobs, for example – they need to really focus on these items. Because the cost of living is just going up everywhere, and Republicans need to say they’re doing something about it,” Noble said. “You need to show people some proof that there’s some things happening, because if not, they only feel what they feel.”

Noble added that President Donald Trump “was smart to stick to that” during his 2024 presidential campaign, and that Republicans should follow his lead if they want to maintain control of Congress.

“Trump won because he said, ‘look at this, [Biden is] doing a terrible job,’” Noble said. “But now Republicans are in power, so they hold all the accountability.”