Jenna Buzzacco-Foerster
The Senate District 19 race will come down to the wire.
A new poll by St. Pete Polls found the race is essentially tied, proving the outcome will depend heavily on ground game and get-out-the-vote efforts in the final days of primary.
The survey, conducted for FloridaPolitics.com, found 26 percent of Democratic voters said they were backing Ed Narain. Darryl Rouson is in second with 24 percent, followed by Betty Reed with 19 percent. Augie Ribeiro is polling at 17 percent, while 14 percent of voters said they were undecided.
The automated phone poll was conducted Aug. 24. The poll surveyed 786 likely Democratic primary voters, and has a margin of error of 3.5 percent.
More than half (54 percent) of respondents said they had already voted in the primary.
Narain is pulling ahead in Hillsborough County, with 35 percent of Hillsborough respondents saying they were backing Narain. Six percent of Hillsborough respondents picked Rouson.
Rouson, meanwhile, is leading in Pinellas County. The poll found 52 percent of Pinellas respondents said they would vote for Rouson, while 12 percent said they’re backing Narain.
Those numbers are unsurprising. Rouson, a longtime St. Petersburg resident, has represented parts of Hillsborough and Pinellas counties in the Florida House since 2008. A Tampa Democrat, Narain has represented parts of Hillsborough County since 2014.
The tight race means campaigns will need to ramp up operations in the final days of the primary, to get voters out to the polls. In both counties, early voting runs through Sunday.
The primary is Tuesday.
