donald trump holds leads in arizona and texas, two republican strongholds where democrats have hoped to gain an edge in the presidential election from fast-growing hispanic populations, while he and hillary clinton are in a dead heat in georgia, new wall street journal/nbc news/marist polls find. mr. trump leads mrs. clinton by a single point among likely voters in georgia, 45% to 44%, the poll there found.<u+00a0>he leads in arizona, 45% to 40%, and texas, 49% to 40%, according to the surveys. all three polls were conducted<u+00a0>on sunday<u+00a0>through<u+00a0>tuesday, after the fbi announced<u+00a0>friday<u+00a0>that it had found and was reviewing additional emails that could be material to its investigation of mrs. clinton<u+2019>s private email server. texas hasn<u+2019>t backed a democratic presidential nominee since 1976, while georgia last went for a democrat in 1992 and arizona, in 1996. but to varying degrees, their racially diverse voting pools have at times put them on the democratic party<u+2019>s target list of potential pickups in the electoral college. while the new surveys found the closest contest to be in georgia, mrs. clinton hasn<u+2019>t campaigned in the state recently and isn<u+2019>t known to have plans to do so in the remaining days of the campaign. on wednesday, however, she held a rally in arizona, where she said her party had <u+201c>a real chance to turn this state blue again.<u+201d> her husband, former president bill clinton, won there in 1996. mr. trump, similarly, is visiting states that his party hasn<u+2019>t won in years. recent campaign stops have included new mexico and michigan, as well as colorado, which republicans last won in 2004. in georgia, mrs. clinton benefits from the support of 89% of african-americans, who make up about 30% of the likely voter pool. mr. trump has 5% support. mr. trump leads by more than 2-to-1 among white likely voters, 63% to 25%. and he carries 83% of white evangelical christians, who make up nearly a third of the likely voter pool. mrs. clinton holds big leads among hispanic voters, but mr. trump<u+2019>s support is stronger in arizona and texas than in many national polls. mr. trump carries 24% of hispanic voters in arizona, where they account for one voter in five, and the same share in texas, where hispanics make up about one-quarter of likely voters. he holds substantial leads among white voters<u+2014>a 17-point lead in arizona and 48-point margin in texas. lee miringoff, director of the marist college institute for public opinion, said growing minority populations were one reason that mr. trump<u+2019>s leads in texas and arizona in the new polls are narrower than the margin by which his predecessor as gop nominee, mitt romney, carried the two states in 2012. mr. romney won texas by nearly 16 points and arizona by 9. <u+201c>in each of these states, we<u+2019>re seeing the effect of the demographic shift,<u+201d> he said. but the new polls suggest <u+201c>they<u+2019>re not ready to flip from red to blue.<u+201d> in all three states, mr. trump and mrs. clinton are carrying about the same share of likely voters within their own parties. mr. trump wins among independents in georgia and arizona. mrs. clinton carries independents in texas, but mr. trump benefits from the large share of republican voters in that state. the clinton campaign has long seen arizona as more winnable than georgia, and invested considerably more time and money there. that<u+2019>s partly because arizona has a large swath of hispanics, who are voting at higher rates this year. in addition, the clinton campaign sees white voters in arizona as more persuadable than white voters in georgia. white voters who aren<u+2019>t registered with either party in arizona are more likely to be under age 35, for instance, and are more persuadable than white georgians, officials concluded. in addition, there are signs that mrs. clinton is struggling to turn out african-american voters at the same rate as president barack obama did in 2008 and 2012, and black voters are key to victory for any democrat in georgia. mrs. clinton holds one advantage in arizona that she doesn<u+2019>t have in texas or georgia: she is winning narrowly among white voters with a college degree, 43% to 41%. mr. trump holds large advantages among white voters without a college degree, who have been a solid part of his coalition. white voters with and without degrees each make up a little more than one-third of arizona<u+2019>s voter pool. the journal/nbc news/marist surveys were conducted oct. 30 through nov. 1 and included the equivalent of 719 likely voters in arizona, 707 in georgia and 679 in texas. the margins of error were plus or minus 3.7 percentage points in arizona and georgia and 3.8 points in texas. <u+2014>laura meckler contributed to this article. write to aaron zitner at aaron.zitner@dowjones.com
new poll finds close race in georgia  - wsj
aaron zitner