(WHTM) – Democrat Josh Shapiro has expanded his lead over Republican Doug Mastriano in Pennsylvania’s race for governor.

According to an October 2022 Franklin & Marshall College Poll, Shapiro currently holds a 58% to 35% advantage over Mastriano among 620 likely Pennsylvania voters.

The race continues to show separation by Shapiro, who held a 52% to 42% advantage in F&M’s September poll.

October’s poll showed Shapiro receiving a larger share of support from Democrats (91%) than Mastriano received from Republicans with 69% support. Shapiro also led Independent voters by 16%.

Shapiro led among female voters (67% to 44%) while support among men was even. Mastriano had a 5% lead among voters with a high school education or less while Shapiro had a double-digit lead among voters with a college degree.

Shapiro had more than 60% support in the Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, and northeast regions of the commonwealth, while Mastriano had a 12% lead in the northwest region. Central Pennsylvania voters were even at 40% with 11% undecided.

Nearly half of Republican voters said they would have preferred a candidate other than Mastriano. The number of voters who were strongly unfavorable of Mastriano increased by 5% since September.

About two in three (66%) Pennsylvania registered voters are “very interested” in the
upcoming election, and most (90%) report they are “certain” to vote.

About half (49%) of respondents say that they are “worse off” financially than a year ago.

President Biden’s approval rating in Pennsylvania finished at 36%, on par with Donald Trump and above Barack Obama at similar points in their first terms.

Methodology

The survey findings presented in this release are based on the results of interviews conducted October 14 – 23, 2022. The interviews were conducted at the Center for Opinion Research at Franklin & Marshall. The data included in this release represent the responses of 620 registered Pennsylvania voters, including 280 Democrats, 254 Republicans, and 86 independents.

The sample of voters was obtained from Marketing Systems Group. All sampled respondents were notified by mail about the survey. Interviews were completed over the phone and online depending on each respondent’s preference. Survey results were weighted (age, gender, education, geography, vote history, and party registration) using an iterative weighting algorithm to reflect the known distribution of those characteristics. Estimates for age, geography, and party registration are based on active voters within the PA Department of State’s voter registration data. Gender and education is estimated using data from the November 2018 CPS Voter Registration Supplement.

The sample error for this survey is +/- 5.3 percentage points when the design effects from weighting are considered. An alternative means of calculating the variation in a sample is to take a series of bootstrap samples from the original sample and to use those bootstrapped samples to produce an estimate of sampling error. The standard deviation of the mean of 10,000 bootstrapped samples for the estimated positive job approval for President Biden was 1.9%, and 95% of the samples fell within a range of 32% and 39%.

In addition to sampling error, this poll is also subject to other sources of non-sampling error. Generally speaking, two sources of error concern researchers most. Non-response bias is created when selected participants either choose not to participate in the survey or are unavailable for interviewing. Response errors are the product of the question and answer process.

Surveys that rely on self-reported behaviors and attitudes are susceptible to biases related to the way respondents process and respond to survey questions.

Election Day is Tuesday, November 8.