Poll: Republican voters more engaged

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WASHINGTON, June 22 (UPI) -- A Pew Research Center poll indicated more Republican voters are closely following the presidential campaign but Barack Obama is better liked than Mitt Romney.

The poll of 2,013 adults, including 1,563 registered voters, indicated 73 percent of Republican respondents said they had given the election a lot of thought, while 45 percent of Republicans said they were closely following election news.

Meanwhile, 66 percent Democrats asked said they have given the election a lot of thought, and just 37 percent said they were closely following election news.

These figures are all down from 2008, when 72 percent of Republicans and 77 percent of Democrats said they had given that election a lot of thought, and 44 percent of Republicans and 55 percent of Democrats said they were following the news coverage.

More Democrats -- 68 percent -- said they were satisfied with President Obama as their candidate, while 60 percent of Republican respondents said the same about Romney.

When asked who they would vote for if the election was now, 50 percent of respondents said they would vote for Obama and 46 percent said they would vote for Romney.

The poll was conducted June 7-17 and has a margin of error of 2.5 percentage points.