LOS ANGELES, July 23 (UPI) -- Sen. John Kerry has a substantial lead in the battleground state of Pennsylvania in the race for president, a Los Angeles Times poll shows.
The Times also did state polling in Florida, another key state in the November election, but the data there indicates a race too close to call. It was the tight Florida vote in 2000 that caused the delay in determining who won the presidential election that year. George W. Bush was eventually declared the winner by 537 votes.
A total of 45 percent of respondents in Florida said they favored the Bush-Cheney Republican ticket in the November election while 44 percent said they would likely vote for the Kerry-Edwards Democratic ticket. Two percent chose the independent ticket of Nader-Camejo.
In Pennsylvania, Kerry, from Massachusetts, was the stated choice of 48 percent of respondents, well ahead of the 38-percent total that expressed support for President Bush. Ralph Nader was named by 5 percent of those asked.
The Los Angeles times poll was conducted July 17-21 by telephone. A total of 1,130 adults were polled in Florida and 1,314 people in Pennsylvania. Both sets of data have a margin of error of 4 percentage points.
