Hillary Clinton's lead over Donald Trump narrows to 4 points: poll

Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton’s lead over her Republican rival Donald Trump has narrowed to 4 points, according to a new nationwide poll.

This is quite low given that in almost all major national polls after the two back-to-back conventions Clinton’s lead was around nine percentage points.

“Forty one per cent of registered voters say if the election were held today they would support Clinton or lean toward Clinton, 37 per cent back Trump, 10 per cent favour (Libertarian candidate Jill) Johnson and four per cent back (Green Party nominee Jill) Stein,” the Pew Research Center said in its findings.

As was the case earlier this year, most voters have doubts that either Clinton or Trump would make a good president. Just 27 per cent of registered voters say that Trump would make a good or great president, while about twice as many (55 per cent) say he would be either poor or terrible (with 43 per cent saying he would make a “terrible” president).

Just 15 per cent say Trump would make an “average” president, the poll said. Opinions about how Clinton might do as president are not as negative.

Still, only about a third (31 per cent) said she would be a “good or great president”, while 22 per cent said would be average and 45 per cent think she would be a poor (12 per cent) or terrible (33 per cent) president, Pew said.

The latest national survey by Pew Research Center were conducted August 9-16 among 2,010 adults, including 1,567 registered voters.

According to Pew, the survey found that Trump supporters overwhelmingly believe that life in America is worse than it was 50 years ago “for people like them.”

Fully 81 per cent of registered voters who support Trump say life has gotten worse, compared with just 11 per cent who say it has gotten better (six percent say it is about the same), it said.

“Most Clinton supporters take the opposite view: 59 per cent say life for people like them has gotten better over the past half-century, while 19 per cent think it has gotten worse and 18 percent see little change,” the polls said. In the RealClearPolitics.com average of all major national polls, Clinton is leading Trump by 5.8 percentage points.