With under a month until the midterm elections, both candidates make a final push as undecided voters take center stage.
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. —
With less than one month remaining before the midterm elections, a new Journal poll in the New Mexico gubernatorial race shows Democratic candidate Deb Haaland leading candidate Gregg Hull by seven points.
The latest Albuquerque Journal poll shows that 49% of likely voters plan to vote for Haaland if they have not already, while 42% support Hull. With the race in its home stretch, both candidates are working hard in the final days of their campaign to win over remaining voters.
KOAT political expert Brian Sanderoff analyzed the current standings.
“Deb Haaland hasn’t reached the 50 percent point yet, and there are 9% who are still undecided,” Sanderoff said.
According to Sanderoff, Haaland shows strength among Democrats, women, and Hispanic voters, while Hull holds a slight pull among men. Despite Haaland holding a major financial advantage over Hull, the poll results remain nearly identical to those recorded in August.
“So it looks like we’re trending in the right direction, regardless of what the poll says. We’re working really hard, we’re going to run past the finish line,” Haaland said while speaking with KOAT at the Indian Pueblo Cultural Center on Indigenous Peoples’ Day. “We’re not taking a single thing for granted. I’m on my third statewide tour, so I’ve traveled all over New Mexico to every county three times.”
Reflecting on the stability of the race, Haaland added, “it didn’t close all the way, but I’m a point ahead and my opponent is a point behind from the last poll. The most important poll that matters is the one on Election Day.”
Hull said over Zoom while traveling the state. “I can tell you right now the polling is still very encouraging that clearly shows that there’s a path to victory for us here in New Mexico.”
Hull noted that the results did not surprise him because “nothing’s changed, up until the debate. That was going to be the changing factor.”
Hull raised concerns regarding the poll’s methodology and timing, pointing out that it combined voter data from a presidential election year with a midterm election year, and noting that it largely omitted public reaction to there not being a televised debate.
“I was a little concerned about the difference in the polling information, the difference in the sample size, and the difference in the pools of voters that the data came from because, in this particular case, they combined a presidential year with a midterm year to get the amount of individuals that they had in the poll,” Hull said. “So that kind of concerned me, and then of course the other thing that concerned me about this poll is that it did not include the fact, with the exception of one day, how people felt about Deb Haaland missing the only televised debate for this election. A lot of those undecideds got decided real fast because you know the comments online are they want to see her in an unscripted atmosphere.”
When asked directly about Hull’s critiques, Haaland responded: “I’m fine with the poll.”
Both candidates are continuing to travel across the state to reach voters and share their platforms, with both emphasizing economic affordability.
Haaland’s platform focuses on financial support for residents.
“Affordability is a real issue that so many New Mexicans have,” Haaland said. “That’s everything they talk about. No matter where I go, people are finding it difficult. The Trump tariffs have made things more expensive. Medicaid cuts, SNAP benefit cuts. Those are really making people worried about the future. So I want to put more money in the pockets of New Mexicans. We want to increase the child tax credit, the working families tax credit. We want to move our clean energy forward so utility costs can be lowered. There are so many things that I know that will help achieve this. For New Mexicans, moving our universal childcare programs forward will also boost our economy. So I want to create jobs. I want to make sure that people can live comfortably here in New Mexico.”
Hull is approaching affordability through tax reductions, outlining a plan to eliminate specific state taxes.
“Get the facts about our four steps to zero plan to eliminate personal income tax in the state of New Mexico, eliminating tax on Social Security altogether, eliminating tax on retirement benefits such as PERA and other retirement benefits, making sure that our veterans are keeping all of their hard-earned money that they earned,” Hull said. “So really look at this because this is going to affect and help the lower-income, fixed-income individuals first in our communities. And that’s going to really have a really strong economic boost throughout the state.”
Addressing the 9% of undecided voters remaining in the race, both candidates encouraged voters to contact them directly, with Hull advising undecided voters to send emails with their questions and Haaland echoing the request for voters to reach out.
