SALISBURY — A poll released earlier this week by Washington DC-based polling center Cygnal indicates that Salisbury’s Bill Graham has a lot of swooning to do with GOP voters if he wants to have any hope of capturing the Republican nomination for the state’s highest seat.

According to the poll, which was released by Republican candidate for governor and current lieutenant governor, Mark Robinson’s, campaign, Robinson holds a “commanding lead in the GOP gubernatorial primary with support from more than 54 percent of likely voters.”

The same poll showed that Graham has the support of slightly more than 9 percent of likely voters.

Conrad Pogorzelski III, senior advisor and general consultant to Mark Robinson for Governor said, “We are releasing internal numbers for the first time this cycle because the Republican primary for governor is over. Despite over $3 million spent by the Graham campaign over the last 60 days, Lieutenant Governor Robinson’s lead has increased, and he has now surpassed 50 percent while undecideds are now in the low 30s. It’s clear that voters want a true conservative who is a public servant, not a RINO-backed Republican John Edwards who made his money suing our farmers in North Carolina. The only question now is how much more money Graham is willing to light on fire on a fruitless endeavor, when that money could be used to help Robinson beat Democrats in the fall.

The initial ballot shows Mark Robinson at 54.2 percent, Bill Graham at 9.1 percent, and N.C. Treasurer Dale Folwell at 4.1 percent.

Graham’s own votes jumped in a hypothetical head-to-head matchup with Robinson but at a net loss and Robinson saw a sharper uptick. In that matchup, Robinson secured 59.7 percent of votes to Graham’s 11.4 percent.

The survey also included message testing for the respective candidates, both positive and negative. After learning more about the respective candidates, the informed ballot shows Mark Robinson at 59 percent, Bill Graham at 7.5 percent and Dale Folwell at 5.3 percent. In another head-to-head matchup focuses on messaging, the informed ballot shows Mark Robinson leading Bill Graham 63.1 percent to 9.1 percent.

Cygnal has an A grade from FiveThirtyEight’s pollster ratings with 94 percent of polls analyzed in 2022 called correctly. FiveThirtyEight is an American website that focuses on opinion poll analysis, politics, economics and sports blogging in the United States.