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First look: Alabama poll

Roy Moore prepares for a debate. Photo: Brynn Anderson / AP

The data analytics firm 0ptimus has been running surveys in the lead up to Tuesday's Alabama special election. Their latest poll — taken on Friday and Saturday — has anti-establishment candidate Roy Moore at 55.4 percent and the Trump/McConnell-backed candidate Luther Strange at 44.6 percent.

0ptimus partner Scott Tranter says he was struck by this statistic: "80% of those surveyed and 86% of primary voters know Trump endorsed Strange, which is up 5% since Tuesday and 15% since last week. Moore has maintained similar leads throughout this period."The RealClearPolitics average of recent polls for the Alabama Senate race has Moore ahead by 8.6 percentage points, which is within the margin of error of the 0ptimus survey.

(Methodology: Tranter says they've been running automated telephone surveys for two weeks in Alabama. This latest sample of 1,035 modeled likely voters has a margin of error of 2.9 percentage points, according to Tranter.)