(CNN) – Three months ahead of November's general election, races for the U.S. Senate are deadlocked in Virginia and Wisconsin, according to a poll released Wednesday.
Virginia's two candidates – former Governors Tim Kaine and George Allen – are statistically tied in their race to replace retiring Democratic Sen. Jim Webb. Kaine, a Democrat, stood at 48% in the Quinnipiac University/CBS News/New York Times poll, while Allen, a Republican, was at 46%.
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"Virginia's U.S. Senate has been a dead heat since it began," Peter A. Brown, assistant director of the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute, wrote in a statement accompanying the poll's release. "It's pretty clear that whether George Allen or Tim Kaine becomes the Old Dominion's next senator, it almost certainly will be by a razor-thin margin."
Virginia's Republican governor Bob McDonnell held a 52% approval rating, according to the poll. McDonnell has been the subject of speculation as a potential vice presidential pick for presumptive GOP nominee Mitt Romney, and will campaign with him on the Virginia leg of his bus tour at the end of this week.
In Wisconsin, three Republican candidates are vying to compete against Democratic Rep. Tammy Baldwin in the general election. The victor in that race will replace Sen. Herb Kohl, a four-term Democrat who announced he was not running for re-election in May 2011.
A GOP primary will be held August 14 between former U.S. Rep. Mark Neumann, former Wisconsin Gov. Tommy Thompson and banking executive Eric Hovde.
In Wednesday's poll, all three Republican candidates were stacked closely against Baldwin in potential match-ups. Baldwin was at 48% to Neumann's 45%, 47% to Hovde's 43%, and 47% to an identical 47% for Thompson.
"No matter who wins next week's GOP senate primary the fall campaign against U.S. Rep. Tammy Baldwin looks like it will be a nail-biter," Brown said.
Gov. Scott Walker, who survived a recall election in June, enjoyed a 52% approval rating among Wisconsin voters.
The Quinnipiac University/CBS News/New York Times poll was conducted July 31-August 6, with 1,412 likely voters in Virginia and 1,428 likely voters in Wisconsin questioned by telephone. The survey's overall sampling error is plus or minus three percentage points.
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