Hank Silverberg, wtop.com

WASHINGTON – Virginia could play a key role in deciding the 2012 presidential election, and a new poll indicates the state’s voters are split.

The Quinnipiac University Poll indicates that Virginia republicans now favor former House Speaker Newt Gingrich over former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney for the GOP nomination, 30 percent to 25 percent.

None of the other GOP candidates topped 9 percent.

In a direct matchup between Gingrich and Romney that gap opens to 47 percent for Gingrich and 39 percent for Romney.

Quinnipiac University Pollster Peter Brown says the poll also shows that Romney would run better against President Obama in the November general election.

“Romney gets 44 percent to President Obama’s 42 percent and Gingrich loses to the president 46 to 41 percent.”

With a margin of error of 4.4 percent, that is close to a dead heat in a state that is considered key to an overall victory.

President Obama carried Virginia in 2008, the first Democrat to do so since 1964.

“We’ll see if 2008 was an aberration or that that’s the new reality in Virginia politics, because of the growth of the Northern Virginia vote, which tends to be more Democratic,” Brown says.

The poll also looked at the race for the U.S. Senate, where former Va. governor Tim Kaine and George Allen have been locked in a tight battle.

The poll puts Allen at 44 percent and Kaine at 42 percent, well within the margin of error of 2.9 percent for that race.

Brown says as usual, the margin of victory in Virginia may lie with independent voters.

It’s the fourth time the Quinnipiac poll asked about the race for Virginia’s U.S. Senate seat. Brown says the numbers have not moved that much.

The full poll is available on Quinnipiac’s website.

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