Poll finds Trump, Clinton even as they turn to general election

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Republican Donald Trump and Democrat Hillary Clinton are in a statistical tie in the latest Reuters/Ipsos poll released on Wednesday, showing a tight battle for the White House as the two likely nominees turn their attention to the Nov. 8 election, Reuters reports.

The narrowing poll numbers are the result of both a gain by Trump and a drop by Clinton in the days since the New York real estate mogul effectively secured the Republican nomination when his two remaining rivals quit last week.

The national poll found 41 percent of likely voters supporting Clinton and 40 percent backing Trump, with 19 percent undecided. The online survey of 1,289 people was conducted over five days in the last week and has a credibility interval of 3 percentage points.

While the general election campaign has hardly begun, the poll marks a shift from a similar Reuters/Ipsos survey conducted over the five days before Trump effectively became the nominee. That poll showed Clinton at 48 percent and Trump at 35 percent.

The former U.S. secretary of state's loss in the Democratic primary election to Bernie Sanders in West Virginia on Tuesday signaled possible trouble for her in industrial states in November.