In an election today in California's 52nd US Congressional District, first-term incumbent Democrat Scott Peters must battle to hold his seat, according to research conducted by SurveyUSA for the U-T San Diego newspaper and KGTV-TV 10News. Today, it's Republican challenger DeMaio 48%, Peters 45% --- within the survey's theoretical margin of sampling error, and too close for DeMaio to be considered any kind of odds-on favorite. A narrow victory for either candidate is equally likely.

Compared to a SurveyUSA poll 3 weeks ago, DeMaio is up 2 points, Peters is down 2 points. Poll-on-poll, there is movement among men, where the Republican is now up by 12, and there is movement among independent voters, where the Republican is now up by 18. Voters say that "integrity" is the most important issue when filling out their ballot, and on that issue, DeMaio leads narrowly 50% to 46%. Second most important is the issue of "fiscal responsibility," and on that issue, DeMaio leads overwhelmingly, 81% to 15%.

Peters leads on 3 and DeMaio leads on 2 of the following 5 attributes:

* More trustworthy? 48% say DeMaio, 44% say Peters.
* Stronger on transportation issues? DeMaio 42%, Peters 40%.
* In sync with you on same-sex marriage? Peters 44%, DeMaio 38%.
* In sync with you on abortion? Peters 45%, DeMaio 37%.
* In sync with you on veterans affairs? Peters 46% to DeMaio's 43%.

Cell-phone respondents and home-phone respondents included in this research, which was conducted 100% by telephone: SurveyUSA interviewed 650 registered voters from California's 52nd Congressional District 10/02/14 through 10/06/14, using Registration Based Sample (RBS, aka: voter list sample) from Aristotle in Washington DC. Of the registered voters, 542 were determined by SurveyUSA to be likely to vote on or before the 11/04/14 general election. This research was conducted 100% by telephone: respondents reachable on a home telephone (89% of likely voters) were interviewed on their home telephone in the recorded voice of a professional announcer. Respondents not reachable on a home telephone (11% of likely voters) were contacted by live operators, who hand-dialed the cell phones, secured respondent cooperation, qualified the respondent, asked the survey questions and remained on the phone until the interview was completed. You must credit KGTV-TV and the U-T if you air, cite or publish these results in whole or part.