Former U.S. Rep. Nathan Deal may make it into a runoff for the Republican nomination, but Gainesville’s hometown gubernatorial candidate isn’t faring well with two key groups of voters, according to a poll released Thursday.

A Georgia Newspaper Partnership poll surveying 400 likely voters in the Republican primary shows that Deal doesn’t have the support of as many metro-Atlantans or tea partiers as his biggest Republican opponents, Insurance Commissioner John Oxendine and former Secretary of State Karen Handel.

Voters in metropolitan Atlanta make up more than half of Georgia’s voting population and the tea party movement has had a growing influence on the state’s conservative political scene.

“It’s like what Willie Sutton said when he was asked ‘Why did you rob banks?’ And he said ‘Well, that’s because that’s where the money is,’ ” said Douglas Young, a political science professor at Gainesville State College. “Atlanta is where the votes are.”

The poll was commissioned by The Times and 12 other newspapers across the state that make up the Georgia Newspaper Partnership. The poll was conducted by Mason-Dixon Polling & Research from July 8 through July 13, surveying 400 Republicans and 400 Democrats who plan to vote in Tuesday’s primary. It has a margin of error of plus or minus 5 points.

The results indicate that former Gov. Roy Barnes could win the Democratic primary without a runoff.

But the race for second place in Georgia’s Republican gubernatorial primary will be the hardest fought battle, according to the poll’s results.

Oxendine led the poll with 31 percent of Republican voters. Who will join him in a runoff election is less clear.

In the poll, Handel, with 23 percent, has a 5 percentage point lead over Deal. Her lead is within the poll’s margin of error, meaning Deal could pull ahead on Tuesday.

The Deal camp isn’t surprised by the results.

“I think this has been a tight race all along,” Deal campaign spokesman Brian Robinson said. “...We are perfectly positioned to find ourselves in this runoff. We are right where we need to be today.”

Handel expressed just as much confidence in her own chances of making it into the Aug. 10 runoff.

“I feel very, very optimistic going into Tuesday,” Handel said.

But Eric Johnson, who the poll showed has the support of 6 percent of voters who will vote in the Republican primary, dismissed the poll results as under-representing his strength.

“This poll is absolutely wrong,” the former state senate leader’s spokesman Ben Fry said, pointing to a number of other recent polls that have shown Johnson in a tight race for third and closer to Deal.

“With recent developments, numbers are moving by the day, and we are confident we will be just where we need to be on July 20,” Fry said. “While others are attacking each other and slinging mud, Eric is focused on sharing his plans to put Georgia back to work directly with Georgia voters.”

The poll shows many voters are still trying to decide on a candidate. Sixteen percent of Democrats and 19 percent of Republicans surveyed have not decided who they’ll vote for in the state’s gubernatorial race.

Name recognition remains a problem for Deal and Handel, less than a week before the primary, the poll showed. About two-thirds of the Republican voters surveyed in the poll either did not recognize or have no opinion of Handel or Deal, though slightly more recognized Handel than Deal.

The battle between Handel and Deal is the one to watch, said Brad Coker, managing director of Mason-Dixon Polling & Research.

There was a slight tightening of the results the research group recorded Tuesday, and Coker said that could possibly be attributed to Sarah Palin’s decision Monday to endorse Handel.

“There might be a little bump from that,” Coker said. “I still see a lot of fluidity in the race. The undecided vote is 19 percent - that’s a lot of voters still in play.”

Also this week, Deal was endorsed by Newt Gingrich, the former U.S. speaker of the house and fellow Georgian, an endorsement that could also impact Tuesday’s vote.

Robinson, speaking for the Deal campaign, said those undecided voters will come around to Deal by Tuesday, calling the former congressman a “real, honest-to-God conservative alternative to the ethics-plagued John Oxendine.”

“Oxendine has more baggage than an Amtrak train,” Robinson said. “... These undecided voters are conservatives, and what they’re learning this week is that Karen Handel has a liberal voting record and she’s been lying about it, which raises a character issue. And the more they find out about John Oxendine the less they like him, and the more you find out about Nathan Deal the more you like him. He is the grown-up in this race.”

But Deal doesn’t have nearly as much support from voters from the state’s largest voting block: metro-Atlanta.

Oxendine had the support of 36 percent of Republicans surveyed from metro-Atlanta; Handel was supported by 23 percent and Deal had about 11 percent of the capital city’s vote. Outside of the metro area, however, Deal does much better and actually leads Oxendine and Handel by a small margin.

The absence of Atlanta support did not surprise political scientist Young.

“Deal is not remotely as well-known to Atlantans as are Oxendine and Handel,” Young said. “Deal has long had this north congressional district; also, Deal has had to spend most of his time way off in D.C. while Oxendine and Handel are in Atlanta almost every weekday.”

Deal’s campaign responded that the congressman’s near two decades of service for a 15-county North Georgia district and endorsements from congressmen in some of the state’s most Republican districts might make up for the lack of support in the city.

Snagging that second spot in the runoff might hinge upon the turnout of Deal’s 9th District supporters, the campaign said.

“We’re going to do better in the 9th District than any other candidate is going to do in their own congressional district,” Robinson said. “We’ve got the endorsements of Congressmen Broun, Congressman Linder, Congressman Gingrey and Congressman Westmoreland, and those are some of the most Republican districts in the country, and those congressmen are highly respected by their constituencies.”

Oxendine and Handel also seem to be attracting about twice the voters who identify with the tea party movement as Deal, according to the poll. Both Oxendine and Handel, who each had 26 percent of female voters’ support, had double the support from Republican women as Deal did.

But the Deal camp says it will “significantly” exceed the 13 percent of tea party support documented in the poll when the polls close on Tuesday.

“Our tea party voters are those who believe in small government and they’re conservative in their traditional values,” Robinson said. “They’re going to see by Tuesday that Karen Handel doesn’t represent those values, and they may not know that today but they’ll know it by Tuesday.”

As for the support of women, Robinson did not address Oxendine’s attraction, only the ability for a female candidate to garner female support.

“It makes sense that Karen would have some support from other women. I don’t think that’s shocking to anybody,” Robinson said. “We’re focused on getting conservative voters - men and women - conservative voters, and I think, in these last few days our message on TV is that Nathan Deal is the honest pro-life conservative in this race who won’t change his principles from one election to another. And I think that’s going to really move our numbers with conservative women voters in Georgia.”

During a bus tour stop in the Augusta area Wednesday, a crowd of Republican women, area Handel supporters and others interviewed the female Republican candidate for themselves. One called her “feisty,” and Handel said it applied.

“I think it’s an adjective that you could attach to Nikki Haley, to Carly Fiorina or Meg Whitman,” Handel said. “They are business women, they are outsiders, and they’re not career politicians. They are reformers.”

Richmond County Handel supporter Janice McDonald said it was indeed “the year of the woman” in American politics. “We’re just into change for the better,” McDonald said.

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, the Savannah Morning News and the Augusta Chronicle contributed to this report as part of the Georgia Newspaper Partnership.