Public Policy Polling

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2011-09-01T11:56:00.001-05:00

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North Carolina and West Virginia Question Suggestions

2011-08-31T16:23:00.002-05:00

West Virginia won our vote on where to poll this week, to go along with our regularly scheduled North Carolina poll. Obviously we'll look at both states' Presidential and Gubernatorial contests, as well as the Senate race in West Virginia. Anything else we should ask about in those states?

Poll vote time!

2011-08-30T16:48:00.004-05:00

We're due for our monthly North Carolina poll this week and we'll do one other state poll. Your choices are:

-Connecticut. Haven't polled the state since March and with Chris Shays' entry into the Senate race, interested to see if this one should be added to the list of seats Democrats really need to worry about.

-Florida. Always worth looking at the Presidential race there and interested in seeing if the Perry surge is extending to that state. Perry wins there and it could be close to game over if he's already won Iowa and South Carolina.

-Missouri. Interested to see just how bad Peter Kinder's doing and what kind of shape Republican alternatives would be in, as well as how Claire McCaskill's holding up in these times of record low approval numbers for Barack Obama.

-New Hampshire. Given the amazing numbers Rick Perry's putting up nationally right now I have to think he's gained a good bit of ground on Mitt Romney even in the Granite State...is that firewall starting to collapse?

-West Virginia. Clearly the most competitive Gubernatorial race in the country this year and Joe Manchin's another Democratic Senator up next year who may or may not be vulnerable.

Voting's open for the next 24 hours, don't cheat.

Obama keeps hitting record lows

2011-08-30T15:23:00.003-05:00

In our national polling for Daily Kos Barack Obama has hit a record low approval rating 3 weeks in a row now. He's gone from 43/53 to 42/53 to now 42/54 in our poll this week.

What might be most noteworthy is this week's poll is how bad Obama's numbers are with a few key and usually dependable Democratic constituencies. He's under water in union households at 44/47. He's also under water with voters under 30 at 45/48. The Northeast tends to a pretty dependable region for Democrats but Obama's under water there at 47/49. Obama's usually been able to hold his ground with female voters but he's under water with them too at 45/49. And even with African Americans his approval rating's down to 76%, about as low as we've ever found it.

I wrote a blog post last week about how Democratic enthusiasm was at a year long low. Now it's at a lower year long low with only 47% of the party's voters 'very excited' about voting this year compared to 58% of Republicans.

There is perhaps one piece of good news for Obama these days and that's the surge of Rick Perry, who our polling suggests is not as strong a general election candidate as Mitt Romney. Perry fared 6 points worse than Romney against Obama in our national poll last week and does 7 points worse on South Carolina numbers we're releasing tomorrow. Obama trails a generic opponent 48-44 on our national poll this week, including 51-37 with independents. He has to hope Perry proves to be something worse than generic. And although Perry's off to a good start with Republicans, Democrats and independents don't think much of him. So that's possible.

Beshear up big, could have down ballot implications

2011-08-30T12:43:00.003-05:00

It doesn't look like there's going to be much to see in the Kentucky Governor's race this year. Incumbent Steve Beshear leads by 27 points right now with 55% to 28% for Republican David Williams and 10% Gatewood Galbraith.

More than anything else this is because Williams is one of the worst candidates a party's put forth in a plausibly competitive Gubernatorial race in recent memory. Only 21% of voters have a favorable opinion of him to 54% who view him negatively. Even with Republicans he's barely seen positively by a 41/29 margin and with Democrats (9/70) and independents (16/55) there are virtually no voters with a favorable view.

Even if the GOP had a really strong candidate this might be an uphill battle though. Beshear has a 57% approval rating, with only 30% of voters giving him bad marks. Out of 42 sitting Governors PPP's polled on those numbers put Beshear in a tie for the 4th most popular with Tennessee's Bill Haslam, behind only Dave Heineman of Nebraska, Mike Beebe of Arkansas, and John Hickenlooper of Colorado. Combine one of the most popular Governors in the country with one of the worst challengers imaginable and you get this blow out race.

Beshear is winning 78% of the Democratic vote. At the same time Williams gets only 59% of Republicans, with Beshear taking 19% of those votes. And Beshear is also up big with independents, getting 51% to 25% for Williams and 14% for Galbraith.

The Governor's race is probably a lost cause for Republicans. The bigger concern is the effect its lack of competitiveness might have down ballot. Those saying they're likely to vote this fall only report having supported John McCain by 4 points over Barack Obama in 2008, in contrast to McCain's actual 16 point victory in the state. That suggests a very low motivation level for GOP voters at this point, likely due to the weakness at the top of their ticket.

That could really come into play especially in the races for Auditor, Secretary of State, and Agriculture Commissioner, all of which look like toss ups right now. In the Auditor race Democrat Adam Edelen leads Republican John Kemper III 34-31. In the Secretary of State race Democrat Alison Lundergan Grimes leads Republican Bill Johnson 38-35. And in the Agriculture Commissioner race Republican James Comer leads Democrat Bob Farmer 37-36. Those are all contests that could go in the GOP's direction if the party's voters step up their level of engagement.

In 2 other statewide contests the Democratic candidates hold wider leads. Jack Conway's up 47-36 for reelection as Attorney General against Republican challenger Todd P'Pool. Conway's favorability numbers dropped all the way to a pretty dreadful 34/52 spread in the closing days of his Senate run against Rand Paul last year, but now he's at 38/35, suggesting that campaign didn't do him too much permanent damage. Fellow Democrat Todd Hollenbach leads with 43% for Treasurer to 28% for Republican K.C. Crosbie and perhaps most notably 16% for Libertarian Ken Moellman. While third party candidates rarely end up doing as well in the end as they poll a couple months out from an election, that figure still reflects a pretty high degree of unhappiness with both political parties.

Steve Beshear looks like a shoo in for reelection. The biggest question in Kentucky is whether Republicans staying home because of their disenchantment with David Williams sinks the rest of the GOP ticket as well.

Full results here

Perry up big in South Carolina

2011-08-30T09:37:00.003-05:00

There might not be a state that betters symbolizes the fundamental shift that's occurred in the Republican Presidential race over the last few months than South Carolina. When PPP last polled there in early June, Mitt Romney led everyone in the field by at least 15 points. But now with Rick Perry's entry Romney has lost almost half of his support. That leaves Perry with a 20 point lead- he's at 36% to 16% for Romney, 13% for Michele Bachmann, 9% for Herman Cain, 8% for Newt Gingrich, 5% for Ron Paul, 4% for Rick Santorum, and 2% for Jon Huntsman.

Voters on the far right side of the Republican spectrum have been dying for a candidate they can call their own and Perry is filling that void. With folks describing themselves as 'very conservative,' which is the largest segment of the GOP electorate in South Carolina, Perry's at 44% to 14% for Bachmann, with Romney mired in single digits at 9%.

That furthest right group of voters has never been all that friendly to Romney though. What has to be a greater sign of concern for him is that with those labeling themselves as only 'somewhat conservative' he still trails Perry 37-19 with Bachmann at 11% and Cain at 10%. When Romney's primary threat was Bachmann he was still winning this group of voters. But Perry seems to be filling a void for voters looking for someone more conservative than Romney and more credible than Bachmann and if he can sustain his lead with that segment of voters he's going to be tough to topple.

Romney does continue to be the favorite of moderate Republicans, leading Perry 26-20. But since those folks only account for 16% of the overall GOP electorate having their support isn't going to take Romney very far.

Romney's certainly lost the most support because of Perry's entry into the race, dropping 14 points from 30% on our June poll to now 16%. But pretty much everyone else has lost ground too. Gingrich is down 7 points from 15% to 8%, Cain is down 6 points from 15% to 9%, and Paul is down 5 points from 10% to 5%. The only folks who have held steady are Bachmann at 13% and Huntsman at 2% on both of these polls.

Another potential candidate losing ground with the Perry surge is Sarah Palin. In June we found that she would be in a clear second place behind Romney at 18% if she decided to get into the field. Now she's in third place at only 10%, well behind the 36% Perry would get with her in the field and putting her in back of Romney's 13% as well. Palin would probably see some boost in her support if she actually formally entered the race but this continues a trend in our polling showing that as time passes support for her is getting smaller and smaller.

It's possible that by the time the Republican race gets to South Carolina there will have been some narrowing down of the field as candidates perform poorly in Iowa and New Hampshire. So we looked at some scenarios addressing that. If it was a three person contest by that point Perry would hit 50% with Romney at 25% and Bachmann at 16%. If it was just Perry and Romney, Perry would lead 59-28. If it was Perry and Bachmann, Perry would lead 63-20. And if it was just Romney and Bachmann, Romney would lead 45-40. It's really not a good sign for Bachmann that in a state with a Republican electorate as conservative as South Carolina, voters would still prefer Romney.

So why is Perry doing so well? He's out there talking about a lot of things that Republican voters agree with. For instance he's been made fun of for his skepticism about global warming but only 25% of primary voters believe it exists to 61% who do not. He has a 42-11 lead over Romney with the climate skeptics compared to only a 24-22 one with the voters who believe in global warming. It's a similar story with evolution- only 32% of GOP voters believe in it while 57% do not. He's up 41-10 with the evolution skeptics compared to just 31-24 with the voters who believe in evolution. People can make fun of Perry all day long but he's in line with the Republican electorate on these issues and his willingness to voice his skepticism publicly seems to be helping him pick up some support.

Full results here

Wisconsin Miscellaneous

2011-08-26T13:21:00.003-05:00

Though a previous release showed voters were slightly happy with the results of the recent Wisconsin recall elections, that was because Republicans were more happy that they did not lose control of the Senate than Democrats were unhappy that they did not gain a third seat. By a one-point margin (48-47), Wisconsinites would actually prefer that Democrats control that body. Most of that is because Democrats have a three-point identification advantage in the state, as Republicans seem to now be a tad more enthusiastic about maintaining their majority than Democrats are wanting their party in charge, and independents split 43-42 for the GOP.

Wisconsin is not particularly eager to see same-sex marriage made legal. Only 39% want that, and half do not. But when voters are given three options, including civil unions, two-thirds want gay couples to at least have the same legal rights as married couples, if not the name. That includes 81% of Democrats, 71% of independents, and even 49% of Republicans.

New Sen. Ron Johnson remains a cipher to most voters in his first year in office. His name recognition is up a bit from May, but those who have an opinion on him now who didn't before are split evenly in approval and disapproval. 39% approve, 35% disapprove, and still 26% aren't sure how they feel about his performance so far. Three months ago, it was 35-31-34.

Johnson's retiring senior colleague Herb Kohl is much more beloved, at 50-31, essentially the same as the 50-30 we found in May. He has a solid 22% approval rating from Republicans. Whoever the Democrats nominate to replace him on the ticket next year is going to have to hope some of his bipartisan appeal rubs off, because we found last week that the Senate race is surprisingly close, even if Russ Feingold had chosen to run.

Wisconsin football fans are pretty confident the Green Bay Packers will win the Super Bowl this season. 55% think they will, and only 22% bet they will not.

Speaking of the Packers, the state is way down on the team’s longtime quarterback Brett Favre, who came out of retirement three years ago to play for the New York Jets and then the rival Minnesota Vikings. Only a third see him favorably, and 54% unfavorably. The state may be divided over politics, but Favre is one thing on which Democrats, Republicans, and independents almost exactly agree.

Unsurprisingly, the postseason-bound Milwaukee Brewers are overwhelmingly the state’s favorite baseball team. 71% claim the Brew Crew as their favorite club among a list of seven other Major League Baseball teams. Way behind are the Chicago Cubs at 8%, the Minnesota Twins at 4%, and the Atlanta (formerly Milwaukee) Braves, Boston Red Sox, Chicago White Sox, and New York Yankees all the favorites of 2% of Wisconsin voters, and the St. Louis Cardinals of 1%. 7% favor a different team or are not baseball fans.

Full results here.

Iowa Miscellaneous

2011-08-26T12:56:00.003-05:00

Iowans have cut their governor a little more slack since we last polled the state three months ago. 41% approve and 44% disapprove of Terry Branstad’s performance, up from 39-47. But that makes him 29th out of 42 sitting governors we've polled, and voters still would only narrowly prefer him to the Democrat he ousted from office last fall, Chet Culver.

In a hypothetical do-over, Branstad would prevail, 48-44, when he actually won by a 53-43 margin. The problem for Culver is that Branstad wins over twice as many Democrats (a huge 18%) as he won last fall. On top of that, even though the third of voters who say they are independents disapprove, 36-46, they prefer Branstad to Culver, 46-41. That is down, however, from the 51-41 margin reported by exit polls.

As the only Midwestern state where it is legal, Iowa is becoming increasingly favorable to same-sex marriage. 46% think it should be legal, and 45% illegal. But when civil unions are included as an alternative, giving gay couples the same rights as marriage, 40% still prefer full marriage equality, 30% favor civil unions, and only 29% think there should be no recognition of these relationships at all. When we asked the same question in April, the breakdown was 35-29-33. Democrats, Republicans, and independents are all more in favor of both marriage and civil unions than before, but particularly Republicans, 14% of whom favor marriage and 36% civil unions now, versus 10-28 four months ago. For Democrats, it is 63-23 versus 57-25, and for independents, 40-31 versus 35-36.

With Iowa losing a congressional seat after the census, the new map has double-bunked two incumbent Republicans, and should favor Democrats. On top of that, voters prefer Democrats for Congress by a 44-40 margin over GOP candidates. Democrats, at 88-4, are slightly more united than Republicans (85-5), but independents just barely prefer the GOP, 36-34.

52% of Iowans see their senior senator Chuck Grassley favorably, and 33% unfavorably. They are not as hot on Tom Harkin, giving him a 46-40 mark, but that still puts him in a tie for 50th out of 86 senators on which we've polled. Grassley is tied for 25th. The two are equally popular with their own bases, but Grassley, at 39-45 with Democrats, is way more popular across the aisle than is Harkin (a still healthy 23-64 with Republicans). Grassley also bests Harkin with independents, 50-34 versus 39-45.

Full results here.

Ohio Miscellaneous

2011-08-26T11:26:00.002-05:00

The recent debt deal has caused Ohioans to sour on John Boehner. When PPP polled the state in May, 37% both approved and disapproved of Speaker Boehner’s performance in office. Now, only 34% approve, and his disapproval is up to 47%. The main cause? A movement of 23 points in the wrong direction with independents, from 37-34 to 34-54. He has also declined with the two major parties. Now, more Republicans disapprove (16%) than Democrats approve (12%), the opposite of three months ago, when only 8% of Republicans disapproved and 14% of Democrats approved.

Boehner’s native state does still see him more positively than they do Nancy Pelosi, however, with 49% viewing Boehner more favorably and 34% Pelosi. 14% see them equally well--almost all Democrats and independents. Though Republicans are not terribly high on Boehner in isolation, when matched with his vile foe, the former speaker, 90% of them prefer Boehner. Still only 62% of Democrats have a higher opinion of Pelosi, and independents split 52-25 Boehner's way, a huge switch from their overall feelings on him. Pelosi should probably steer clear of Ohio when her vulnerable members are running in Ohio House races next year.

Speaking of those House races, Ohio voters narrowly prefer Democrats for Congress, 42-37, but that is down from 43-34 in May, mainly because Republicans are hardening, moving from 73-9 in favor of the GOP pick to 80-5, now equaling Democrats' 81-6, the same as three months ago. Still 45% of independents remain undecided, down from 53% in May, and they have moved slightly towards the Democrats, from 30-17 in favor of the GOP to only 32-23 now.

As bad as the economy has been in the Rust Belt, more Ohioans still blame George W. Bush for the state of the economy than President Obama. 51% say Bush has been more responsible for the recession, and 42% say Obama. Independents side 49-44 with Bush, and Democrats are just slightly more likely to blame Bush than Republicans blame Obama.

We also asked a number of questions on the debt ceiling deal. 45% of Ohio voters think it will be bad for the economy, and only 27% predict it will be a good thing. As in the other states we asked the question, Democrats narrowly think averting default was a positive, 37-30, and most of the negative sentiment comes from Republicans (18-51) and independents (19-65).

Ohioans are almost unanimously sure the deal will do nothing for the deficit. 5% think it will solve it, but 82% do not. Again, Republicans (2-88) and independents (3-91) are most pessimistic.

As the deficit supercommittee gears up its negotiations, Boehner and crew should be wary of pushing a solution that is too heavy on cuts. 54% of Ohioans think the deficit should be dealt with through a combination of cuts and tax increases, while only 37% think cuts alone will suffice. Republicans favor cuts (68-25), obviously, but less so than Democrats prefer a balanced approach (13-77). Independents also side with Obama and the Democrats, 37-55.

Ohio is generally not in favor of same-sex marriage. Only a third think it should be legal, and 53% say it should remain illegal. That is just slightly up from May (31-53), as Democrats have moved from 45-40 in favor to 50-33, and independents from 28-51 against to only 37-47. But when given the option of civil unions, 61% of Ohio voters favor equal legal rights for gay couples, including 73% of Democrats, 67% of independents, and even 44% of Republicans.

When recently confronted by hostile Iowa voters, Mitt Romney proclaimed that “corporations are people, my friends.” PPP asked whether Ohioans agreed. 36% do, but half do not. Democrats unsurprisingly are least likely to agree with Romney (26-60), but even Republicans only narrowly do (42-41), less than independents do (45-42).

Full results here.

Mandel leading for OH Sen. nomination, Perry for Pres.

2011-08-25T15:12:00.004-05:00

The Republican race for the right to face off with Ohio Sen. Sherrod Brown next fall seems to lean strongly State Treasurer Josh Mandel's way, based on our new poll and on the latest developments in the race. Polled before Rep. Jim Jordan declined a bid and instead endorsed Mandel, Mandel tops Jordan and former State Sen. Kevin Coughlin, 27-16-8, and beats Coughlin in what will now likely be a two-way race, 31-12.

Since so few voters are familiar with the candidates so far, 57% are undecided. Coughlin obviously has an opportunity, but if he stays in the race, he'll have to cast himself as a Tea-Party, anti-establishment conservative and make up a lot of ground with the furthest right voters, who make up a 41% plurality of this electorate.

The problem for Coughlin is that Jordan's nod could only further help Mandel with the far right. Mandel is already strong against Coughlin with this group, but Jordan actually tied Mandel at 22% in the three-way match-up, meaning his credibility with conservatives could only further widen the gap with Coughlin.

Just to see what would happen, we also decided to test disgraced former Ohio State football coach Jim Tressel in this race. Republicans should probably not be terribly proud that, if he ran, Tressel would be their top pick. He is still popular, certainly more than any of the others, and he is more than twice as well-known as any of them, but it is at best a sign that no one is paying attention to the burgeoning race yet, and at worst a sign that there is little enthusiasm for the real candidates at this point. Tressel is almost certain not to run, but he leads with 23% over Mandel’s 17%, Jordan’s 13%, and Coughlin’s 5%, with 43% undecided, a clear indication that name recognition is the most decisive factor at this stage.

Two-thirds have an opinion of Tressel; 46% have a favorable opinion of him and 21% a negative one. By contrast, only 31% know enough about Mandel to express an opinion, but he is very well-liked (24-7). Only 22% are aware of Jordan (14-8) and a mere 15% of Coughlin (6-9).

We already showed Rick Perry leading Mitt Romney nationally by 13 points yesterday, and leading a tight four-way contest in Iowa on Tuesday. This poll, conducted a week before Perry even officially entered the race, was already showing Perry's threat to Romney's presidential chances as becoming more and more real. When PPP polled Ohio GOP primary voters three months ago, Romney led with 23% over Newt Gingrich’s 16%, Herman Cain’s and Ron Paul’s 13%, Michele Bachmann’s 11%, and Tim Pawlenty’s 6%.

Now Perry, polled for the first time here, has jumped into the lead with 21% to Romney’s 20%, Bachmann’s 14%, Cain’s 10%, Gingrich’s and Paul’s 8%, and Jon Huntsman’s 1%. Polled before he dropped out, Pawlenty got only 3% support. Perry seems to have taken a lot of support from Gingrich, Paul, and Cain, and holds a huge 28-15-13-11 lead over Bachmann, Romney, and Cain with the most conservative voters.

If Sarah Palin were to jump into the race, she would knock Bachmann from third but help Perry. Perry would hold at 21% to Romney’s 18%, Palin’s 11%, Bachmann’s 10%, Cain’s 8%, and Gingrich’s and Paul’s 7%.

Full results here.

Third-party bids would help Obama

2011-08-25T13:47:00.003-05:00

Some have suggested that with an unpopular president who's got a somewhat dissatisfied base and suffers from a weak economy, and with a Republican nominee who inevitably will either struggle with the middle or who is not conservative enough for the right, there is room for a strong third-party bid for the first time in at least 16 years. But we took a look at seven possible independent candidates against Obama and his strongest GOP challenger, Mitt Romney, and found that the chances of defection by GOP-inclined voters are stronger than are cracks in the Democrats’ armor. Despite their grumbling, Democrats remain pretty united behind Obama, and six of the seven possible independent candidates would hurt Romney more than the president.

Head-to-head, Romney and Obama are tied at 45% in the national popular vote, per Tuesday’s release. Against Democrat-turned-Republican-turned-independent New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, the major-party candidates are still knotted at 42%, with Bloomberg at 10%. Faced with a well-known moderate who leans more left these days, this is the only instance in which Romney is able to hold more of his base than the president does of his (82% versus 78%). But Obama treads water by holding a six-point lead with independents, 13% of whom go to Bloomberg.

With a challenge from his left by either Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders or perpetual Democratic thorn Ralph Nader, Obama would remain at 45%, with Romney falling to 41% and Nader getting 7% and Sanders only 5%. Partly because Democrats hate Nader and aren't familiar with Sanders, Romney would still win more Democratic support, in double digits, than either of these liberal candidates would. But Obama again leads, this time by ten against Sanders and 13 against Nader, with independent voters.

Jon Huntsman has spent a lot of time criticizing both parties lately, and if he takes his iconoclasm from his quixotic GOP primary bid to the general, he would earn 7%, with Obama prevailing, 46-40. Huntsman is the second-least-known of these candidates after Sanders, so he essentially serves as a "generic centrist independent" in more than half of poll respondents' eyes. Romney still pulls more Democrats than Huntsman does, but Obama leads by 18 with independents.

Though he refused in 2008, there would probably be a lot of appetite for a third-party candidacy from 1988 Libertarian Party nominee Ron Paul. He would get a solid 15%, with Romney falling to 33% and Obama still at 45%. Paul earns the most independent support of any of these third-party options (20%), almost all GOP-leaners, as Obama beats Romney by 20 with independents overall. Paul also holds Romney to 63% of Republicans, taking 22% himself. Despite his supporters' claims about his popularity with Democrats, Paul wouldn't get anymore crossover support from Democrats than any of the others.

Even though he declined to make good on his flirtation with running as a Republican earlier this year, Donald Trump keeps reviving his threats to run as an independent if he isn't personally satisfied with the GOP nominee. Even though his birther shenanigans trashed his name with most voters, he would still pull 18% to Romney’s 30% and Obama’s 46%, meaning Romney would finish closer to third than first. After initially leading in our April national primary poll, Trump soon tanked before announcing he wouldn't run after all. But Republican voters would still give him 32% of their support to Romney's 56%, and he'd also pull 17% of independents, with Obama up 51-27 over Romney.

Romney’s biggest obstacle could come from Sarah Palin, whose decision about whether she will run at all remains a mystery. She isn't polling all that well in our primary matchups anymore, with more Republicans coalescing around the announced candidates. But Palin would split general-electorate Republicans, with Romney at 46% to her 41%. As she usually does when the two are pitted head-to-head, she would give Obama his biggest lead among independents, 51-26, with Palin at 15%. Overall, Obama would run away with the election, 47-26-21 over Romney and Palin.

The main problem for Romney is that Obama holds his base, both Democrats and the independents who are inclined to vote for him anyway, better than Romney does his. Most of the peeling-off is among Republicans (at least against Palin, Trump, and Paul) and independents who might ordinarily lean Romney's way if he were the only other choice than Obama. These independent candidates earn only 4-9% of the Democratic vote, and Obama gets 41-51% of the independent vote, not much less than the 48-59% he gets against just the five Republicans we tested against him head-to-head. By contrast, while Romney is the strongest head-to-head with independents, trailing the president by nine points, he gets a measly 26-35% of the independent vote in these three-way match-ups. The only third-partier who would help Romney in that department is Bloomberg, and Romney would still lag by six with independents, and by 10 to 25 points versus the others.

Romney would probably be more susceptible to a right-wing third-party challenge than would, say, Rick Perry, and less so to someone like Bloomberg or Huntsman than would Perry. But whoever comes out of the Republican primary is almost certainly going to be weaker than the president--less popular, with less money, with a bruised image, and with a less secure voting bloc. The GOP is going to be walking on thin ice, praying not to draw a challenge from either the center or the right. It'll be a tough, fine line to satisfy both ends of the spectrum.

Full results here.

Obama leads in Wisconsin, Iowa

2011-08-24T14:43:00.004-05:00

Barack Obama leads the entire Republican field in both Wisconsin and Iowa, two states that were hotly contested in 2000 and 2004 but that he won easily in 2008.

Obama is not popular in either state. In Iowa just 45% of voters approve of him to 48% who disapprove. Independents split against him 43/47 and only 79% of Democrats think he's doing a good job while 87% of Republicans give him bad marks. It's a pretty similar story in Wisconsin. There an equal 45% of voters approve of him with his disapproval number standing at 51%. Independents go against him 40/52 and 94% of Republicans disapprove of him to 86% of Democrats who rate him positively.

Obama's not running for reelection in a vacuum though and given the GOP alternatives he still leads in both of these states. In Wisconsin he's clearly weaker at this point than in 2008, when he won the state by 14 points. He leads Mitt Romney only 47-42. And while he does have double digit advantages over the rest of the Republican field- 10 over Rick Perry at 50-40, 12 over Michele Bachmann and Sarah Palin at 51-39 and 52-40 respectively, and 14 over Herman Cain at 50-36- for the most part he's not matching his margin of victory from last time.

It's a different story in Iowa though and that may bode well for Obama in terms of what happens when voters get a lot of exposure to the Republican candidates. There he actually exceeds his 2008 margin of victory against the entire GOP field- he's up 10 on Romney at 49-39, 13 on Perry at 51-38, 17 on Bachmann at 51-34, 18 on Cain at 51-33, and 21 on Palin at 54-33.

Iowa's a closely divided state in terms of its partisan loyalties, meaning it's one of those places where independents really do make the difference. Romney's favorability with them is 27/55. Perry's is 23/52. Bachmann's is 22/60. And Obama has leads of 13, 17, and 17 points respectively with independents over the three of them. What those folks have to say to make the Republican base happy doesn't look like it will serve them well heading toward November. It's just one poll and one state but it points to the possibility that Obama can win with a 45% approval rating because the GOP field is so bad.

One last point- with Romney doing 5 points better than Perry against Obama in Wisconsin and 3 points in Iowa it's another data point showing that the Perry surge is good news for Obama's reelection prospects.

Full results here

Perry leads nationally

2011-08-24T12:12:00.005-05:00

In PPP's first national poll since Rick Perry's official entry into the Presidential race he's jumped out to a double digit advantage. Perry's at 33% to 20% for Mitt Romney, 16% for Michele Bachmann, 8% for Newt Gingrich, 6% for Herman Cain and Ron Paul, 4% for Rick Santorum, and 3% for Jon Huntsman.

Conservative voters have been looking for a candidate that they can rally around and Perry's filling that role. Romney continues to lead with the small portion of voters describing themselves as moderates at 27% to 20% for Bachmann and 15% for Perry. But Perry gets stronger and stronger as you move across the ideological spectrum. With 'somewhat conservative' voters Perry leads by 15 points with 38% to Romney's 23% and Bachmann's 11%. And with 'very conservative' voters the advantage expands to 22 points with him at 40% to 18% for Bachmann and 14% for Romney.

Perry was at only 12% five weeks ago, so he's climbed 21 points since entering the race. The biggest losers with his entry have been Bachmann and Cain, who've each lost 5 points of support, and Paul, who's lost 3 points of support. Romney and Huntsman are both unchanged from a month ago while Gingrich has actually gained a point of support.

There's some thought that this may eventually come down to a 2 or 3 person race and Perry would be favored in both of those instances as well. In a 3 way Perry would get 41% to 29% for Romney and 19% for Bachmann. There was some thought that Perry's entry would actually help Romney because it would lead to a split in the conservative vote between Perry and Bachmann but Perry is now winning those voters by such a wide margin that it doesn't even matter.

Perry also leads head to heads with both Romney (52-36) and Bachmann (56-26). In the match up with Romney Perry picks up Bachmann supporters (47-37), Cain supporters (61-29), Paul supporters (43-28), and Santorum supporters (68-21). Romney gets Gingrich supporters (51-35) and Huntsman supporters (76-24).

In the match up with Bachmann Perry wins Cain supporters (49-38), Gingrich supporters (52-32), Paul supporters (44-28), and Romney supporters (53-20). Huntsman supporters (24-21 for Bachmann) and Santorum supporters (44-43 for Perry) split pretty evenly.

In the event of the race coming down to Bachmann and Romney, Romney would lead 49-40. Somewhat surprisingly he narrowly wins Perry voters (48-42). He also gets Huntsman backers (88-6) and Gingrich ones (59-29). Paul voters split evenly at 42 while Cain voters (64-29) and Santorum voters (65-27) go to Bachmann.

Full results here

Kentucky/South Carolina Question Suggestions

2011-08-24T09:28:00.003-05:00

Kentucky and South Carolina won our vote on where to poll this week. We'll obviously poll the Presidential race in both states, Senate and Governor approval ratings, and the Governor's race in Kentucky. Beyond those things what questions would you like to see us ask in those states?

Obama tops Perry

2011-08-23T12:19:00.004-05:00

Rick Perry is looking increasingly like the Republican favorite for President- he led in the Iowa poll we released this morning and he leads by double digits in the national poll we'll release tomorrow. The biggest beneficiary of Perry's rise? It might be Barack Obama.

In our first national poll pitting the two Obama leads Perry 49-43. That six point advantage is pretty comparable to Obama's margin of victory over John McCain. Perry has certainly come on strong with Republicans but independents view him negatively already by an almost 2:1 margin, 29/55, and Democrats pretty universally give him bad ratings at a 10/71 spread. As a result Obama leads Perry thanks in large part to a 24 point advantage with independents at 56-32.

It's a different story for Obama when it comes to the match up against Romney. There he can only achieve a tie at 45%, and because there are a lot more undecided Republicans than Democrats in all likelihood Romney would come out ahead if voters had to go to the polls and really make a decision today. Romney does better than Perry because he holds Obama to only a 9 point advantage with independents, 48-39, and because he loses only 5% of the Republican vote to Obama where Perry loses 10%.

None of the rest of the Republican hopefuls even fare as well as Perry. Obama leads Michele Bachmann by 8 points at 50-42, Herman Cain by 10 points at 49-39, and Sarah Palin by 13 points at 53-40. This poll is more confirmation of what's become a broad trend in our polling- against Romney Obama faces a toss up and against anyone else he's in decent shape for reelection.

One big reason Obama's doing pretty well in these match ups is the Hispanic vote. Exit polls in 2008 showed him winning it by a 36 point margin over McCain but he builds on that in all of these match ups with a 37 point advantage over Romney at 66-29, a 46 point one over Perry at 72-26, a 48 point edge over Bachmann at 74-26, a 49 point lead on Palin at 74-25, and a 53 point spread on Herman Cain at 75-22. This is a good example of what Republican strategist Mike Murphy has described as the economics vs. demographics tension for next year's election. The economy could sink Obama but at the same time an ever growing expanding Hispanic vote that he wins by a huge margin could be enough to let him eek out a second term. It's certainly propping him up on this poll.

Full results here

This week's poll choices

2011-08-23T11:01:00.002-05:00

We'll have voting open the rest of the day for where we do our two state polls this weekend. Choices are:

-Connecticut. With Chris Shays entering the Senate race probably worth taking a fresh look at one we haven't polled since March.

-Kentucky. It's been a while now since there was a new poll on this fall's Governor's race and we haven't polled it for the entirety of 2011.

-Missouri. An internal poll yesterday suggested that Peter Kinder's recent issues haven't damaged him any...maybe that's true but it's worth another set of eyes. And also interested to see where Claire McCaskill is right now.

-South Carolina. The general assumption is that Rick Perry is the man to beat in the state now but it would be good to actually confirm whether or not that's the case with some polling.

-West Virginia. This Governor's race seems likely to be the most competitive in 2011, and it's really creeping up now. Worth checking in on how Joe Manchin's holding up as well.

Please don't cheat by voting repeatedly, we had a problem with that on last week's vote. Thanks!

Perry takes the lead in Iowa

2011-08-23T09:15:00.003-05:00

Rick Perry is the new leader in Iowa:

The race is pretty close four ways in Iowa but Rick Perry is the new favorite among Republican voters in the state. Among announced candidates he's at 22% to 19% for Mitt Romney, 18% for Michele Bachmann, and 16% for Ron Paul. Further back are Herman Cain at 7%, Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum at 5%, and Jon Huntsman at 3%.

If you throw Sarah Palin into the mix the numbers are pretty similar with Perry at 21%, Romney at 18%, Bachmann at 15%, Paul at 12%, and Palin registering at only 10%.

Perry's support is being built on Tea Party support and voters with very conservative positions on certain issues:

Only 33% of Republican voters in Iowa identify themselves as members of the Tea Party but a broad advantage with them is driving Perry's lead. He gets 32% to 22% for Bachmann, and 19% for Paul. Romney is all the way back in 6th place with those voters at only 6%. Romney doesn't need to win Tea Party voters to win in Iowa but he needs to do a whole lot better than that. With the majority of Republicans who don't consider themselves Tea Partiers Romney actually leads Perry and Bachmann with 30% to their 16% but it's not enough to make up for his poor performance with the far right faction of the party.

Perry's drawn some attention in the last week for his statements about global warming and evolution and although he's drawn ridicule from Democrats and Republican elites for them our polling suggests he's perfectly in line with the GOP base. Only 35% of Iowa Republicans believe in evolution to 48% who don't. With the ones who do believe in it Perry's in 4th place at 12%, putting him behind Romney's 24%, Paul's 18%, and Bachmann's 15%. But with the evolution deniers Perry is the overwhelming favorite at 32% to Bachmann's 19%, Romney's 15%, and Paul's 13%.

It's a similar story with global warming. Only 21% of GOP voters believe in it while 66% do not. Again with the believers Romney is in a strong first place at 31% to 15% for Paul, 13% for Bachmann, 11% for Huntsman, and only 9% for Perry. But with the much more numerous group of Republicans who think global warming is a farce Perry cleans up at 28% to 20% for Bachmann, 16% for Paul, and 13% for Romney, giving him the overall lead.

There even continues to be a pretty strong birther strain in Iowa. 48% of Republican voters believe Barack Obama was born in the United States but 32% still do not. With the ones who think Obama was born in the country, Romney edges Perry 25-22. That's more than overcome by Perry's 22-10 lead with the GOP voters who don't think the President is a legitimate US citizen.

Can you believe in global warming and evolution and still win the Republican Presidential nomination? I'm not sure you can given these numbers.

These numbers are very bad news for Michele Bachmann, and to a lesser extent Romney:

It's clear that Bachmann has gotten virtually no momentum out of her victory in the Ames Straw Poll. She was in 3rd place when we polled Iowa in June and she's in third place now. Beyond that her favorability numbers in the state have taken a significant hit. In June she had a 53/16 breakdown. Since then her positive number has dropped 6 points from 53% to 47%, and her negative number has climbed 19 points from 16% to 35%. Perry's now winning the voters on the far right that we showed her doing really well with throughout most of June and July. The day of her win in Ames may be remembered as the peak of her campaign.

In some sense the news is worse for Romney- he's actually losing support- going from 26% and the lead in June to 19% and second place now. There had been some thought that he might absorb Tim Pawlenty's support in the state and clearly that has not happened. But Romney probably doesn't need Iowa with New Hampshire serving as his firewall so these numbers still don't seem as bad for him as they do for Bachmann.

The other winner in the poll

Michele Bachmann may not have much momentum coming off of her strong performance in Ames but Ron Paul sure does. His 16% poll standing is up from 11% on our June poll of the state and his net favorability of +24 at 53/29 makes him the second most popular of 15 announced and potential candidates that we polled, behind only Perry's +32 at 56/24. While Paul is certainly still a very long shot for the nomination it looks likely that he will be a more relevant candidate this time around at least than he was in 2008.

Who's up and down

Here's the net favorability of everyone we polled in Iowa ranked from most popular to least popular, compared with where they were on our June poll:

Candidate	Favorability (Net)	Change from June Poll
Rick Perry	56/24 (+32)	+27 (was +5 at 21/16)
Ron Paul	53/29 (+24)	+11 (was +13 at 42/29)
Rick Santorum	44/22 (+22)	+11 (was +11 at 29/18)
Chris Christie	43/21 (+22)	-8 (was +30 at 42/12)
Paul Ryan	38/21 (+17)	-11 (was +28 at 42/14)
Sarah Palin	52/36 (+16)	-12 (was +28 at 59/31)
Michele Bachmann	47/35 (+12)	-25 (was +37 at 53/16)
Rudy Giuliani	43/34 (+9)	-9 (was +18 at 49/31)
Herman Cain	42/35 (+7)	-7 (was +14 at 38/24)
Mitt Romney	45/38 (+7)	-10 (was +17 at 51/34)
Newt Gingrich	42/44 (-2)	None (was -2 at 39/41)
Fred Karger	3/25 (-22)	-7 (was -15 at 2/17)
Gary Johnson	5/31 (-26)	-12 (was -14 at 4/18)
Jon Huntsman	13/40 (-27)	-11 (was -16 at 7/23)
Buddy Roemer	1/34 (-33)	-16 (was -17 at 4/21)

Besides Romney and Paul the only other candidate who appears to be getting any traction right now in Iowa is Santorum, who's seen a healthy improvement in his favorability numbers. That still doesn't appear to be translating into many votes for Santorum but if Republican voters demonstrate that they at least like him that might help his cause for getting a show on Fox, which might be the best possible outcome for him out of this campaign.

No one is sinking faster than Bachmann. And it's interesting to note that Palin's popularity is on the decline as well, which makes you wonder how much of a factor she would be even if she did jump into the race at this point.

Full results here

Obama's Base Problem

2011-08-19T14:29:00.004-05:00

There's been plenty of bad news for Barack Obama this month in the form of his approval numbers, but our polling finds that his problems go deeper than that. Democratic enthusiasm about voting in next year's election has hit a record low this month.

Only 48% of Democrats on our most recent national survey said they were 'very excited' about voting in 2012. On the survey before that the figure was 49%. Those last two polls are the only times all year the 'very excited' number has dipped below 50%.

In 13 polls before August the average level of Democrats 'very excited' about voting next year had averaged 57%. It had been as high as 65% and only twice had the number even dipped below 55%.

It had seemed earlier in the year like Democrats had overcome the 'enthusiasm gap' that caused so much of their trouble in last year's elections. But now 54% of Republicans say they're 'very excited' about casting their ballots next year, indicating that the problem may be back.

The debt deal really does appear to have demoralized the base, and the weird thing about it is that this is one issue where if Obama had done what folks on the left wanted him to do, he also would have had the support of independents. The deal has proven to be a complete flop in swing states where we've polled it like Colorado, North Carolina, and Ohio. And in every single one of those states a majority of voters overall, as well as a majority of independents, think new taxes are going to be needed to solve the deficit problem.

In Colorado it's 59/31 overall and 55/33 with independents for more taxes. In North Carolina it's 53/32 overall and 56/31 with independents for more taxes. And in Ohio it's 54/37 overall and 55/37 with independents for more taxes. It's obviously not like these voters want more taxes- no one does. But they do see them as necessary and Obama antagonized his base with the deal he cut on this issue without doing anything to help himself with independents or Republicans.

It's a long way until November 2012 and Obama certainly has time to redeem himself but for the first time in his Presidency I really do think he has an issue with the Democratic base.

Kasich/SB 5 numbers

2011-08-18T16:14:00.003-05:00

John Kasich and Senate Bill 5 are both still unpopular: but neither is as unpopular as it was 3 months ago.

50% of Ohioans say they would vote to reject Senate Bill 5 if the election was today, to 39% who would vote to accept it. Those are encouraging numbers for pro-labor interests but when we last polled the state in May 55% of voters say they were against the bill to only 35% in favor of it. So the trendlines at least are working in favor of the bill remaining as law.

Democrats (69/21) are more in favor of rejecting the bill than Republicans (58/29) are of accepting it. But independents have moved from 52/40 opposition to it in May to 46/44 support for it now.

The odds are still stacked against SB 5 staying enacted but just like we saw in the Wisconsin recalls the anger is not there at the same level it was during the spring, which has to be a slight cause of concern for those working to reject it.

John Kasich remains one of the most unpopular Governors in the country with a 36/53 approval rating. The only one we've polled this year with worse approval numbers is Florida's Rick Scott. Still Kasich's numbers represent a slight improvement from May when he was at 33/56. That's mostly attributable to Republicans rallying around him- they've gone from 58/28 approval to 67/21. He continues to have basically no support from Democrats- an 11/80 spread- and with independents he mirrors his overall numbers at 36/52.

Despite the small improvement in Kasich's approval numbers he would still lose a hypothetical rematch to predecessor Ted Strickland by a wide 54-39 margin. Democrats are having a rough August nationally but when you see those numbers it's still a reminder that we're a long way away from the political climate of 2010.

Perhaps the worst finding for Kasich on our poll is this: by a 41-31 margin Ohio voters think ousted Ohio State football Jim Tressel is a more 'ethical and honest' person than their Governor. This despite the fact that Tressel has been found to have repeatedly lied about various issues surrounding his program.

Full results here

Close Senate race in Wisconsin

2011-08-18T13:53:00.004-05:00

The Wisconsin Senate seat being vacated by Herb Kohl is looking like a genuine Republican pick up opportunity, with both Tommy Thompson and Mark Neumann leading all the potential Democratic candidates we tested besides Russ Feingold.

Feingold, who doesn't seem terribly interested in running, would still be the strongest potential candidate. He has the best favorability rating of anyone we looked at both overall (49/43) and specifically with independents (52/37). He would have the slightest advantage over Thompson, 48-47, and a more healthy one over Neumann at 51-44. Feingold led them by 10 and 12 points respectively when PPP first looked at this race in May so there's been a good amount of movement toward the Republicans since that time.

Voters in the state are pretty evenly divided in their feelings about Thompson with 44% rating him favorably and 42% unfavorably. He would start out with decent sized leads over all the Democratic candidates not named Russ Feingold- 7 points over Ron Kind at 48-41, 8 over Tammy Baldwin at 50-42, and 8 over Steve Kagen at 49-41. Thompson was tied with Kind, led Baldwin by only 1, and had just a 3 point advantage over Kagen the last time we polled so again these numbers show momentum in the GOP's direction.

Neumann doesn't fare as well as Thompson but still has small leads over the Democratic field. He's up 3 on Kind at 43-40, 4 on Baldwin at 44-40, and 7 on Kagen at 45-38.

None of the candidates beyond Thompson and Feingold are particularly well known. Baldwin has 54% name recognition, Neumann's is 52%, Kind's is 44%, and Kagen's is 36%.

The timing of both Wisconsin polls we've done since Kohl's retirement announcement has been a little odd. The first was done just a couple weeks after the killing of Osama bin Laden and may have represented somewhat of a high point for Democrats. This one was done the same weekend that we nationally found a record low approval rating for Barack Obama. So unless Obama's numbers continue to get worse, this may be something of a high point for the Republicans.

Split the difference between the two polls and you're looking at a sheer toss up, with Democrats probably having the slightest advantage if Feingold runs and Republicans probably having the slightest advantage if Feingold doesn't run and Thompson can actually survive the Republican primary.

Everything we saw in the recall elections points to a closely divided state and against that backdrop it's no surprise the Senate race is falling into that category as well.

Full results here

Iowa and National Poll Question Suggestions

2011-08-17T19:35:00.002-05:00

Iowa was the winner of our vote on where to poll this week so we'll do that in addition to our national poll. Obviously we'll ask about the Republican primary on both polls and test Obama against the regulars. Beyond those things what would you like to see us delve into? Appreciate the question suggestions as always.

Perdue down 8 to McCrory

2011-08-17T15:35:00.003-05:00

When it comes to Bev Perdue's poll numbers you can look at it one of two ways.

If you look at her situation just in terms of where she stands now it's a pretty sorry picture. Her approval rating is 37% with 48% of voters disapproving of her. Independents split against her 38/51 and only 58% of Democrats think she's doing a good job while at the same time 77% of Republicans think she's doing poorly. She trails Pat McCrory 47-39 for reelection, the same deficit she faced a month ago.

If you look at where she stands today in context with where her numbers have been in the past though, they look a little bit more promising. Six months ago she had an identical 48% disapproval to what she has now, but her approval rating was only 30%. So she's improved 7 points on that front. In fact her 37% standing right now is the best she's enjoyed since April of 2009, only 3 months after she took office. And while the 8 point deficit against McCrory is bad, it's not as bad as the 12 point one she had against him in February at 49-37.

Perdue's making progress. She hasn't made enough progress yet and has a long way to go but there's more of a ray of hope for her now than there was earlier in the year.

The Republican legislature has undoubtedly helped Perdue's prospects. Asked whether voters have more faith in her or them to lead the state the Governor comes out on top by a 44-41 margin. In February the GOP led 44-37 on that question. They've proven to be a good foil for her and things are moving in her direction, if slowly. It just remains to be seen if she can continue that progress over the next 14 months and change.

Full results here

Brown leads Republican field

2011-08-17T13:42:00.003-05:00

As soon as Jim Tressel stepped down as Ohio State's football coach folks started contacting us and saying we needed to test him as a potential Republican Senate candidate against Sherrod Brown. So on our poll of the state last weekend, the first we've conducted since Tressel's resignation, we did.

Tressel remains a pretty popular figure in the state. 39% of voters have a favorable opinion of him to 27% with a negative one. Those numbers are certainly better than any major politician in the state can claim. Beyond that he has bipartisan appeal. Both Republicans (44/19) and Democrats (37/28) have a favorable opinion of him.

Nevertheless Tressel would trail Brown in a hypothetical match up, 46-34. Democrats may like Tressel but they wouldn't be willing to actually vote for him over their incumbent Senator. Brown leads him 79-9 within his party. Brown also has a 43-31 lead with independents, while Tressel has the 68-6 advantage with Republicans.

Tressel does as well as any of the Republicans who are actually running or could plausbly get into the race though. Brown leads Congressman Jim Jordan 47-35, former state senator Kevin Coughlin 47-33, and State Treasurer Josh Mandel 48-33.

Brown is not as safe as those double digit margins might suggest. Mandel has only 34% name recognition, Jordan's is just 29%, and only 23% of voters claim to have an opinion about Coughlin. Because they're so unknown at this point there are far more Republican voters than Democrats undecided in each of these match ups and that means there would be definite tightening once one of them actually became the GOP nominee.

Brown's approval numbers are not exactly stellar, with 37% of voters approving of him to 34% who disapprove. Independents split against him by a 32/40 margin. Still his net approval is running 11 points ahead of Obama's in the state, so Brown will probably continue to be out ahead unless the President really, really tanks. Republicans have some reasons for hope here but compared to places like Nebraska, Montana, and Missouri it's looking like a second tier pick up possibility.

Full results here

Perry, Bachmann tied in Wisconsin

2011-08-17T11:07:00.004-05:00

Rick Perry and Michele Bachmann are tied for the Republican Presidential lead in Wisconsin at 20%...with Mitt Romney all the way back at 13%. Sarah Palin at 11%, Herman Cain at 7%, Newt Gingrich and Ron Paul at 6%, Tim Pawlenty (the poll was conducted before he dropped out) at 3%, and Jon Huntsman at 1% round out the field.

These numbers make it clear that Bachmann and Perry have all the momentum in the state, while all the other candidates are losing steam. Perry wasn't even tested when we polled Wisconsin in May and Bachmann's up 9 points now from her 11% standing then. Everyone else is on the decline- Pawlenty's fall was the worst, down 8 points from 11% in May to now 3%. You can see why he dropped out.

Palin's support is down 5 points, Romney, Paul, and Gingrich are each down 4, Cain's down 3, and Huntsman's down 1. At least in Wisconsin Perry and Bachmann are clearly sucking the wind out of the rest of the field and it's going to be interesting to see if that's the case everywhere in polling over the next couple weeks.

There are two key things within the crosstabs that don't bode terribly well for Romney:

-Among 'very conservative' voters, the largest segment of the Republican electorate in Wisconsin, Romney gets only 11%. That puts him well behind Bachmann's 25% and Perry's 22%. This was never a group of voters that Romney seemed particularly likely to win, but it's one that he has generally been able to stay competitive with. With two candidates in the race now who are better liked by the far right it's not clear if Romney's going to be able to get the minimum threshold of support he needs there.

-Here's the other problem though: the pattern in our polling over the last few months has been Bachmann wins the far right, Romney wins the moderates, and Romney wins overall because he also finishes first among what you might think of as the Republican middle- voters who identify themselves as conservative, but not as 'very conservative.' Winning with those voters in Wisconsin? Perry with 25% to 17% for Romney and 15% for Bachmann. That's the real threat Perry poses to Romney- if he can be the guy for Republican partisans who think Romney's too liberal but also think Bachmann's nuts. This is just one state and not a terribly important one to the nomination process at that but the numbers are not great news for Romney.

If you take Palin out of the picture Bachmann gains even more steam, getting 24% to 20% for Perry, 17% for Romney, and 10% for Gingrich.

Full results here

Thompson vulnerable on right

2011-08-17T09:51:00.003-05:00

I think it's highly unlikely Tommy Thompson is going to be the Republican Senate candidate in Wisconsin next year.

Sure our newest poll of the state finds Thompson leading Mark Neumann 47-39 in a head to head primary match up. But that's based much more than anything else on Thompson's far superior name recognition. 91% of GOP voters are familiar enough with him to have formed an opinion, while that's only the case for 57% of voters when it comes to Neumann. With that 57% of voters who have formed an opinion of Neumann, whether it's a positive or a negative one, he leads Thompson by a 55-39 margin. That bodes pretty well for Neumann's prospects as he gets into the swing of the campaign.

Here's the real sign of how weak Thompson is though. We read respondents a two sentence, 28 word summary of the attacks he's likely to face from Neumann during the primary campaign and then asked voters again who they would support if the primary was today. And all the sudden Thompson trailed Neumann by a whooping 33 points, 59-26! Two sentences led to a 40 point swing in the horse race. We don't see that happen very often. (Here's the likely future Neumann line of attack on Thompson that we read: "While Tommy Thompson was Governor, he more than doubled state spending and increased government bureaucracy. Then he endorsed Obamacare, President Obama’s $1- trillion-dollar government takeover of health care.")

Thompson is already vulnerable with the far right. On the original ballot question he trailed 54-38 with 'very conservative' voters, but made up for that with a 57-21 advantage among moderates and a 48-33 one with 'somewhat conservative' voters. After the rigor of a primary campaign his situation will be far worse. He's made a successful career out of being a moderate Republican, but there may not be a place for that anymore in today''s Tea Party dominated GOP. I will be very surprised if he snags the nomination.

On the Democratic side in Wisconsin we didn't even bother testing Russ Feingold this month because if he runs, he'll be the Democratic nominee, end of story. If Feingold sits it out Tammy Baldwin is looking like the early favorite. In a three way race with Ron Kind and Steve Kagen she leads with 37% to 21% for Kind and 15% for Kagen. And in just a two way race with Kagen she leads 48-19.

Certainly Baldwin is at her strongest in the three way race with voters describing themselves as 'very liberal,' with whom she leads Kagen by 42 points and Kind by 47. But she's also up 19 on Kind and 31 on Kagen with voters identifying just as 'somewhat liberal' and even with moderates she basically runs even with Kind, getting 23% to his 24% with Kagen back at 16%. In the head to head with Kagen, Baldwin is up double digits with every ideology group. If she runs and Feingold doesn't, she's going to be pretty difficult to beat in a primary.

Full results here

This week's poll choices

2011-08-17T08:42:00.003-05:00

We're due up for our national poll this week, which I'm pretty excited about given all the recent changes in the GOP race. We're also going to do one individual state poll. Here are the choices:

-Connecticut. With a lot of ground to defend next year this is definitely one Senate seat Democrats could live with not having to worry about- would a Chris Shays candidacy put it in play for the GOP?

-Kentucky. It's now less than three months until the general election for Governor there and we haven't polled the race a single time this year. In addition to that I'm very interested to see how Rand Paul and Mitch McConnell's approval numbers are holding up.

-Iowa. Obviously it'll be interesting to see what the Republican numbers look like in a post-Pawlenty exit, post-Perry entrance landscape. And beyond that the general election numbers in this difficult period for Barack Obama would be interesting to see as well.

-South Carolina. Seeing the numbers post-Perry entrance is the most interesting thing here as well and one reason you could argue for polling South Carolina over Iowa is that there will probably be a lot of Iowa polls in the next few weeks but we seem to be about the only company looking at SC with any sort of regularity.

-West Virginia. The general election for this Gubernatorial race is now less than two months away and it's probably going to be closer than the one in Kentucky. Also good to get the regular refresh on how Joe Manchin is holding up.

Voting will be open until 5 PM today.

Obama in Vermont

2011-08-16T14:50:00.002-05:00

If you're looking for a place to symbolize Barack Obama's dropping poll numbers Vermont might not exactly be the first that comes to mind. And Obama certainly doesn't need to worry about losing the state next year. But his numbers there are considerably weaker than in 2008, reflecting the general bad trend we're seeing for him pretty much everywhere right now.

Obama defeated John McCain by 37 points, 68-31. Now he leads Mitt Romney in the state by only a 20 point margin, 54-34. Suffice it to say if Obama saw a 17 point drop in his margin versus John McCain nationally, as he is in Vermont, he would get blown out in his reelection bid next year.

Obama does worse than he did last time around against the whole rest of the Republican roster of candidates as well, even Sarah Palin. Michele Bachmann does 9 points better than McCain did, trailing by 28 points at 58-30. Rick Perry improves on the McCain margin by 8, trailing by 29 points at 57-28. Herman Cain outperforms McCain by 5, down 32 to Obama at 58-26. And Palin fares 3 points better than McCain, trailing Obama by 34 at 62-28.

Vermont is not going to be a consequential state in the 2012 Presidential race, or maybe any Presidential race ever. But the numbers there are indicative of the extent to which Obama's down everywhere. His approval in the state is 53%, with 40% of voters disapproving. Those are pretty weak numbers in a place where he won with 68% of the vote.

Full results here

Obama, GOP candidates all unpopular

2011-08-16T12:26:00.004-05:00

Ohio's a pretty good microcosm for an unhappy nation right now.

Barack Obama's approval rating in the state right now is 44%, with 52% of voters disapproving of him. His numbers with independents are horrid at 34/59. And there's a whole lot more Democrats (16%) who disapprove of him than there are Republicans (just 4%) who like him.

So with those numbers Obama must be doomed in one of the country's most important swing states, right? Wrong. Obama leads the entire Republican field in Ohio.

How can that be? Well Obama's pretty unpopular. But consider these favorability numbers for the Republican alternatives: Mitt Romney, 30% favorable/49% unfavorable, Rick Perry, 28% favorable/37% unfavorable, Michele Bachmann, 30% favorable/49% unfavorable, Sarah Palin, 34% favorable/59% unfavorable, and Herman Cain, 22% favorable/35% unfavorable.

Obama's net approval is a -8 spread. Every Republican's net favorability is even worse than that. Ohio voters don't like Obama. They like the GOP Presidential field even less. So at least for now Obama's up 2 points on Romney at 45-43, 4 points on Perry at 45-41, 7 points on Bachmann at 48-41, 8 points on Cain at 47-39, and 13 points on Palin at 51-38.

In all of these match ups there are a lot more undecided Republicans than Democrats so at least the Romney and Perry match ups with Obama are sheer toss ups. But it's still kind of amazing the President's holding up as well as he is with these approval numbers.

Like Obama, all of the Republican candidates get negative assessments from independents. And also like Obama they're all more unpopular across party lines than they are well liked within their own parties. Voters in Ohio aren't real impressed with any politicians right now and it shows in these numbers. Bottom line- Ohio looks like it will have the same closely contested Presidential contest next year that it's had regularly over the last few election cycles.

Full results here

Sentiment moving against Walker recall

2011-08-16T10:36:00.003-05:00

Public sentiment in Wisconsin is moving against a recall of Scott Walker. Walker though remains very unpopular and if Russ Feingold chose to run against him in a recall election he would find himself in deep trouble.

50% of Wisconsin voters generally oppose a recall of Walker, compared to 47% in favor. Those numbers are flipped from our last statewide poll, in May, which found 50% generally in support of a recall and 47% in opposition. The overall switch comes because independents have moved from slightly in favor of removing Walker from office (50/47) to slightly opposed (46/50) and because 94% of Republicans now oppose recalling Walker, up from 89% on the last poll.

It's not that Walker has become popular all the sudden. His approval rating is still a pretty bad 45/53. Independents disapprove of him by a 44/53 margin. Democrats are more unified in their dislike of him (93%) than Republicans are in their support (87%). But I think there's a certain segment of voters in Wisconsin- somewhere around 10% of the population- that is generally opposed to the concept of recalls regardless of how they feel about how things are going in the state. We've seen that in the State Senate recalls so far- the polls have universally moved in the closing days in favor of the incumbents, both Democratic and Republican. When folks get off the fence they're tending to vote anti-recall.

For all that Walker could still be in pretty big trouble though. Russ Feingold would lead him 52-45 in a recall at this stage, taking independents by a 53-43 margin. Despite his defeat last year in an election marked by very low Democratic turnout, Feingold remains decently popular in the state with a 49/43 favorability rating.

Democrats may be dependent on a Feingold candidacy to win though. In May Tom Barrett led Walker 50-43 in a hypothetical rematch of their contest last fall, but now Barrett's advantage is only 48-47. Given the way sentiment has moved against recall in the closing days of these elections I don't think Barrett would beat Walker if he started with only a one point lead. And Walker already has the advantage over two other Democrats that have been mentioned as potential candidates- 47-44 over former Congressman David Obey and 46-43 over sitting Congressman Ron Kind.

A Walker recall is certainly doable, but it's not going to be easy by any stretch of the imagination regardless of his continued poor polling numbers.

Nationally both Democrats and Republicans claimed victory in last week's recall elections: Republicans because they maintained control of the State Senate and Democrats because they picked up two seats they hadn't been able to win even in the wave election of 2008. When it comes to Wisconsin voters though there's a more stark contrast in reactions. Republicans are pleased with the results by a 73/13 margin. Democrats are unhappy with the results by a 17/64 spread. Clearly for Democratic voters in the state it was a majority or bust.

Full results here

Perry tied in NC, CO

2011-08-15T14:58:00.003-05:00

Rick Perry's only been in the Presidential race for two days but based on our most recent round of state polling he's already close to deserving co-front runner status. We found him tied for the lead last week among Republican voters in both Colorado and North Carolina, two very different states and also two that are a long way from Texas.

In North Carolina Perry's in a three way tie with Mitt Romney and Sarah Palin. Each is getting 17%. Herman Cain at 11% and Newt Gingrich at 10% round out the candidates in double digits and Michele Bachmann at 9%, Ron Paul at 7%, Tim Pawlenty at 2% (the poll was conducted before he dropped out), and Jon Huntsman at 1% represent the rest of the field.

Perry also led a PPP poll conducted in Virginia two weeks ago. It's clear he's going to be an extremely formidable candidate in the South and I'd expect that the next time we poll South Carolina he's either going to be in the lead or awfully close to it.

Perry's strength in Colorado might be more of a surprise. There he and Romney each get 20%, followed by Bachmann at 12%, Palin at 11%, Paul at 8%, Cain at 7%, Gingrich at 6%, Pawlenty at 3%, and Huntsman at 2%.

In both states Bachmann gains a lot of ground if you take Palin out of the picture. In North Carolina she and Perry tie at 17% with Romney at 16% and Paul and Gingrich at 11%. In Colorado she goes up to 15% with Romney at 22% and Perry at 21% leading the way.

We will also show Perry doing very well in Ohio and Wisconsin Republican polling that will be released later this week.

Full results here

Colorado Miscellaneous

2011-08-11T14:01:00.002-05:00

-John Hickenlooper is proving to be one of the most popular Governors in the country. 54% of voters approve of him to only 24% who disapprove. That +30 net approval spread makes him the third most popular sitting Governor out of 42 PPP has polled on, putting him behind only Nebraska's Dave Heineman and Arkansas' Mike Beebe.

Hickenlooper's very popular with Democrats at 73/11, that's a given. And his strong numbers with independents at 49/29 are no surprise either. What sets him apart from most other Governors is that he nearly breaks even across party lines, with 34% of Republicans approving of him and only 37% disapproving. It's very unusual to see that in these highly polarized political times.

If- and it's a big if just 7 months into office- Hickenlooper can keep up these sorts of numbers he seems bound to be in the 2016 discussion either as a Presidential or Vice Presidential candidate. Not a lot of purple state Governors with this kind of popularity.

-Hickenlooper's always been popular. New to the popularity game is Michael Bennet, who 44% of voters now give good marks to compared to 36% who think he's doing a bad job. Bennet's mostly had bad approval numbers since being appointed in 2009. Even right before he got reelected last year we found him with only a 39% approval rating while 47% of voters disapproved of him. But folks seem to have warmed up to him since he won the full term.

One person they haven't warmed up to is his 2010 opponent, Ken Buck. Only 25% of voters now express a favorable opinion of Buck to 46% with an unfavorable one. And in a hypothetical rematch voters say they would pick Bennet by a 55-38 margin over Buck, quite a contrast from his razor thin margin of victory last fall. Those numbers would seem to suggest increasing trepidation from Colorado voters about a Tea Party candidate, speaking of which...

-Only 38% of voters in Colorado now have a favorable opinion of the Tea Party to 49% who see it unfavorably. It's predictable that Republicans (74/10) pretty universally have a positive opinion of it while Democrats (11/79) pretty universally have a negative opinion of it. What tips the scales is that it's quite unpopular with independents, a majority of whom (51%) don't care for the movement to 36% who see it favorably.

Running as a Tea Party candidate isn't going to be a very good idea for Republicans in Colorado next year, at least when it comes to the general election.

-Colorado voters will be deciding in November whether to enact a slight increase in the sales and income taxes to provide more money for education and right now they're very closely divided on the proposal. 45% of voters say they're inclined to support it while 47% are opposed. Independents support it by a 48/44 margin and usually that would make the difference but Republicans (21/73) are more unified in their opposition to the proposal than Democrats are in their support (63/29). Convincing more Democrats to be supportive may be the key to its passage.

-Looking toward 2012 Colorado voters may have the chance to vote on whether to legalize marijuana and for now a majority of voters are in support of that- 51% compared to 38% opposed to legalization. Independents are strongly in favor of this proposal (55/31) and there are actually more Republicans in support of it (31%) than there are Democrats opposed (24%).

These are encouraging numbers for legalization proponents but it's important to remember that California's proposal for legalizing marijuana last year polled pretty well until completely collapsing in the final month before the election. There's a long road ahead.

-Colorado voters are evenly divided on allowed gay couples to marry, but when civil unions are given as an option they're strongly supportive of extending some form of legal recognition to same sex couples. 45% of voters support gay marriage to 45% opposed. Independents are strongly in favor (54/33) but like on the tax issue Republicans are more strongly against it (73%) than Democrats are in support (64%). Still these numbers are indicative of the fast moving shift in public opinion on gay marriage. Just 5 years ago Colorado voters supported a constitutional amendment to define marriage as being between a man and a woman by a 56/44 margin.

With civil unions in the mix 71% of voters support some legal recognition for gay couples to only 27% completely opposed. Of that 71%, 40% say full marriage rights are their first choice with another 31% saying civil unions would be their preference. 76% of independents and even 57% of Republicans support extending more right to same sex couples.

-Quick hits: Mark Udall's approval rating is 45/34, solid numbers. Democrats lead the generic Congressional ballot 45/40, reflecting what we're seeing in our polls nationally. The passage of time is not helping resurrect Scott McInnis' image, with only 14% of voters rating him favorably to 31% with a negative opinion. Tom Tancredo's unpopular as well with a 30% positive rating and 43% of voters rating him unfavorably. Most surprising thing in those numbers is the 26% with no opinion- how can you be ambivalent on Tom Tancredo? And 32% of voters think prostitution should be legal to 56% illegal. We were prompted to ask that question after surprisingly finding that Democrats, Republicans, and independents in Nevada all thought that it should be legal. But we found the opposite in Colorado with voters across party lines all thinking that it should be illegal. Nevada's an island unto itself, at least on that front.

Full results here

Obama up in North Carolina

2011-08-11T09:49:00.003-05:00

Our newest North Carolina Presidential poll falls into what's becoming a familiar pattern as we take the pulse of swing states across the country: Mitt Romney would be in a toss up with Barack Obama right now, while Obama holds healthy leads over the rest of the Republican field.

Obama leads Romney by 3 points in the state, 46-43. However most of the undecided voters are GOP leaning so it's probably best to think of that match up as a tie. The numbers are an improvement for Obama compared to a month ago when he and Romney were dead even. We've seen a general improvement in Obama's numbers as opposed to the Republican alternatives in the wake of the debt deal. My take on the fallout from that based on the polling we've done is that it hurt Obama's image a little bit but it probably hurt the GOP's image even more.

Obama's 3 point lead over Romney underscores another emerging reality: North Carolina is likely to play a much more important role in the Presidential race next year than it has in years. Obama's doing better against Romney here than in more quintessential swing states like Pennsylvania, New Hampshire, and Nevada and the numbers are very comparable to places like Ohio, Florida, and Virginia.

North Carolina was extremely competitive in 2008 but it was the cherry on top for Obama- he really didn't need it. With his numbers holding up better now in the state than in other places that he won by much wider margins last time around, North Carolina is a good deal more likely to be one of the states key to getting him to 270 electoral votes. It's quite a remarkable shift from 2004 when Democrats basically gave up on the state in September.

Against the rest of the GOP field Obama has pretty healthy leads- it's 8 points over Rick Perry at 48-40, 10 over Michele Bachmann at 50-40, and 13 over both Herman Cain and Sarah Palin at 50-37 and 52-39. There are a lot more undecided Republicans than Democrats in all of those match ups so the final results would probably be closer if voters really had to cast their ballots today but the margins are wide enough it's pretty safe to say that he would beat any of those four at this point in time.

Obama's approval rating is 46%, with 50% of voters disapproving of him. That's up a tick from a 45/51 spread on last month's poll but below where he's been throughout most of the year. The main thing dragging him down is that only 38% of independents are happy with the job he's doing to 56% who disapprove. It's also worth noting that in metro Charlotte, where the Democratic convention will be held next year, his approval numbers break down at a pretty poor 41/56 spread.

It looks like North Carolina's battleground days are here to stay.

Full results here

Ohio and Wisconsin Question Suggestion Thread

2011-08-10T16:04:00.003-05:00

Ohio and Wisconsin won our vote on where to poll this week.

In Ohio we'll obviously test Josh Mandel and Kevin Coughlin against Sherrod Brown. Anyone else?

We'll do some Jim Tressel related questions of Ohio State fans- anything in particular you think we should ask?

Obviously we'll do the standard Presidential stuff we do in every state and any other suggestions you might have would be much appreciated as well.

In Wisconsin I think it's a given we'll test Russ Feingold, Tammy Baldwin, Ron Kind, and Steve Kagen against Tommy Thompson and Mark Neumann. Anyone else we need to throw into those Senate general election match ups?

We'll test Feingold and Tom Barrett against Scott Walker in a potential recall election. Any other Dems we should throw in that hat?

As with Ohio we'll do the standard rate Presidential stuff but if you have any other good Wisconsin question ideas please let us know as well.

Thanks as always for the great suggestions!

Michigan Miscellaneous

2011-08-10T15:15:00.003-05:00

-Michigan voters are opposed to gay marriage but when you add civil unions to the mix a majority of people in the state support form of legal recognition for same sex couples.

Only 33% think gay marriage should be legal compared to 53% who think it should continue to be illegal. Democrats narrowly support it (48/36), while independents are narrowly opposed (36/50). Tipping the scales is near unanimous opposition among Republicans, 10/78.

Asked whether they support gay marriage, civil unions, or no recognition for gay couples though 62% express favor for granting more rights with 29% saying their choice is full marriage rights and an additional 33% preferring civil unions. 35% oppose giving gay couples any rights.

This is becoming a theme in our polling- voters are willing to give gay couples the legal rights associated with marriage but they're not willing to put the term 'marriage' on it. It seems to be a semantic issue more than anything else.

-Kwame Kilpatrick may be out of jail but he's not getting a free pass in the court of public opinion. Only 4% of voters in the state have a favorable opinion of him to 77% with a negative one. That makes him the second most unpopular person PPP has ever polled on, putting him behind only former Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich who we found a -75 spread (8/83) for last year. Kilpatrick's numbers make him more unpopular than folks like John Edwards in North Carolina, Levi Johnston in Alaska, and Charlie Sheen nationally who also rank among the least appealing folks we've looked at.

The current occupant of the Mayor's chair in Detroit, Dave Bing, is viewed positively by voters around the state. 36% have a favorable opinion of him to 15% with an unfavorable one, and 49% have no opinion. He's popular across party lines with Democrats (31/21), Republicans (37/9), and independents (42/11) all giving him good marks.

We looked at former Detroit mayors Dennis Archer and the late Coleman Young as well. Archer has Bing-like polling numbers with 36% of voters seeing him positively and 16% unfavorably. Like Bing, Archer is well respected across the line with Democrats (37/20), Republicans (32/12), and independents (38/14) all seeing him in a good light.

Young has more Kilpatrick-like poll numbers, even more than 13 years after his death. Only 17% of voters have a favorable opinion of him to 49% with a negative one. He's reviled by Republicans (6/62) and independents (7/57), while Democrats pretty much split evenly on him (32/33).

There are two clear and very different categories the last 38 years of Detroit mayors fall into when it comes to how they're seen across the state.

-Absence apparently does not make the heart grow fonder, at least when it comes to the image of recently departed Governor Jennifer Granholm. She continues to be a pretty unpopular figure in the state with only 39% of voters saying they like her while 54% view her in a dim light. Those numbers are almost identical to the ones Rick Snyder's getting for his job performance right now- serving as Governor of Michigan is not the job you want right now if you hope for people to like you.

-Voters must not be very happy with the Michigan House of Representatives back in Republican control, because they say if they could vote today they'd support Democrats for the legislature by a 47-36 margin. A lot of Democratic voters jumped ship last year but now 94% say they would support their party's candidates if the election was today, compared to only 88% of GOP voters committed to their party. Republicans do lead by a 6 point margin with independents but that represents a significant shift from the blow out advantages GOP candidates tended to have with them in the state last year. Democrats would probably retake control of the House if they won the popular vote by this much next November.

Full results here

Obama leads in Colorado

2011-08-10T13:25:00.004-05:00

Barack Obama isn't terribly popular in Colorado. But he has healthy leads over all of his potential Republican opponents there anyway and this is looking like one of the states he flipped in 2008 that's most likely to remain in his column for 2012.

Obama's Colorado approval rating is 46% with 50% of voters disapproving of him. That represents a 10 point decline on the margin from when we last polled Colorado in February, when he was at 51/45. Obama's numbers with Republicans (8/89) are identical to what they were then and he's seen only a slight down tick with Democrats (from 84/13 to 82/15). The reason his numbers have slid is a significant drop with independents. Six months ago they approved of him by a 54/42 margin. Now those numbers are reversed and then some with only 38% approving of him to 56% who disapprove.

In spite of that Obama still has solid leads over all of his potential Republican opponents. Only Mitt Romney improves on John McCain's 9 point margin of defeat in the state, trailing Obama by 7 points at 48-41. That's almost identical to the 47-41 lead we found for Obama in February, interesting considering the drop in his approval numbers since that time. Against the rest of the GOP field Obama holds a double digit advantage: he's up 12 on Michele Bachmann at 51-39, 13 on Rick Perry at 51-38, and 16 on both Herman Cain and Sarah Palin at 51-35 and 54-38 respectively.

How can Obama be doing so well despite his own lack of popularity in Colorado? Voters may not like him but they like him a heck of a lot more than any of the Republican candidates. Cain's net favorability is -10 at 20/30, Perry's is -14 at 24/38, Romney's is -21 at 30/51, Bachmann's is -22 at 28/50, and Palin's is -27 at 33/60. Obama's definitely benefiting from a 'lesser of two evils' mindset.

Colorado showed last fall it was perfectly willing to elect someone it didn't like if it liked the alternative even less. Michael Bennet had a 39/47 approval rating on our final poll before the election and still managed to get reelected and Obama's at least faring better than that. What it appears has happened over the last six months is that voters have soured on Obama but they've soured on the Republicans just as much over that period of time and the net impact has been a wash when it comes to the horse race. It's a reflection of the disgust voters are feeling towards politicians across the spectrum right now.

I think the most telling stat about the weakness of the GOP candidate field is this- despite Obama's 38/56 approval with independents he still has the upper hand against every Republican with them- a 2 point lead over Romney, 12 point advantage over Perry, 14 over Bachmann, 17 against Palin, and 19 against Cain. They're down on Obama but they're not buying the alternatives either.

The last few weeks have been some of the darkest ones of the Obama administration and for all that he still has a 7 point lead over his strongest potential opponent in Colorado. This is coming off a year where Democrats in Colorado held their Senate seat and the Governor's office in what was otherwise a terrible year for the party nationally. It's still probably best to call the state purple, but it seems to be shading toward blue.

Full results here

Dismal numbers for NC GOP...but a structural advantage

2011-08-10T11:47:00.003-05:00

North Carolina voters think the budget that went into effect last month has had a negative impact on the state and as a result the Republicans in the Legislature have now hit a record level of unpopularity, with a majority of voters disapproving of them.

33% of voters approve of the job the Republicans legislators are doing, while 50% disapprove. Those poor numbers are mostly attributable to a 24/52 spread with independent voters. What makes that particularly notable is that on our last statewide poll before the election last year we found that independents were planning to support GOP legislative candidates by a 20 point margin, 51-31. Those voters are clearly having second thoughts now about the outcomes of their choices last fall.

Why have the Republicans hit a record low? There are a couple clues within the questions we asked on the poll. A little more than a month after the new state budget went into effect 45% of voters say they think it's having a negative impact on the state compared to only 14% who think it's making a positive difference. The bad feelings toward the budget cut across party lines. Democrats (49/15), independents (44/14), and even Republicans (38/13) are all more inclined to think the budget is hurting the state than helping it.

Beyond that voters are responding pretty negatively to the new redistricting maps that were approved by the legislature last month. Unsurprisingly 41% of voters expressed no opinion on such an inside baseball topic. But among those who have one only 19% of voters support the new district lines to 41% opposed. Independents oppose them by a 47/20 margin and while Republicans support them, as you would expect, the 33-20 spread is much tighter than the 54-8 one by which Democrats are against them.

Those new boundary lines may be the GOP legislative majority's saving grace though. Democrats lead the generic legislative ballot this month by a 46-42 margin. That margin would certainly result in the party picking up seats if there was an election today, and it would give them a pretty decent chance at taking back control- under the current boundary lines. But the Republicans did such a good job in redistricting that I think it could well take a double digit advantage on the generic ballot for Democrats to win back a majority under these lines and that's only likely to happen in a wave election year on par with 2006. At this point that doesn't look terribly likely to occur last year.

The Republican legislators are extremely unpopular- but one of their unpopular actions could leave them in power for years to come.

Full results here

Boehner as unpopular as Pelosi

2011-08-10T09:41:00.003-05:00

A major milestone occurred in our national polling this week: John Boehner is now just as unpopular as Nancy Pelosi. His net approval is -24 at a 28/52 spread and her net approval is -24 as well at a 31/55 spread. In 2010 Republican House challengers were dying to run against Pelosi and did so with a high level of success. Now it looks like Democratic candidates may similarly be able to get traction by running against Boehner next year.

Pelosi's numbers now are exactly identical to what they were when we did our first poll of the year in January. But Boehner has dropped by an astounding 31 points. He began the year in positive ground with 35% of voters approving of him and 28% disapproving. Over the course of his first seven months as speaker his approval has dropped 7 points while his disapproval has spiked by 24 points.

I think most national pundits continue to be missing the boat on how possible it is that Democrats will retake control of the House next year. We find Democrats with a 7 point lead on the generic Congressional ballot this week at 47-40. After getting demolished with independent voters last year, they now hold a slight 39-36 advantage with them. And in another contrast to 2010 Democratic voters are actually slightly more unified than Republicans, with 83% committed to supporting the party's Congressional candidates compared to 80% in line with theirs.

This poll is certainly not an outlier. We have looked at the generic ballot 11 times going back to the beginning of March and Democrats have been ahead every single time, by an average margin of about 4 points. This 7 point advantage is the largest Democrats have had and if there was an election today I'm think that they'd take back the House. Of course there's plenty of time between now and next November for the momentum to shift back in the other direction.

There's little doubt that Democrats are winning the fallout of the debt debate. Approval for Congressional Republicans has now plunged to a 25/65 spread. That's a 21 point decline on the margin from when they started the year at 33/52. Last year independent voters were the driving factor behind the GOP retaking the House majority. Now they give it a 20/68 approval rating.

It's early- but it looks very plausible that we could be back to Speaker Pelosi 17 months from now.

Full results here

Where should we poll this week?

2011-08-09T23:46:00.002-05:00

We were due for our national poll this week but there are so many places where it's worth doing a state poll that we're going to do a couple of those this week and hold off on the national poll. Here are your choices:

-Iowa. It would be worthwhile to have a 'real poll' in the field this weekend as a reality check on over interpretation of whatever happens in Ames. Plus we haven't polled Iowa since Rick Perry got in the picture and I think that has the potential to be a major game changer there. Also worth looking at Obama in the state- that's one it would be really nice for him not to have to worry about too much.

-Kentucky. The Governor's race seems to pretty much be in Democratic hands but we haven't taken a look at it since last October and it never hurts to have an extra set of eyes, especially on a race that's actually occurring this year. I'm also quite eager to take our first look at Rand Paul's approval numbers, and to see where Mitch McConnell is standing these days.

-Ohio. It's been almost three months now since we last polled the state and Ohio is definitely one that deserves to be polled at least quarterly. It's not a state Obama needs to win but it's one that if he does win pretty much puts the election away. So it would be good to get a look at where he is post-debt deal. Senate race is worth a look too and you can expect some Jim Tressel polling along the lines of what we put out on Butch Davis today if the state wins as well.

-South Carolina. I'm just going to lay it out there- based on what we released in Virginia last week and what we'll release in North Carolina later this week I think Perry is probably leading in South Carolina now. But that's why you do the polls is to actually know these things instead of making guesses about them. South Carolina gets a lot less polling than the other early states of Iowa and New Hampshire so definitely worth a look.

-West Virginia. In a year devoid of exciting statewide races the West Virginia Gubernatorial contest might be the most competitive one there's going to be. We haven't done anything there since before the primary and the election's in early October so it's time for a check up. And it's always good to keep an eye on Joe Manchin and see if he's still holding Shelley Moore Capito at bay in a hypothetical head to head.

-Wisconsin. Dems didn't get everything they wanted in this week's recall elections but there's a bigger prize ahead and that's Scott Walker. Worth taking a fresh look at how voters feel about removing him from office as well as what voters statewide thought about the outcome of this week's races. We would certainly poll the Senate and Presidential races as well.

Voting's open until 5 PM this afternoon, please don't rig it!

Nevada Miscellaneous

2011-08-09T15:58:00.003-05:00

-Last fall Harry Reid got reelected despite being unpopular because Nevada voters disliked Sharron Angle. 'Dislike' no longer describes how voters in the state feel about Angle. 'Hate' would be a better word. 17% of voters in the state have a favorable opinion of her to 70% with an unfavorable one. Right after Game Change came out 15% of North Carolina voters rated John Edwards favorably to 72% with a negative opinion. That's the only time I can remember polling someone and finding numbers comparable to these ones for Angle. (Edwards is even more unpopular than that now.)

It's a given that Angle gets horrid reviews from Democrats (5/86) and independents (19/71) but what's plunged her numbers down to near record levels in our polling is that even among Republicans only 31% now rate her favorably to 52% with a negative opinion. She is not going to be a factor in any future Nevada political race.

Harry Reid's numbers are about where they always are. 44% of voters approve of him while 51% disapprove. Independents split against him 52/42 and Republicans (88%) are more unified in their disapproval of him than Democrats (75%) are in their approval. But despite his less than stellar numbers he would now defeat Angle 53-40 in a hypothetical rematch, building on his margin of victory from last fall. He'd take independents by 20 points. Reid's continued presence in the Senate is a living symbol of the Tea Party's ability to poke the eyes out of the Republican Party.

-Brian Sandoval is continuing to hold up much better than most of his first term Republican Governor peers across the country. We find him with a 46% approval rating to 36% of voters disapproving of him. Those numbers are a slight improvement from our last poll of the state when he was at 44/38. Sandoval continues to be popular with independents (47/34) and his 25% approval rating with Democrats is a healthy amount of crossover support in a strongly polarized political climate. In a hypothetical rematch Sandoval would defeat Rory Reid 53-42, that 11 point margin identical to the one that he won by in November.

Although Sandoval is doing well our numbers don't suggest that putting him on the ticket would deliver Nevada for the Republican Presidential candidate next year. 46% of voters say Sandoval as the VP choice wouldn't sway their vote one way or the other. And with the ones who say it would make a difference 34% say it would make them less likely to vote GOP to only 20% who say they would consider it a plus.

That's consistent with what we've found in Virginia polling about Bob McDonnell- 31% less likely and 24% more likely- and in Florida polling about Marco Rubio- 35% less likely and 31% more likely. Just because voters like a home state politician doesn't mean they want them to be the Vice Presidential candidate or that it would make them more likely to support that person's party.

-On our last Nevada poll before he resigned we found John Ensign with a 35% approval rating and 50% of voters disapproving of him. Now with him out of office the bottom has dropped out. Only 22% say they have a favorable opinion of him with 58% rating him negatively. Democrats (10/74) and independents (17/61) give him horrid marks but that's nothing new and has been the case all along. What's dropped him further is that Republicans no longer feel the need to say they care for him. In January they approved of him by a 59/29 margin. But now more- 39%- rate him unfavorably than the 37% who give him good marks. Safe to say with those numbers there's not going to be an Ensign comeback somewhere further down the line.

-Nevada voters are split almost evenly in their views on gay marriage with 45% thinking it should be legal and 44% illegal. You see the standard generational divide in the state- every age group under 65 supports it, including a 59/28 margin with those under 30. But senior citizens are very strongly opposed, 35/57, and that makes the overall numbers pretty even.

If you expand the discussion to civil unions 77% of voters support some form of legal recognition for gay couples with only 22% opposed. That 77% breaks down 39% for marriage and 38% for civil unions. Even 61% of Republicans are in favor of recognizing gay couples if civil unions are one of the options.

-56% of Nevada voters think prostitution should be legal to 32% who are opposed. Whats most interesting on this issue is that there's majority support across party lines- 65% of independents, 56% of Democrats, and 51% of Republicans think it should be legal. It is not too often these days we find an issue that Democrats and Republicans agree on and I can't say I thought this would be the one, even in Nevada.

-And finally voters in the state are almost evenly divided on the legalization of online poker. 40% support it with 42% opposed.

Full results here

Romney, Hoekstra up in Michigan

2011-08-09T14:26:00.000-05:00

Mitt Romney continues to be the favored Presidential candidate of Republican voters in Michigan, although maybe not to the extent you would expect given his long standing family ties to the state. He's at 24%, followed by Michele Bachmann at 18%, Rick Perry at 14%, Herman Cain and Newt Gingrich at 7%, Ron Paul at 6%, Thad McCotter at 5%, and Tim Pawlenty at 4%.

Romney's actually in third place with voters describing themselves as 'very conservative' at 16%, trailing Bachmann's 22% and Perry's 17%. But as is the case many places he builds a lead by being very strong with moderates (30-12 over Bachmann) and voters labeling themselves as only 'somewhat conservative' (28-17 over both Bachmann and Perry.)

Perry has to be seen as one of the winners on this poll. A double digit starting point a long way from home, outside the South, without really having done any campaigning yet shows the extent to which Republican voters are open to a new face. They're good news for Bachmann as well, she's clearly established herself as the top alternative to Romney for the moment, although that standing is a little bit tenuous as Perry joins the race.

The biggest loser on the poll is a toss up between McCotter and Pawlenty. For McCotter it's pretty bad news to be polling at only 5% in his home state and beyond that 61% of primary voters don't even know who he is. But for Pawlenty it's another last place finish and beyond that he gets the dubious distinction of being the first serious candidate to poll behind Thad McCotter anywhere.

We also looked at where the race would stand were Sarah Palin to make a last minute jump in. Romney's lead would expand from 6 points to 12, getting 25% to 13% for Perry and 12% for Palin and Bachmann. You can make an argument that Palin running would be the best thing that could happen for Romney- and by extension the Republican Party- at this point. Her candidacy would split the hard right vote three ways between herself, Bachmann, and Perry. That could only help Romney's chances at the nomination, and our polling has repeatedly shown that at least for now Romney's the only GOP candidate who's competitive with Obama both nationally and in key swing states.

Pete Hoekstra's looking like a shoo in for the Republican Senate nomination. He's polling at 78% to 5% for Randy Hekman, and 3% each for Peter Konetchy and John McCulloch (the poll was conducted before McCulloch dropped out and Gary Glenn joined the race.) More important than Hoekstra's lead against a bunch of no name opponents is that he has 75% name recognition with primary voters and a favorability spread of 64/11. The fact that he is pretty universally well liked from the get go will make it pretty hard for any new candidate to come from behind and deny him the nomination.

Full results here

Swing State Deficit Polling

2011-08-09T12:22:00.003-05:00

We decided to look at public opinion on the debt deal in two swing states that could hold the key to Barack Obama's reelection, Colorado and North Carolina. Here's what we found:

-Voters across party lines in both states think the deal will be bad for the economy. In Colorado 55% think the deal will hurt the economy to only 25% who think it will be good and in North Carolina 46% think it will hurt the economy to an identical 25% who believe it will be a good thing. In both states Republicans and independents are strongly opposed to the deal with Democrats against it as well, although by a much more narrow margin. In Colorado the numbers are 14/65 with Republicans, 20/59 with independents, and 36/43 with Democrats. In North Carolina the numbers are 19/56 with Republicans, 24/50 with independents, and 31/37 with Democrats.

-With such an unpopular deal it's hard to really crown a political 'winner' but to the extent there is one it's Barack Obama. Here's why Obama's the nominal winner. Among voters who support the deal, they're more prone to give Obama the credit than Congressional Republicans. And among voters who oppose the deal, they're more inclined to blame the GOP than the President. In Colorado 51% of voters who support it say Obama was more responsible to only 18% who say Congressional Republicans. In North Carolina it's a closer spread but 33% of supporters credit Obama to 30% for the GOP.

When it comes to the blame game among voters displeased with the compromise 33% in Colorado fault Congressional Republicans more to 23% for Obama and in North Carolina 35% say the GOP is more at fault to 21% who lay it more on the President.

The biggest indication that Obama came out ahead on this one may be in polls we'll release later this week though- Obama is ahead of Mitt Romney in both of these states.

-Very few voters think the deal cut last week is really going to solve the deficit problem and they think additional taxes are necessary. Only 3% of Colorado voters think last week's deal will really fix the deficit to 85% who don't believe it will and in North Carolina only 4% think it will solve the problem to 80% who dissent. One reason for that lack of optimism is that few voters think a 'cuts only' approach is going to solve the problem. In Colorado just 31% think spending cuts alone will work while 59% think there needs to be a combination of spending cuts and additional taxes. And in North Carolina only 32% think spending cuts exclusively will get the job done while 53% think it needs to be a mixed approach.

Democrats in both states pretty universally think more taxes will be necessary to solve the deficit. What might be more notable are the numbers with independents and Republicans. In Colorado independents think there needs to be a mixed spending cuts/additional taxes approach by a 55/33 margin and in North Carolina it's 56/31. And even though a majority of GOP voters prefer a cuts only approach there is a sizable chunk of the party- 30% in North Carolina and 33% in Colorado- that believes more taxes are needed.

-Stimulus is a bad word. One thing voters in the two states don't want as a potential aid to the economy is another stimulus. Colorado voters would oppose one 56/32 and North Carolina voters would be against it 53/30. Republicans in both states are pretty universally opposed to another round of stimulus and so are strong majorities of independents (59/30 in Colorado and 56/28 in North Carolina.) Although Democratic voters say they would favor another stimulus it's not terribly strong support- 54/30 in Colorado and 46/31 in North Carolina.

-Voters are still pinning more of the blame for the economy on George W. Bush than Barack Obama. It's been a trying couple of months for the President and his reelection prospects look about as weak as they have since he took office. But it's still a good sign for him moving forward that voters don't necessarily think this is all his fault. In Colorado 54% blame Bush more to 39% for Obama. It's 54/34 with independents. And in North Carolina 50% blame Bush more to 42% for Obama. It's 52/38 with independents.

Blaming Bush is not a reelection strategy and Obama shouldn't be out pushing that message himself. But these numbers suggest that when some swing voters are making their final decisions 14 months from now they might come to the conclusion that even if things aren't going well the President was dealt such a bad hand coming into office that he deserves 4 more years to try to get it turned around. Whether enough voters will see things that way for Obama to win is an open question.

Full results here

UNC Football Polling

2011-08-09T10:40:00.004-05:00

In the two weeks since Butch Davis' firing as UNC football coach there's been endless debate about what Tar Heel nation really thinks about the decision and the direction of the program. Here are the results of our scientific poll conducted over the weekend of self described UNC fans:

-UNC fans think that Butch Davis did a good job as coach, but they still support his firing. There's no doubt that Davis got the team headed in the right direction on the field after the dark days of the Carl Torbush and John Bunting years and Tar Heel partisans appreciate him for it. 41% approve of the job he did as coach to only 21% disapproving, with 39% not taking a side. Those describing themselves as 'hardcore' UNC fans are particularly supportive of the job Davis did with 65% approving and only 19% disapproving.

Despite the on field success though 36% of fans support Davis' firing with 27% opposed and 37% having no opinion. UNC alumni are particularly supportive of the decision, agreeing with it by a 50/32 margin. There is a significant divide though based on respondents' level of fandom. Those describing themselves as 'hardcore' fans disagree with Davis' firing by a 44/40 margin. They only account for 22% of the fan base though and those describing themselves as moderately big UNC fans (42/27) and casual ones (26/18) both support the firing.

-UNC fans think that Holden Thorp is doing a good job as Chancellor and should stay in the job...but they also think he's done a poor job handling the football team. The voices calling for Thorp's ouster are more loud than they are numerous. 31% of UNC fans think Thorp is doing a good overall to 19% who dissent with 50% offering no opinion. And 32% think he should continue as Chancellor to 23% who think he should resign or be fired with 45% unsure. Alumni are particularly supportive of Thorp. They give him good marks for the job he's doing by a 53/24 margin and believe he should stay on by a 55/20 spread. Even though they disagree with the decision to fire Davis, even 'hardcore' fans give Thorp a 40/29 overall approval and think he should keep his position 40/34.

Despite the overall support make no mistake though- UNC backers think Thorp has handled the football situation very poorly. Only 20% give positive marks on that front to 35% who think he's done a bad job. Alumni (31/37) and non-Alumni (17/35) alike are unhappy with his football related leadership and 'hardcore' fans (24/56) are particularly displeased. The Athletic Director hire is going to be huge for Thorp given these numbers- he has to hire someone who has credibility in the football arena because right now folks don't trust South Building on that front.

-Very few UNC fans are planning to pull back on their support of the team this year, and few think the program will be in a weaker position 5 years from now than it is today. There have been a lot of people saying they think the football program is doomed to mediocrity moving forward because of the Davis firing and that they plan to be less supportive of the team, but they're a distinct minority within the fan base. 68% of fans say there will be no change in their level of support for the team this year with only 13% saying they're likely to be less supportive and 18% actually saying that they will be more so. And only 16% of fans think the program will be worse off in five years than it is right now compared to 34% who believe it will be in a better position and 50% who are not sure.

-Support for Baddour, jury's out on Withers. Dick Baddour's taken a lot of abuse over the years but most UNC fans with an opinion about his overall work as Athletic Director give him a good review. 31% approve of the work he's done to 17% who disapprove and 52% with no opinion. Those describing themselves as 'hardcore' fans are more likely to have an opinion and they give Baddour good marks by a better than 2:1 margin, 46/21.

Very few fans have developed an opinion about interim coach Everett Withers yet, although the few who have are positive toward him. 23% have a favorable opinion of him to only 3% with an unfavorable one and 74% taking a wait and see approach. Even among hardcore fans 69% haven't formed an opinion about Withers yet.

-Fans think the football issues have hurt the university's academic reputation, but not that badly. 54% think the episode has hurt UNC's academic reputation to 43% who think it hasn't had much of an impact. But of that 54% only 23% say this has had a 'severe' negative impact on how UNC is seen academically compared to 31% who describe that effect as 'moderate.' The sense is that this hasn't been good for the university, but at the same time it hasn't been that bad.

Full results here

Vermont Miscellany

2011-08-05T08:25:00.004-05:00

-Gay marriage has been legal in Vermont for almost 2 years now and most voters in the state say it's had no impact on their lives. 60% say it's been a non factor for them personally to 22% who say it'd had a positive effect on them and 18% who say it's had a negative one.

A strong majority of voters in the state- 58%- are glad that same sex marriage is legal to only 33% opposed. And even among those who remain opposed 55% admit that its legalization has had no effect on their lives.

When you add civil unions to the equation 79% of voters support some form of legal recognition for gay couples- 55% preferring marriage and 24% civil unions- with only 18% opposing any sorts of rights. Even 56% of Republicans support either gay marriage or civil unions.

-There aren't a lot of states where a Senator can have a 62% approval rating and be the less popular member of the delegation but that's where Pat Leahy finds himself. That 62% mark- with 31% disapproving- ties him for the 7th most popular out of 86 sitting Senators PPP has polled on. But it doesn't stack up to Bernie Sanders' 67/28 spread. Leahy's popularity is less than Sanders' across the board but interestingly the largest disparity is with Republicans, only 15% of whom think Leahy's doing a good job compared to 25% for Sanders.

You'd be hard pressed to find a Congressional delegation more popular than Vermont's. House member Peter Welch has a 59% approval rating with only 29% of voters disapproving of him. If he can maintain that level of popularity he'll be a pretty logical replacement whenever one of the state's Senate seats opens up.

-Voters in the state are closely divided on two of its major policy issues. 40% support the new single payer health care law with 35% opposed and 25% unsure. And 45% think the Vermont Yankee Nuclear power plan should continue to operate while 41% believe that it should be shut down. Democrats support the health care law and oppose the power plan, Republicans oppose the health care law and support the power plant, and helping to tip the scales is that independents support both the health care law and the power plant.

-We took a look at how voters feel about a couple of the state's former elected officials who played major roles in national politics in the early 2000's. Former Senator Jim Jeffords, whose party switch handed Democrats control of the Senate in 2001, has a 52% favorable rating with 22% of voters giving him negative marks. Jeffords may have served most of his career as a Republican but his pivot has left him permanent unpopular with those voters, 27% of whom rate him favorably and 49% unfavorably. But his stellar numbers with Democrats (62/10) and independents (58/18) make him quite popular overall.

Howard Dean has an identical 52% favorability rating, although his negatives are a good deal higher than Jeffords' at 38%. Unsurprisingly he is a more polarizing figure than many of the other state's major politicians. 78% of Democrats view him positively but at the same time 82% of Republicans give him a negative rating. He does come out ahead with independents at 53/35.

Jeffords, Dean, Sanders, Leahy, Welch, Jim Douglas, and Peter Shumlin account for all of Vermont's Governors, Senators, and House members this century and they all have positive poll numbers with each of them above 50% with the exception of Shumlin. I think you'd be hard pressed to find a state more fond of its politicians than Vermont.

-We took a quick look at a potential State Treasurer's race between appointed incumbent Beth Pearce and potential Republican challenger Randy Brock. Brock would start out ahead 36-33 but with a very significant 31% of voters are undecided. And 32% of Democrats say they would be undecided compared to only 17% of Republicans. So that's pretty much a wash.

-And finally we've been talking about how popular Bernie Sanders is the whole week we've been releasing this Vermont poll so in that context this finding is amusing- only 20% of voters in the state have a favorable opinion of Socialism to 46% who view it negatively. But the voters there either love Bernie anyway or just don't realize he's a Socialist.

Full results here

Berkley crushing Georgiou

2011-08-04T14:35:00.004-05:00

If Byron Georgiou wins the Democratic nomination for the Senate from Nevada he will have accomplished something unprecedented in PPP's polling- climbing back from a 65 point deficit.

Shelley Berkley leads Georgiou 71-6, an even more lopsided margin than in April when we found her leading 65-8. As you might imagine with a lead that large Berkley is up big with every segment of the Democratic electorate. One interesting group to note is the small share of primary voters- 15%- who disapprove of Harry Reid. Georgiou has made his distaste for Reid quite public so you would think if he was going to get traction with anyone it would be those folks. No dice- Berkley leads 48-18 with them.

So Georgiou has basically no chance at the Democratic nomination but he's suggested he might run as an independent, something that would ostensibly hurt Berkley's chances of winning the general election. Well maybe not- more than 3 times as many Democrats- 22%- have a negative opinion of Georgiou as a positive one- 7%. Those numbers don't suggest the ability to peel off a lot of Democrats.

Georgiou doesn't appear terribly likely to be a factor in either a primary or general election.

Full results here

Romney leads in NV, momentum for Perry

2011-08-04T13:58:00.003-05:00

Mitt Romney continues to be the clear top choice of Republicans in Nevada to be their Presidential nominee. But Rick Perry's moved into second place in the state and when you dig deeper into the numbers there are signs of potential trouble ahead for Romney.

Romney's at 31% to 18% for Perry, 14% for Michele Bachmann, 11% for Ron Paul, 8% for Herman Cain and Newt Gingrich, 2% for Jon Huntsman, and 1% for Tim Pawlenty.

Here's what should worry Romney: he has 88% name recognition. With the voters who have an opinion about him, positive or negative, his lead expands a little bit to 34-17. Perry, however, has only 60% name recognition. And with those voters who are familiar with him he actually leads Romney 29-23. That suggests Perry could overtake Romney if he gets into the race and achieves parity in name recognition- voters who know both prefer Perry.

For now though Romney does have the lead in Nevada. Some folks are inclined to write off his strength in the Silver State as a function of the large Mormon presence in the state. That doesn't tell the whole story though- Romney does lead Perry 64-11 with Mormons but they only account for 13% of the Republican primary voters we polled. He leads Perry 26-19 with non-Mormons as well. So you can credit 6 points of his lead- about half of it- to the Mormon vote but his appeal extends beyond that.

It may look a little tenuous but Romney still has to be considered one of the winners on any poll where he holds the lead and certainly Perry's strong debut makes him a winner as well. Here are the losers:

-Huntsman polls at only 2% even though he served as Governor in the state next door and even though the state has a decent sized Mormon population. This guy isn't getting any traction anywhere.

-When we polled Nevada in April Pawlenty was at anywhere from 7-10% in the various iterations of the field that we tested. Now he's all the way down at 1%. Clearly whatever support he was showing then was quite soft and has dissipated as other candidates- Perry, Bachmann, even Cain- have proved to be more compelling to the GOP electorate. I think there's a general perception nationally that Pawlenty is failing to gain support but in Nevada he's actively losing it.

-Newt Gingrich barely seems worth talking about anymore but on our last Nevada poll he was polling at 21% in the version of the field that didn't include Palin, Mike Huckabee, or Donald Trump. Now he's at 8%. Gingrich still looked like a viable candidate in April before his May implosion and these numbers are a good measure of just how far his support has fallen.

We also looked at a version of the Republican field that included Sarah Palin. In that one Romney still leads Perry 31-18, with Bachmann and Palin at 10%.

Bottom line: Romney is still the favorite in Nevada but it looks like things could get a little bit more interesting than they were last time around when Romney romped in the state.

Full results here

A primary challenger to Obama?

2011-08-04T11:13:00.003-05:00

If there's any state where you could imagine there being a serious desire among Democratic voters to replace Barack Obama with someone further to the left next year it would probably be Vermont. Not only is it one of the most liberal states in the country it's also the home of 2 liberal icons, Bernie Sanders and Howard Dean, who if there was going to be a viable primary challenger seem like plausible candidates. But our polling there finds neither of them would come all that close to Obama, an indicator that the likelihood of Obama facing any serious contest next year is pretty minuscule.

Sanders would pose the more serious challenge to Obama but still trails 52-33. He actually would edge the President 50-38 with voters describing themselves as 'very liberal' but would face a 39 point disadvantage with 'somewhat liberal' voters at 62-23 and a 32 point deficit with moderates at 57-25.

That the margin between Obama and Sanders is as close as it is probably has more to do with Sanders' popularity than unhappiness with the President. Obama's approval rating with Democratic primary voters in the state is 81/11 and his numbers with the far left are even better than that at 86/6. Sanders is even more popular than that though, boasting a 90/7 overall approval rating, including 97/3 with 'very liberal' voters. Even with Sanders' higher approval though most voters who have a favorable view of both him and Obama would still prefer Obama for renomination.

Obama would lead Dean 61-24. He does 45 points better against Dean than Sanders with 'very liberal' voters, leading 61-28 while holding similar leads with moderate and somewhat liberal voters. Dean has comparable favorability numbers to Obama- they break down favorably 77/12- but again it's a case where voters like both Obama and Dean but want Obama to be the Democratic Presidential candidate.

We'll probably keep hearing about the prospect of a liberal primary challenger to Obama until he accepts the nomination in Charlotte next year but there doesn't appear to be much of an appetite for it from voters at this point.

Mitt Romney has a solid lead in Vermont, as we've found for him in every New England state except Maine. 26% say he's their top choice to 16% for Michele Bachmann and Sarah Palin, 10% for Rick Perry, 9% for Herman Cain, 7% for Ron Paul, 6% for Newt Gingrich, 3% for Jon Huntsman, and 1% for Tim Pawlenty.

If you take Palin out of the picture Bachmann picks up a large chunk of her support and narrows Romney's lead to 8 points. He gets 29% to 21% for Bachmann, 11% for Perry, 10% for Cain, 9% for Gingrich, 8% for Paul, 2% for Perry, and 1% for Huntsman.

Bachmann narrowly edges Romney with far right voters, 30-28. But he makes up for that with solid leads among moderates (31-18) and 'somewhat conservative' voters (32-19).

Full results here

Colorado/North Carolina Question Suggestions

2011-08-03T21:07:00.002-05:00

Colorado was the winner of our vote on where to poll this week. We'll also poll North Carolina this weekend.

Particularly interested in Colorado question suggestions since there's no 2012 Gubernatorial or Senate race to poll there. We'll obviously look at the basics- Obama v. Romney, Bachmann, Perry, Cain, and Palin, GOP primary, approvals for Hickenlooper, Udall, and Bennet. But what else beyond that stuff would you like to see us ask about?

There's going to be a lot of focus on the North Carolina poll to get a gauge of what Tar Heel fans think about the recent developments with the football program so question ideas along those lines would be much appreciated, as well as more general political question ideas.

Thanks as always for the great suggestions!

GOP holds slight lead for Virginia Gov

2011-08-03T13:59:00.003-05:00

It's too early to really even have a handle on who the candidates for Governor of Virginia will be in 2013 but by popular demand we looked at how a couple of the better known potential candidates on the Republican side and on the Democratic side would match up, at least at this early point in time.

Bill Bolling and Ken Cuccinelli would both lead Tom Perriello and Terry McAuliffe by modest margins. Even though we found yesterday that Bolling would start out well behind Cuccinelli in the primary, he does slightly better in the general election match ups. He has a 5 point advantage over McAuliffe at 38-33, while Cuccinelli leads McAuliffe by only 3 points at 41-38. And he has a 7 point advantage over Perriello at 39-32, while Cuccinelli is only up 5 on McAuliffe at 41-36.

At least 20% of voters are undecided in all of these match ups and that's a function both of how long it is until the election but also how little known all of these candidates, with the exception of Cuccinelli, really are to average voters. 66% don't know enough about Bolling to have formed an opinion and the same is true for 64% when it comes to Perriello and 59% for McAuliffe. Even Cuccinelli isn't really that well known- 35% of voters have no opinion about him.

The anonymity on the Democratic side makes it very clear that field is wide open for other faces to get into the race and while Cuccinelli may be tough to beat in a primary if he decides to run there would be a lot of room for a different face to challenge the little known Bolling.

Of course several decades of Virginia political history suggest that the winner in this race may be determined not in 2013, but by whoever wins the Presidential race in 2012. Barack Obama gets reelected, Republican probably hold the Governor's office in 2013. Obama loses, voters quickly become dissatisfied with the new Republican President, Democrats probably take the office back in 2013.

We took our first look at a Creigh Deeds/Bob McDonnell match up in June of 2008 and found McDonnell leading by a 5 point margin at 32-27, pretty similar sorts of numbers to where we see these four hypothetical match ups. McDonnell of course ended up winning by 12 more points than that. But if John McCain had been elected President and blame for the economy had remained with the Republicans it seems quite possible that 12 point shift from the initial poll would have moved in Deeds' direction. Virginia Gubernatorial race outcomes seem more dictated by Presidential results than most so while these numbers are fun to look at right now they're probably not terribly predictive of what's to come.

Full results here

Does the GOP need Romney to win?

2011-08-03T10:02:00.003-05:00

A broad theme has been emerging in our state by state Presidential polling over the last couple months: if the Republicans nominate Mitt Romney it's a toss up. And if they nominate anyone else it's 2008 all over again. Our newest Nevada numbers very much reinforce that trend.

Barack Obama took the Silver State by 12 points in his first run. But if he had to stand for reelection today he'd be in a very competitive race against Romney, leading only 47-46 in the state. Pit him against any of the other Republicans there though and the numbers look pretty similar to last time- 9 point advantages over Herman Cain and Rick Perry at 48-39 and 49-40 respectively, a 10 point lead over Michele Bachmann at 50-40, and a 12 point advantage over Sarah Palin at 51-39.

Over the last month we've had similar findings in:

-Pennsylvania, where Obama is tied with Romney but leads all other Republicans by at least 7 points.

-New Hampshire, where Romney leads Obama by 2 points but all other Republicans trails Obama by at least 7.

-Virginia, where Obama leads Romney by 4 but has at least a 9 point advantage over all the rest of the GOP hopefuls.

-Michigan, where Obama has a 5 point advantage over Romney but at least a 15 point lead over everyone else.

-North Carolina, where the disparity between Romney and the rest of the Republicans isn't quite as great. Obama and Romney are tied while Obama leads all the others by at least 3 points.

Taken all together it makes you ask the question: do Republicans have to nominate Romney to defeat Obama next year?

Obama's approval numbers are actually on the rise a little bit in Nevada from where they were when PPP last polled the state in late October. Then 45% approved of him to 52% disapproving. Now it's 47% approving to 50% disapproving. He's actually on positive ground with independents at 52/45 but he's under water overall because Republicans (89% disapproval) dislike him a whole lot more at this point than Democrats (79%) do like him.

Obama's holding his ground against everyone but Romney in Nevada because voters there find the whole GOP field even more unpalatable than him. Romney comes close to breaking even on favorability at 38/43 but the rest of the Republicans are quite unpopular- a -9 spread for Cain at 24/33, a -12 for Perry at 24/36, a -21 for Bachmann at 30/51, and a -28 for Palin at 32/60.

Voters disliking the Republican candidates really is a vital component of Obama's horse race numbers holding up as well as they are even as his approval numbers struggle. It remains to be seen whether he can really get reelected by being the lesser of two evils or if the election will end up being solely a referendum on him regardless of who the GOP puts forward. And one thing's for sure- if voters ever warm up to one of the Republican candidates Obama will really be in trouble, in Nevada and everywhere.

Full results here

Shumlin leads for reelection

2011-08-03T09:10:00.003-05:00

Vermont Governor Peter Shumlin can't match the popularity of Bernie Sanders, Pat Leahy, or Peter Welch. But he would still be in a pretty solid position to win a second term as Governor if the election was today.

45% of voters approve of Shumlin to 36% who disapprove. The good news for him is that he's on narrowly positive ground with independents at 41/34. The bad news is that he has virtually no support from Republicans- only an 11% approval rating- and GOP voters are more unified in their disapproval (73%) of Shumlin than Democrats are in their support for him (71%). That approval rating with his own party is decent but certainly not in the same league with his statewide colleagues.

Even if he's not setting the world on fire approval wise Shumlin does appear to be a little bit stronger than he was back in November when he defeated Brian Dubie by just a 2 point margin. In a hypothetical rematch Shumlin would now lead Dubie 48-40, thanks largely to a 47-38 advantage with independents. It's going to be very hard for Republicans to knock off a Democratic incumbent in a Presidential election year in Vermont- Dubie's best chance may have been last year or it might be in an upcoming off year election but it looks like 2012 could be a challenge.

Dubie would easily be Shumlin's strongest challenger. He leads by anywhere from 17-27 points against the other five Republicans we tested against him- it's 17 over Phil Scott at 50-33, 19 over Tom Salmon at 50-31, 21 over Mark Snelling at 50-29, 22 over Randy Brock at 51-29, and 27 over Thom Lauzon at 52-25.

Shumlin's pretty solid numbers speak to a broader trend in our polling- the few new Democratic Governors who were elected last fall are almost all proving to be pretty popular. Shumlin joins California's Jerry Brown, Colorado's John Hickenlooper, Hawaii's Neil Abercrombie, Minnesota's Mark Dayton, and Oregon's John Kitzhaber with positive approval numbers in PPP's polling. We haven't polled New York but the massive amount of public polling in that state makes it clear Andrew Cuomo is very popular as well. The one exception to the popular new Democratic Governors is Connecticut's Dan Malloy, who we found under water on a poll this spring.

The strong numbers of the new Democratic Governors are a sharp contrast to what we've found for the 13 new Republican Governors we've polled on. 7 of them- Florida's Rick Scott, Iowa's Terry Branstad, Maine's Paul LePage, Michigan's Rick Snyder, Ohio's John Kasich, Pennsylvania's Tom Corbett, and Wisconsin's Scott Walker- are under water. The 6 with positive approval numbers are Georgia's Nathan Deal, Nevada's Brian Sandoval, New Mexico's Susana Martinez, South Dakota's Dennis Daugaard, South Carolina's Nikki Haley, and Tennessee's Bill Haslam.

The fact that the new Democratic Governors are so much more popular than the new Republicans is a definite sign of a shift in the political landscape since last November- certainly things are nowhere near as rosy for Democrats right now as they were in 2006 and 2008. But they're not nearly as dark as they were in 2010 either.

Full results here

This week's poll finalists

2011-08-02T16:04:00.002-05:00

It's North Carolina week so we're just going to do one other state poll this week. Here are the choices:

-Colorado. We haven't polled it in six months now and that's the longest we've gone without polling any of the pivotal swing states so it's well overdue for a look.

-Hawaii. Ed Case's somewhat dubious internal poll released today that showed Mazie Hirono trailing Linda Linge when all other polling has shown Hirono up double digits has me ready to take our first look at this race since March.

-Iowa. It's been a couple months since we last polled the state and it would be good to have a 'real' poll there headed into Ames week...has Rick Perry's momentum taken enough of the shine off Michele Bachmann to put Mitt Romney back in first place there?

-South Carolina. Another one where my primary interest is to see the Perry effect- after seeing him pull ahead of Romney in the Virginia numbers we released today I wouldn't be shocked to see him in or near the lead in South Carolina too.

-West Virginia. With Kentucky looking more and more like it will not be competitive this could be the closest Gubernatorial race in the country this year. And it would be interesting to see the Joe Manchin/Shelley Moore Capito numbers after the debt ceiling debate.

Voting's open for 24 hours and then we'll take question suggestions.

Virginia Republican Numbers

2011-08-02T13:41:00.004-05:00

-In another sign of his strength as he prepares to enter the Presidential race Rick Perry leads the Republican field in Virginia, pointing to the possibility for him to be a very strong candidate particularly in the South. He gets 20% to 16% for Mitt Romney, 15% for Michele Bachmann, 13% for Sarah Palin, 6% each for Ron Paul and Newt Gingrich, 2% for Tim Pawlenty, and 1% for Jon Huntsman.

What might be most impressive about Perry's lead is that it comes despite his lagging the rest of the top contenders in name recognition. Palin's known to 90% of GOP primary voters, Romney to 83%, and Bachmann to 80%. But despite only 62% of Republicans knowing enough about Perry to have an opinion about him he still comes out tops in the horse race.

Perry's first place finish is derived from his strength with the far right. Among 'very conservative' voters he's at 28% with Bachmann getting 20%, Palin 15%, and Romney in a distant fourth place at 12%. Romney leads the way with moderates and voters who are only 'somewhat conservative.' But that 'very conservative' segment is the largest part of the GOP electorate and propels Perry to the overall lead.

If you take Palin out of the picture though Bachmann gets much more of her support than anyone else and it takes her to the top at 21% with Perry and Romney each getting 18%, and Cain the only other person in double digits at 10%. That's another reminder that Palin's decision on whether or not to run has huge implications for Bachmann- if Palin gets in it may effectively scuttle Bachmann's chances at the nomination. If Palin stays out she has a fighting chance.

-Apparently playing a large role in a move that no one saw- The Undefeated- didn't do much to enhance Jamie Radtke's chances at winning the GOP Senate nomination. George Allen is polling at 68% to 6% for Radtke, 2% each for Tim Donner and E.W. Jackson, and 0% for David McCormick.

You could say Allen's huge lead over Radtke is just about name recognition but it actually speaks to a larger truth- GOP voters don't think Allen's too liberal and they're not looking for a more conservative alternative to him. Since those are the premises Radtke's campaign is built on she doesn't have much of a chance. 67% of primary voters think Allen is ideologically 'about right' compared to just 7% who think he's too liberal. There are actually slightly more- 9%- who think he's too conservative than think he's too liberal.

When we polled Virginia in late February Allen led a generic 'more conservative' challenger by 27 points at 52-25. Now that margin's expanded even further to 35 points at 58-23. A seriously contested primary for Allen was already a long shot. Now it's looking like an even longer shot.

-Poor Bill Bolling. He's been toiling as Lieutenant Governor of Virginia for almost 6 years now, ostensibly so that he can run for Governor some day. And now after less than 2 years in office Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli has cut him in line. Cuccinelli leads Bolling 45-21 in an early look ahead to the 2013 race for Governor. He is particularly strong with the far right as you would expect, leading 56-15 with 'very conservative' voters. But he's up 40-22 with moderates and 34-25 with 'somewhat conservative' voters as well.

Cuccinelli has simply become much better known than Bolling is. 71% of GOP primary voters have an opinion about him and they break down favorably 56/15. Only 41% know Bolling and they break down 28% favorable and 13% unfavorable.

Obviously a whole lot could change in the next two years but if I was Bolling I might have a back up plan for my political future- Cuccinelli's going to be very tough to beat in a Republican primary.

Full results here

Heller's popularity declining

2011-08-02T11:39:00.003-05:00

An early appointment to the US Senate isn't doing Dean Heller's prospects for a full term any favors. Heller's statewide popularity has declined significantly over the first 7 months of 2011 and although he still leads Shelley Berkley by 3 points that's the closest we've ever found the race and a far cry from the 13 point lead he had over her in January.

The first time we polled Nevada this year 46% of voters had a favorable opinion of Heller to 23% with a negative one. He had a greater than 2:1 favorability ratio with independents at 47/23 and had almost as many Democrats (22%) holding a positive opinion of him as an unfavorable one (31%).

That picture has changed significantly. Now Heller's approval rating (not the exact same thing as the favorability we were measuring earlier in the year but pretty similar) is just 38% with 35% of voters disapproving of him. Independents still like him but only narrowly, breaking down 41/32 in their support for him. His appeal to Democrats has pretty much evaporated- their opinions of him now break down 12/59.

As Heller's personal popularity has declined so has his lead over Shelley Berkley. He led her 51-38 in January, now that advantage is only 46-43. What was a 28 point advantage with independents then is now only 3 points at 44-41. And where he was winning over 20% of the Democratic vote back in January, now he gets only 11% across party lines.

51% of the undecideds between Berkley and Heller are Democrats, while only 25% are Republicans. The high level of undecided Democrats is likely a function of Berkley being unknown to 33% of voters in the state. Assuming those voters would end up supporting their party's candidate in the end the race would be dead even.

Primary numbers we'll release later in the week make it clear that Byron Georgiou has virtually no chance of winning the Democratic Senate nomination but if by some chance he did he would start out 17 points behind Heller at 48-31. Georgiou has threatened in recent days to run as an independent but it's not really clear where his support would come from if he did that.

Only 27 respondents to our poll had a favorable opinion of Georgiou and if anything they're Republican leaning- they support Heller 61-39 over Berkley and go for Mitt Romney 46-39 over Barack Obama. It's too small a sample size to make much out of but it would seem to dispel the notion that Georgiou running third party would be particularly bad news for Berkley.

When we started polling this race at the start of the year it looked like it leaned toward the GOP but with each new survey now it's become more and more clear that it's a sheer toss up.

Full results here

Sanders safe for reelection

2011-08-02T09:23:00.003-05:00

There have been rumblings that Bernie Sanders might draw a serious challenge next year from State Auditor and ex-Democrat Tom Salmon but our newest Vermont poll finds that Sanders is one of the most popular Senators in the country and wouldn't be vulnerable no matter who Republicans put up against him.

Sanders' approval rating is 67% with only 28% of voters disapproving of him. That +39 spread ranks him third in popularity out of 85 sitting Senators PPP has polled on, behind only Hawaii's Daniel Inouye (+46 at 69/23) and Wyoming's John Barrasso (+44 at 69/25). Sanders enjoys near universal popularity with Democrats (93/5), is extremely well liked by independents (68/25), and even has an unusually high level of crossover popularity with Republicans. 25% of them approve of him to 69% disapproving.

Salmon has been the most discussed potential challenger to Sanders next year. He is not terribly well known, with 47% of voters saying they don't know enough about him to have an opinion. He is viewed favorably among those who are familiar with him by a 30/23 margin. In a head to head he trails Sanders by 34 points at 62/28, facing a 41 point deficit with independents and losing 14% of the Republican vote while picking up only 5% of Democrats.

There are other Republicans who would come closer than Salmon, although none of them make it competitive. Former Governor Jim Douglas is very popular, with 56% of voters rating him favorably to 29% with a negative opinion. But he still trails Sanders by 18 points at 56-38. Last year's losing Republican nominee for Governor, Brian Dubie, is also pretty well liked at a 48/33 favorability spread. He nevertheless trails Sanders by 26 points at 60-34. And Lieutenant Governor Phil Scott, although a blank slate to 55% of voters, has an outstanding 33/12 breakdown with those who do have an opinion about him. He nevertheless finds himself down by 31 points at 61-30.

We also polled a trio of lesser known potential candidates- Mark Snelling, Randy Brock, and Thom Lauzon- whose name recognition falls into the 23-35% range. They all trail by even wider margins than Salmon- Brock and Snelling are each down 37 points and Lauzon's deficit is 39.

Bottom line: Bernie Sanders has nothing to worry about. There is a broader takeaway though- Vermont loves its politicians. There aren't a lot of states where 5 potential Senate challengers would all have positive favorability ratings yet still get trounced in head to heads because the incumbent is so transcendently popular. We've seen similar things in states like Wyoming and Delaware- smaller states just tend to be a lot more kind to their politicians than the bigger ones.

Full results here

New Jersey Miscellaneous Poll

2011-07-29T15:15:00.003-05:00

One of the things we like to do on our polls is ask voters what they feel about politicians who have been out of the spotlight for a while. On our New Jersey poll we looked at Christie Whitman, Jim McGreevey, Bill Bradley, and Robert Torricelli. Only Bradley came out looking good:

-31% of voters have a favorable opinion of Whitman to 52% with an unfavorable one. She seems to have fallen into one what may call the Joe Lieberman trap- her moderation antagonized voters in her own party, who have a favorable opinion of her by only a 43/37 margin. But it didn't win over Democrats or independents either, who rate her at 23/60 and 29/54 respectively. What is it that allows the Scott Browns and Olympia Snowes of the world to ride moderation to incredible popularity while it trips up the Whitmans and Liebermans and Ben Nelsons of the world? I'm not really sure.

-Whitman certainly looks like a popular ex-Governor compared to her elected successor, Jim McGreevey, though. Only 19% of voters view McGreevey favorably to 64% with an unfavorable opinion. The animosity towards him cuts pretty strongly across party lines. Democrats like him the 'best,' such as it is at 31/48. With Republicans (5/85) and independents (12/70) warm feelings are virtually nonexistent. This same poll finds that New Jersey supports gay marriage so that's clearly not the issue- the way he handled it is.

-Eight and a half years after he left the Senate Robert Torricelli has quickly been forgotten by Garden State voters. 56% have no opinion of him. He might want even more to forget about him because among those who do remember only 10% have a positive opinion to 33% with a negative one. Torricelli replicates the McGreevey trifecta of being disliked by Democrats, Republicans, and independents alike. What other elected Senators who have served in the office within the last 10 years do you think would be unpopular/forgotten enough now to have a favorability rating at 10% or lower? John Edwards manages that feat but he may be the only other one.

-There is one ex-pol New Jersey voters still love and that's Bill Bradley, who has a 56/14 favorability rating. There are only 2 sitting Senators in the country who have a net approval better than Bradley's current net favorability- Hawaii's Daniel Inouye and Wyoming's John Barrasso. To be that popular you have to have broad appeal and Bradley is quite well liked across the party spectrum- 67/7 with Democrats, 46/17 with independents, and 47/21 with Republicans.

Other items from our New Jersey poll:

-Voters in the state narrowly think gay marriage should be legal, by a 47/42 margin. That includes a 46/35 spread with independent voters. When you broaden the issue to civil unions 81% of voters support some form of legal recognition for gay couples to only 17% opposed. 41% say full same sex marriage rights would be their preference with another 40% supporting civil unions. Even among Republicans in the state 77% support either gay marriage or civil unions.

-New Jersey's attitude towards its current Senate delegation could be easily summarized as 'meh.' Last week we showed Robert Menendez had tepid approval ratings and Frank Lautenberg does too with 41% of voters approving of him and 36% disapproving. What might be most remarkable is that 23% have no opinion even though Lautenberg's been in the Senate for nearly 30 years. Maybe that lack of familiarity is a product of the state not having its own media markets.

-And finally Democrats lead on the generic legislative ballot 52-39. They're holding their base (91% support from Dems for Dems) better than the Republicans (87% of GOP voters for the GOP) and only trailing by a 39-36 margin with independents. That 3 point deficit is a lot smaller than the advantage Republicans had with independents in 2009 and it's not nearly enough for the party to win in a state with a significant Democratic party id advantage.

Full results here

Voters dislike Snyder, also oppose recall

2011-07-29T12:39:00.003-05:00

Michigan voters don't like Rick Snyder...but they don't support recalling him from office at this point either.

Snyder's approval rating is 38% with 50% of voters disapproving of him. That's actually a slight improvement from when PPP last polled the state in March, when Snyder stood at 33/50. His numbers are identical to where they were with Democrats on the previous poll and he's seen nominal gains with Republicans (from 68% approval to 72%) and with independents (from 32% to 40%, although his disapproval number has also risen with them as they've come off the fence.)

There are 2 key reasons Snyder continues to be under water. The main one is that independents disapprove of him 40/46. That's particularly notable because of how popular he once was with that group of voters- in fact it's been almost one year to the day that I wrote a blog post specifically on that subject. That unique appeal he had to independents over the course of last year's campaign is now a thing of the past. Snyder's other problem is that Democrats (80%) are more united in their disapproval of him than Republicans (72%) are in their approval. The intensity of feelings about him now are stronger on the other side of the party ledger than within his own.

As bad as Snyder's numbers are though voters are still slightly opposed to recalling him- 42% support removing him from office to 47% against it. That's because only 79% of voters who disapprove of him support recalling him compared to 92% of voters who approve of him that oppose recalling him. There's a large enough mass of voters who disapprove of him but don't think he should be removed to tip the scales against recall.

That phenomenon can particularly be seen with independents. They disapprove of Snyder 40/46 but they simultaneously oppose recalling him by a 50/35 margin.

Democrats aren't having a great July nationally but one data point in our Michigan poll still makes it clear that the party's a whole lot better off than it was in 2010. If voters could go to the polls and do last year's election over again they'd split their votes evenly between Snyder and Democrat Virg Bernero at 45%. That's quite a contrast from Snyder's 18 point margin of victory last fall and an indication that voters in the state are moving away from the GOP, at least compared to last year. That's certainly good news for Barack Obama and Debbie Stabenow, as reflected in polling we released for the state earlier this week.

Michigan probably won't be as Democratic next year as it was in 2008...but at this point it looks like it will be more like 2008 than 2010. And that's actually a pretty good microcosm of all our polling across the country right now.

Full results here

Virginia Miscellaneous

2011-07-29T09:40:00.004-05:00

-Bob McDonnell continues to be one of the more popular Governors in the country but that doesn't mean the Republican nominee putting him on the ticket next year would be a big game changer in the state.

50% of voters approve of the job McDonnell's doing to 31% who disapprove. That ties him for the 8th most popular out of 41 sitting Governors PPP has conducted polls about. He's pretty universally liked by the Republican base (83/8), is very solid with independents (49/29) and has a decent if not remarkable amount of crossover support from Democrats (18/56).

But when asked what impact McDonnell being the Republican Vice Presidential candidate next year would have on their vote, a plurality of voters at 44% say it wouldn't make a difference to them either way. And among those who say it would more- 31%- say it would make them less likely to vote Republican for President than say- 24%- that it would make them more inclined to vote for the GOP.

We found a similar result when we asked this question about Marco Rubio in Florida last month. 35% there said Rubio on the ticket would make them less likely to support the Republican nominee to only 31% who said it would be a positive. Rubio and McDonnell are both popular but it doesn't appear giving them the VP nod would be a difference maker in either of their critical swing states.

-Eric Cantor is not a popular figure with voters in his home state. 39% have no opinion about him and those who do view him more negatively than not- 29% have a favorable view to 31% with a negative one. Democrats like and Republicans dislike Cantor in similar numbers. What tips the balance against him is a 23/31 spread with independents. These numbers don't bode particularly well for a future statewide run in Virginia so continuing to climb the ladder of House leadership appears to be his better political future.

-Mark Warner continues to be one of the most popular Senators in the country. His 54/28 approval spread ties him for 12th out of 83 we've polled on. He's at 55/23 with independents and stands at 29% with Republicans. Jim Webb can't match Warner's popularity but he's above average as well at 45/36.

-Virginians are opposed to gay marriage but do support some form of legal recognition for same sex couples. 52% of voters think it should be illegal to 35% who support allowing it. But when you throw civil unions into the mix 65% of voters express favor for giving gay couples more rights to only 33% who oppose any recognition at all. A lot of voters appear to be more concerned about the semantics of 'marriage' than actually denying same sex couples the rights associated with it.

-Voters are leaning toward the GOP in this fall's legislative elections, but only by a 45/42 margin. They have the slight advantage because slightly more Republicans- 94%- commit to supporting their party's candidates than Democrats- 91%- commit to supporting theirs. Independents split evenly at 34%, a welcome change for Democrats after getting flattened with that group of voters in the 2009 election in the state.

-Virginia's favorite major league baseball team is the Braves (19%) with the Yankees taking second place honors at 14%. The Nationals, as close to a home state team as there is, can only muster a third place tie with the Red Sox at 11%. The Nationals do at least triumph in the 703 where 26% of voters say they're their favorite team. The Orioles come in 5th at 10% and the Phillies (4%) and Mets and Cubs (3%) have limited popularity.

-Finally Virginia voters prefer the Hokes over the Cavaliers, although the largest share of voters doesn't care at all. 46% have no opinion but among those who do 32% prefer Virginia Tech to 21% who go for Virginia. We also asked partisans of each school for approval ratings on their football and basketball coaches. Frank Beamer unsurprisingly gets the best marks with 70% of Hokie fans happy with the job he's doing to only 5%.

The other 3 coaches all get similar numbers- Seth Greenberg's at 39/5, Mike London's at 39/7, and Tony Bennett's at 34/4. The interpretation on all three of those guys is that the jury's out- very few fans are unhappy with them but most aren't ready to express support for them either. A lot of folks are taking a wait and see approach.

Full results here

Romney. Bachmann basically tied in NC and NJ

2011-07-28T09:51:00.005-05:00

North Carolina and New Jersey are pretty different states but when it comes to the Republican Presidential race their stories are quite similar- Mitt Romney and Michele Bachmann are basically tied for the lead.

In New Jersey Romney's at 22% with Bachmann at 21%, Ron Paul at 11%, Rick Perry at 10%, Herman Cain at 8%, Newt Gingrich at 7%, Tim Pawlenty at 5%, and Jon Huntsman at 3%.

Bachmann's strength in New Jersey is notable because it has one of the most moderate Republican electorates you will find in any state. There are more voters- 27%- who identify as moderates than there are who label themselves 'very conservative'- 23%. This is the only state where we've found that to be the case and you would expect it to be a drag on her numbers. But she leads Romney 26-18 with those far right voters and also has a 21-19 advantage with ones who are just 'somewhat conservative.' That allows her to offset the 34-16 deficit she faces with moderates.

If by some chance he were to change his mind about running for President Chris Christie would be the top choice of Republicans in the state at 38% to 13% for Romney and 12% for Bachmann. And if Sarah Palin ends up jumping in the race she would be in third place at 16% behind Romney's 21% and Bachmann's 18%. Perry and Paul would tie for 4th at 10% each. The fact that Romney's lead would be wider with Palin in than without her speaks again to the fact that she and Bachmann would likely pull from the same pool of voters and ease Romney's path to the nomination.

In North Carolina the numbers are very similar. There Romney leads Bachmann 23-22 with Rick Perry debuting at 14% and Herman Cain and Newt Gingrich at 9%, Ron Paul at 6%, Tim Pawlenty at 5%, and Jon Huntsman at 2% rounding out the field.

North Carolina's a rare state where Bachmann actually edges out Romney with centrist voters, 23-21. But his 12 point lead with voters just right of center at 30-18 outweighs her 9 point advantage with far right voters at 26-17.

If you add Palin to the equation in North Carolina she finished 4th at 12% behind Romney at 18%, Bachmann at 17%, and Perry at 12%.

Taken together with our national poll last week and other polling we've released this month these numbers are a further indication that Romney and Bachmann have become co-front runners. That could prove to be a pretty short lived position for Bachmann though if Perry formally enters the race and starts eating into her support from conservatives. Perry's double digit standing on both of these polls before he's even entered the race is pretty impressive, especially as Pawlenty and Huntsman continue to languish in the 2-5% range.

And for what it's worth Tom Kean Jr. is who New Jersey Republicans want as their Senate candidate next year. 36% say he's their top choice with Kim Guadagno second at 10% and no one else hitting double digits- Woody Johnson's at 9%, Mike Doherty at 7%, Anna Little at 4%, Joseph Kyrillos at 3%, and Tim Smith at 2%.

Full results here

Kaine leads Allen by small margin

2011-07-27T14:31:00.003-05:00

Barack Obama may have taken a step back in Virginia over the last couple of months but the state of the Senate race remains unchanged: Tim Kaine holds a slight lead over George Allen. This month's poll comes out at 46-43.

Kaine (87-7) and Allen (87-6) have basically identical leads with voters of their own party. What tips the balance toward Kaine is that he leads 44-33 with independent voters. That advantage for Kaine with independents is becoming a trend in our polling. In May Kaine had a 45-40 advantage with them and a 46-44 lead overall.

It's not that independent voters are in love with Kaine: his 43/38 favorability breakdown with them is decent but not earth shattering. But they really don't like Allen. Just 20% rate him positively to 47% with a negative opinion. That breakdown was 32/47 when we polled in May, 36/41 in late February and 38/45 in November. Allen does not have a good image with independent voters in Virginia and that's why he's down with them right now.

There seems to be a general thought that this race will move in whatever direction the national political winds do over the next 15 months and change so it's interesting that Kaine has gained a point on his lead over Allen even as Barack Obama's advantage on Mitt Romney has declined by 7 points. At least right now those races aren't moving in concert. For now that's good news for Kaine- Obama's not dragging him down even as his popularity flags. But longer term it could be good news for Allen too- if Obama's numbers see a recovery that doesn't necessarily mean Kaine's all the sudden going to have an 8 point lead either.

On the extremely off chance that George Allen were to lose the Republican nomination to Tea Party candidate Jamie Radtke, Kaine would have a 16 point lead at 47-31. GOP primary numbers we'll release tomorrow shows the chances of that to be extremely minuscule though.

Full results here

Obama leads in Michigan

2011-07-27T12:25:00.004-05:00

A slim majority of voters in Michigan approve of the job Barack Obama's doing as President and he leads all of his potential opponents for reelection in the state.

50% approve of the job Obama's doing to 46% who disapprove. His numbers are holding up decently well because 89% of Democrats remain in his corner. Independents split against him by a 41/53 margin and only 8% of Republicans think he's doing a good job but the largest number of voters in a Michigan Presidential year electorate are going to be Democrats so if Obama can keep the base in line his numbers are going to be pretty solid overall.

The only Republican who's competitive with Obama is Mitt Romney. The President leads him by 5 points at 47-42. This is the third time PPP has looked at an Obama/Romney match up in Michigan and the results have been pretty consistent- in March Obama led by a 48-41 margin and in December it was a 47-43 advantage. Romney actually leads Obama 45-34 with independent voters but he only takes 9% of Democrats and that may not be enough crossover support for a GOP candidate to win in Michigan.

One issue where voters are clearly on Obama's side over Romney's- and one that has the potential to scuttle Romney's chances of winning the state further down the line- is the auto bailout. 51% of voters think that it's been a success to only 30% who disagree. And asked more specifically whether they think the bailout's been a good thing for Michigan 66% of voters say it has been with only 18% dissenting. Romney's opposition to the popular bailout will give Obama a good card to play if that ends up being the match up in the general election.

Against the rest of the Republican field Obama leads by margins similar to his 2008 margin of victory in the state. He's up 15 on Rick Perry at 50-35, 16 on Michele Bachmann at 53-37, 17 on Herman Cain at 50-33, and 18 on Sarah Palin at 54-36.

Michigan is a rare state where Palin actually is not the potential Republican nominee who fares worst against Obama. That dubious designation goes to home state candidate Thad McCotter, who trails the President by 19 points at 50-31. McCotter is unknown to most voters, with 58% expressing no opinion about him. He does not get good reviews from the folks who do offer an opinion with only 13% rating him favorably to 29% with a negative opinion. Even among Republicans he's on negative ground at a 17/22 favorability spread. Clearly McCotter buzz is a nonexistent phenomenon.

If Republicans nominate Romney they have a chance in Michigan, although he'll have to come from behind. If they go with anyone else Obama appears likely to duplicate his double digit victory from 2008.

Full results here

Nevada and Vermont Question Suggestions

2011-07-26T19:01:00.002-05:00

Nevada and Vermont were the winners of our vote on where to poll this week.

Nevada the Senate race seems pretty set and we'll look at the Presidential race too. Any questions we should ask in the state besides that stuff and the obvious approvals for Harry Reid and Brian Sandoval? This is a statewide poll so we're not going to be doing the special election to fill Dean Heller's House seat at this point but I'm sure we'll take a look that sometime closer to the election.

In Vermont who would you like to see us poll against Bernie Sanders and Peter Shumlin? And what questions we should ask beyond those two races and the Presidential contest?

As always appreciate the suggestions.

Stabenow leads Hoekstra

2011-07-26T14:26:00.003-05:00

Debbie Stabenow starts her race for reelection against Pete Hoekstra in a pretty good position, leading 50-41. That's similar to where she stood the last time PPP polled Michigan in March. At that time her advantage over Hoekstra was 50-38.

The key for Stabenow is that she has Democrats lined up almost 100% behind her. She leads Hoekstra 90-4 with voters of her own party. In a Presidential year in Michigan there are going to be a lot more Democrats voting than Republicans. That means for a Republican to win statewide requires some combination of meaningful crossover support from Democratic voters and a large victory with independents. Hoekstra actually does lead Stabenow 44-38 with independents but he needs a much wider advantage than that if he's only going to get 4% of the Democratic vote. Stabenow's winning 8% of Republicans to that 4% Hoekstra's getting from Democrats- it would be impossible for a GOP candidate who lost more Republicans than they won Democrats to win in Michigan.

Stabenow's approval ratings are about average for a Senator right now- 46% of voters like the job she's doing to 40% who disapprove. That's pretty much identical to our March poll when it was 46/39 and up a little bit from our December poll when it stood at 41/40. Stabenow does poorly with independents (37/47) but she's got more Republicans (15%) who like her than there are Democrats (12%) who dislike her.

There are other Republicans running but none of them are as competitive with Stabenow as Hoekstra- Randy Hekman trails by 16 points at 52-36, John McCulloch is down 20 at 52-32, and Peter Konetchy is down 21 at 52-31. None of that trio of Republicans hopefuls has greater than 23% name recognition. Hoekstra is a blank slate to many voters as well, with 39% holding no opinion about him. Those who do split pretty evenly in their assessments with 31% rating him favorably to 30% who have a negative view of him.

Hoekstra's decision to run certainly gives Republicans a credible candidate in this race. But he's still a long shot and if he wins it's likely going to be the product of a Republican landslide year that results in the party coming away with something in the neighborhood of 55 Senate seats. Think about it this way- Stabenow is stronger in the state than Barack Obama is. Obama won Michigan by 16 points in 2008- he would probably need to shift about 20 points in the wrong direction, losing the state by 4-6 points, to pull Stabenow down with him. Obama's numbers aren't very good right now but they haven't plummeted to that point.

Full results here

Good news and bad news for Obama in VA

2011-07-26T12:24:00.004-05:00

Barack Obama's numbers are the weakest they've been in Virginia since before the 2010 election, but he still leads all of his top potential Republican opponents for next year by at least 4 points in the state.

Obama's approval is in slightly negative territory now with 47% of voters giving him good marks while 48% disapprove. On our last poll, conducted shortly after the capture of Osama bin Laden, he was at 51/44. He had also been on positive ground our previous two surveys before that. In March it was 48/45 and last November it was 50/45.

There's no one place where Obama has seen any particularly drastic shift in his numbers since our last Virginia poll. With Democrats his approval is still a very solid 89%, but it's down from the almost remarkable 94% it stood at in May. And with Republicans his disapproval, which was already pretty unanimous at 88%, has ticked up even further to 93%. If there's a silver lining for Obama in his 8 point net approval drop since May in Virginia it's that his approval with independents has remained steady at 48%, with 42% disapproving of him at this point.

Despite his declining popularity Obama continues to lead all of the top Republican candidates in the state. It's only a 4 point advantage against Mitt Romney at 47-43 but he has pretty healthy leads against the other contenders- 9 points over both Michele Bachmann and Rick Perry at 49-40 and 48-39 respectively, an 11 point advantage over Herman Cain at 49-38, and a 14 point one over Sarah Palin at 51-37.

This is the first time we've tested Bachmann, Perry, and Cain in Virginia. Obama's lead over Romney is down 7 points from an 11 point advantage at 51-40 in May but he's only shed one point against Palin, his 14 point edge almost identical to the 15 point one he had at 55-40 the last time around.

Obama's really benefiting from the unpopularity of the Republican candidate field in the state. All 5 of the candidates we tested have net negative favorability ratings both overall and specifically with independent voters. Cain's numbers are the 'best,' such as it is with a -8 spread at 27/35. He's followed by Perry at -10 (25/35), Romney at -15 (34/49), Bachmann at -19 (30/49), and Palin at -34 (28/62).

The overall take from these numbers is that Virginia continues to look like it could be something of a firewall for Obama, making it the most important state in next year's contest. We found last week that Obama was tied with Romney nationally, performing 7 points behind his margin of victory against John McCain. But here his 4 point advantage over Romney is only 2 points worse than he did against McCain, meaning that Obama's running more or less 5 points better in Virginia compared to 2008 than he is in the rest of the country.

Virginia was in some sense icing on the cake for Obama last time- he was glad to win it, but he didn't necessarily need it to win. Now with his numbers flagging in places like Pennsylvania that are more traditionally Democratic Virginia may well be a critical part of Obama's path to 270 electoral votes next year. Combine that with the Kaine/Allen Senate race and you have the biggest state in the country next year.

Full results here

Voting time

2011-07-26T10:02:00.004-05:00

We'll start releasing our Michigan and Virginia polls later today. Here are the options for where we'll go this coming weekend:

-California. There's been some polling showing Dianne Feinstein with weakening approval numbers. But would she actually be in any trouble against a named Republican candidate? Interested in looking at that and of course there's always plenty of good stuff to look at in our nation's biggest state.

-Colorado. There's no Gubernatorial or Senate race next year and that's why we haven't polled it that much but it could prove to be one of the most pivotal swing states in next year's election. Barack Obama won it by an impressive margin last time. How's he holding up?

-Kentucky. One of the few states with an important race in 2011- the one for Governor, which we haven't looked at since last October. Also very interested to get a first look at Rand Paul's approval numbers, and could Kentucky be the elusive state where Sarah Palin is popular?

-Nevada. There's been some conflicting polling on the Senate race of late and it's also an important early Republican primary and Presidential swing state.

-Vermont. One of the few states where we've never done a public poll and there are a few interesting things worth looking at- would Tom Salmon pose a threat to Bernie Sanders in the Senate race, is Peter Shumlin going to have a trouble winning a second term?

-West Virginia. Haven't taken a look at the Governor's race since before the primary and it's always worth checking up on Joe Manchin whenever Democrats are going through a bit of a down period, as seems to be the case now, to see how he's holding up.

Voting is open until tonight, we'll do the top 2, don't cheat the vote.

North Carolina Miscellaneous

2011-07-22T14:57:00.002-05:00

Perhaps nothing signifies how much North Carolina is changing and its population growing from an influx of Northern transplants than this fact: the New York Yankees and Boston Red Sox are two of the state's three most popular baseball teams. While they are way behind the Atlanta Braves, baseball's most bitter rivals have far bigger fan bases in the state than do any other teams, including the Nationals and Orioles.

The Braves are far-and-away North Carolinians’ favorite baseball team, with 36% choosing them over seven other named Major League Baseball clubs. The Braves appeared for a long time on the TBS network in the state. Atlanta is also closer to some parts of North Carolina than Washington, D.C., or Baltimore.

But despite parts of the state residing in both the Nationals’ and Orioles’ media markets, only 4% cheer primarily for the O’s and 1% for the Nats. The same 1% like the Tampa Bay Rays, whose AAA farm club is the Durham Bulls, but they are no more popular in the Triangle than elsewhere in the state. The Orioles' biggest cluster of fans is in the Northeastern corner of the state, closest to the team; there, 12% say they follow the Birds.

Taking a distant second behind the Braves are the Yanks, with 15%, followed by 10% who root for the Sox. The Yankees are most popular in the Southeastern part of the state, where they trail the Braves only 28-20, followed by the Triangle, where they are behind, 32-19. The Red Sox are most popular in the Charlotte metro area, but so are the Braves, who are ahead 44-16 in popularity. There, the Yanks are least popular, still in third place but only claiming 7% of baseball fans. In addition to the immigration patterns mainly toward the Raleigh and Charlotte areas, these two teams’ recent World Series championships and their prevalence on national sports networks' broadcasts have created larger nationwide bandwagons.

The Chicago Cubs, who have long appeared on WGN stations in the state, and the Cincinnati Reds, whose media market includes some western parts of the state, each claim 3% of fans. 27% root for someone else.

In political news, former U.S. Attorney George Holding was probably wise to have put his hat in the ring to face Brad Miller in the soon-to-be GOP-friendly 13th congressional district rather than take on relatively popular three-term Attorney General Roy Cooper. Holding's decision was made after this poll was in the field. If he changes his mind, he would start out behind Cooper, 40-29, with 31% undecided.

Part of Cooper’s advantage is that Holding is almost unknown, despite leading high-profile prosecutions of former Governor Mike Easley and former Senator John Edwards. Only 22% can express an opinion of Holding, with 5% favorable and 17% unfavorable. Cooper, meanwhile, is a known quantity to almost twice that many voters, and they fall slightly (23-20) in his favor.

But Cooper's crime-fighting record also gives him 12% of the Republican vote, with Holding taking only 7% of Democrats, weak for a Republican in this state. Cooper also has a nominal lead with independents, 32-30. Independents are more undecided than voters of either party, but they are only a fifth of voters. The crossover support/party unity is the deciding factor, and whoever takes on Cooper will have to cut into his strength with moderate to conservative Democrats. Cooper has a whopping 55-14 lead with moderates of all partisan stripes, and they're the 30% plurality of voters. He also gets 20% of the quarter who say they're somewhat conservative and even 11% of the fifth who claim to be far right.

55% are glad the state has the lottery, and 29% wish there was not one. Republicans are least glad, 47-38, and Democrats most, 64-22.

Neither of the state's senators is particularly popular right now, and surprisingly, despite being in her first term, Democrat Kay Hagan is slightly better-known and better-liked than the recently and strongly re-elected sophomore Republican Richard Burr. 38% approve of Hagan's performance, with 41% disapproving. The margin for Burr is 35-39.

Full results here.

Jersey? Fuhgedaboutit

2011-07-22T14:13:00.004-05:00

Except Jon Huntsman's wholloping in Utah and Ron Paul's narrow lead in Texas, we have yet to find a single Republican beating Obama in his own state. Now New Jersey marks another state where a potential favorite-son White House aspirant has no home-field advantage.

The Garden State has been a bit of a tease for Republicans at the presidential level. In the wake of 9/11, George W. Bush’s campaign played there at the last minute in 2004, only to lose by six points on Election Day. The GOP may have sensed renewed hope with the election of Chris Christie in 2009, but his popularity has sunk, and if he were to run, he would do worse in his home state against President Obama than would national frontrunner Mitt Romney. In fact, none of the contenders would come closer than John McCain did to winning the state except Romney, and Romney only barely.

Romney’s 14-point deficit, 53-39, is only a hair less than McCain’s 15-point loss in 2008. Christie falls behind by 17, 56-39; Michele Bachmann by 20, 55-35; Tim Pawlenty by 22, 54-32; Herman Cain by 26, 55-29; and Sarah Palin also by 26, 59-33.

Romney (52-37), Palin (59-29), and Christie (55-38) trailed by similar margins when PPP last took a look at the race in early January.

The president wins the independent vote against everyone but Romney, leading by one (Pawlenty and Bachmann) to twelve points (Palin) but trailing Romney 44-45. But at only 22% of the electorate, independents are the least numerous voters in this state. Obama's greatest advantages are that Democrats have a 46-32 self-identified turnout edge over Republicans and that he wins considerably more support from the opposite party than the Republicans do. He takes 13% (against Romney and Pawlenty) to 17% of the GOP vote (Palin), while they only pull 5% (Cain and Pawlenty) to 9% of Obama's party (Romney).

Obama’s approval rating in the Garden State has essentially not changed in the last seven months, now at 52%, with 43% disapproving (51-43 then), still his seventh or eighth best showing in the country. That is basically the reverse of Christie’s 43-53 spread, which is itself an improvement on all his other partymates, with Romney at a 36-47 favorability margin, Cain a 20-33, Bachmann a 32-50, Pawlenty a 20-44, and Palin a 31-65.

President Obama might be in a periodic popularity swoon nationally right now, and he's struggling in Jersey's western neighbor, Pennsylvania, among other swing states, but he hasn't dipped here, and it's not likely the state's shrunken slate of 14 electoral votes will be up for grabs next fall.

Full results here.

Herbert popular, but in a close race with Matheson

2011-07-22T13:03:00.004-05:00

On the face of it, Governor Gary Herbert couldn’t be safer for re-election. Herbert has a strong 51-32 approval rating and does well among Republican, 71-14, indicating he is not especially vulnerable to a primary challenge. Herbert even garners a significant amount of crossover support with 27% of Democrats approving compared to 58% who disapprove. Herbert’s approval among independents, 34-44, leaves much to be desired. However, in Utah this isn’t a big problem since half the state is Republican. While Herbert has an even lower approval among non-Mormons, 25-59, than his approval among Democrats, he more than makes up for it with a strong 62-20 approval rating with the Mormon majority in Utah.

It appears that Matheson can compete against almost any politician in Utah as despite Herbert’s strong ratings, he can hold Herbert to only a 45-43 lead. Against Matheson, Herbert’s support among Democrats comes to almost nothing as he trails Matheson 10-83 among Democrats while only leading Republicans 73-18. Herbert’s most disappointing numbers are among independents where Matheson beats him more than 2-1 by a 57-23 margin. There is a particularly large generational gap in Utah with those 18-29 supporting Matheson by a large 55-29 margin, while those over 65 favor Herbert 52-39.

Against candidates not named Matheson, Utah looks like it always does in the race for governor. Herbert holds a strong 55-32 lead over his 2010 challenger, Salt Lake County Mayor Peter Corroon, and a 56-29 lead against former Utah Attorney General Jan Graham. Against these candidates, Herbert garners more than twice as much support among Democrats than he loses among Republicans, while holding modest deficits with independents If Matheson doesn’t run, Herbert should have nothing to worry about.

It’s not that the other Democrats are unpopular; Corroon has a 33-29 favorability rating while Graham has a 27-18 spread, but it takes Matheson’s 59-28 rating for a Democrat to get anywhere near victory in Utah. It may be a good idea for Utah Republicans to think twice before redistricting Matheson out of a seat, as he could cause them serious trouble in a statewide election.

Full results here

Evaluating God

2011-07-22T09:01:00.002-05:00

While many polls have asked what Americans’ beliefs are about God, there has been little measurement of voters’ evaluation of its performance. It turns out, if God exists, voters would give God a strong 52-9 approval rating. This is hardly a surprise considering the vast majority of the country believes in an infallible deity, but some of the crosstabs are quite interesting.

There is a considerable age divide on God’s approval with those 18-29 approving 67-18 compared to a 40-6 approval rating among those over 65. What jumps out from this divide is not just that young voters are more likely to be critical of the job performance of the omnipotent figure, but that they are considerably more likely to voice their opinion. Only 15% of those 18-29 said they were unsure whether they approved of God, while 54% of those over 65 said they were unsure. This could indicate that the youth is much more comfortable answering silly questions about religion while the elderly feel a question on God’s approval is taking religion too lightly. There is also an ideological divide over God’s performance. Those who identify as very liberal approve of God 54-18, while those who identify as very conservative are almost uniform in their approval, 61-4.

God also performs well on some of the issues it could be responsible for if it exists. God scores its best rating on its handling of creating the universe. The big bang may be messy, but most voters must feel it gets the job done as they give God a 71-5 rating on the issue. As for the animal kingdom, if God exists it may have been off its game when it evolved up the giraffe’s laryngeal nerve, but perhaps the elegant Monarch butterfly makes up for it as voters give God a 56-11 rating on its handling of animals. As one would expect, God’s worst ratings are on its handling of natural disasters; however, Americans may feel the occasional earthquake or hurricane builds character as voters give God strong marks, rating it 50-13.

The reason God was referred to as “it” rather than “he” in the poll was because not everyone who believes in God believes God to be male. Using “it” in the God questions allowed them to be more inclusive.

Full results here

Utah firmly against same-sex marriage, but not civil unions

2011-07-21T15:52:00.002-05:00

With Utah, there’s no question voters oppose same-sex marriage. After all, it’s one of the reddest states in the country with a population that’s 70% Mormon. PPP confirms this as only 27% of Utah voters think that same-sex marriage should be legal compared to 66% who think it should be illegal. Republicans in Utah, who make up 50% of the state, are united 89-6 against legal same-sex marriage, while Democrats only support it 66-29. Unlike other states, independents also oppose legal same-sex marriage by a large margin, 52-36. This is likely due to the fierce opposition to same-sex marriage from Mormons. Mormons oppose same sex marriage 83-13, while non-Mormons come out strong for same-sex marriage rights by a 63-29 margin. Even in Utah, same-sex marriage has plurality support among the youth with those 18-29 in favor of legal same sex marriage 42-39.

When civil unions are included, a solid 60% majority of Utah voters come out in favor of some form of recognition. 23% favor marriage, 37% civil unions, and 39% oppose all recognition. With this level of support in Utah, it’s likely that there isn’t single state in the nation stands in opposition to all recognition of same-sex couples.

Despite the Mormon Church’s history of supporting polygamy, Utah is united in opposition to its legality. 75% of Utah voters think Polygamy should be illegal while only 14% think it should be legal. What’s most interesting about these numbers is the breakdown between Mormons and non-Mormons. Mormons are actually a bit less likely to support legalized polygamy. 14-78, than non-Mormons, 16-70. Utah voters also leave the Mormon Church’s history in the dust when it comes to interracial marriage, supporting legal interracial marriage 88-5. Mormons support legal interracial marriage a bit less strongly than non-Mormons, 87-5 and 90-5 respectively, but the difference is slight.

As for Utah’s politicians, Mike Lee, who ousted Bob Bennett at the Utah Republican convention, rates only a tepid 35-31. This is a poor rating for a state where Republicans outnumber Democrats more than 2-1. While Lee does fine with Republicans rating 53-12, he gets almost no support among Democrats, 6-60, and is deep underwater with independents, 24-44. Congressman Rob Bishop rates similarly with only a 32-30 rating. Like Lee, Bishop is down considerably with independents 24-47. For many politicians, this would be the kiss of death, but in Utah a Republican usually won’t have any problems unless Republicans begin to disapprove.

Former senator Bennett does better than Lee and Bishop among the general population of Utah voters, rating 48-34. However, Bennett only rates 50-32 among Republicans. Bennett is on positive ground with Democrats, 42-34, and independents, 48-37, but his crossover support proved useless when he had to defend himself against a more popular Republican in his own party last year.

As for sports, Utah voters prefer BYU as their favorite college team by a narrow 35-33 margin over Utah. 11% prefer Utah State, 5% Southern Utah, 4% Weber State, and 1% Utah Valley. Almost all the support for BYU comes from Mormons. Mormons prefer BYU over Utah by a 48-21 margin, but only 3% of non-Mormons prefer BYU compared to 61% who prefer Utah.

Full results here

Dems poised for House gains

2011-07-21T07:12:00.003-05:00

There's a very curious thing going on in our national polling right now: voters are down on Barack Obama and it's looking more likely that there could be a Republican in the White House in 2013. But they're also way down on the Republicans in Congress and Democrats have now led on 11 consecutive PPP generic House ballot polls dating back to February. Could Democrats gain a lot of seats in the House, possibly even a majority, while simultaneously voting out Barack Obama? It would certainly run counter to all historical precedent but these are weird times politically.

PPP's newest national poll finds that Americans think even less of the new Republican majority in the House than they thought of the Nancy Pelosi led Democratic majority. 42% of voters think the GOP is doing a worse job than the Democrats did while in power to only 39% who believe they're an improvement. 18% say the new majority's performance is 'about the same' as the old one's.

Democrats lead this month 46-44 on the generic House ballot. That's a 9 point shift from the Republicans' 7 point margin of victory on that measure in November's election and although it might not be enough to give them back control that margin would almost definitely translate to Democrats winning back a lot of the seats that they lost last fall. The GOP does maintain an 8 point advantage with independents at 41-33, but that represents a significant decline from their 19 point victory with them according to last year's exit polls.

John Boehner is not proving to be popular with the American public. 33% of voters approve of the job he's doing to 37% who disapprove, with independents splitting against him by a 34/37 margin almost identical to the overall numbers. He does have one thing going for him though- with Republicans he's at 55/15, suggesting there's not too much opposition to him within the party. We also found on our GOP primary poll earlier this week that 41% of Republican voters have a higher opinion of Boehner to just 18% who picked Eric Cantor so there's not any appetite for a change in leadership at least with the public at large.

The House landscape has shifted dramatically in the last 9 months.

Full results here

Michigan/Virginia Question Suggestions

2011-07-20T16:00:00.000-05:00

Michigan and Virgina were the easy winners of our vote on where to poll this week: beyond the obvious stuff what questions would you like to see us ask? Always appreciate the good suggestions.

Obama in perilous shape

2011-07-20T14:33:00.001-05:00

For the first time since last July Barack Obama does not lead Mitt Romney in PPP's monthly national poll on the 2012 Presidential race. Romney has now pulled into a tie with the President at 45%.

Obama's approval rating this month is 46% with 48% of voters disapproving of him. There are 2 things particularly troubling in his numbers: independents split against him by a 44/49 margin, and 16% of Democrats are unhappy with the job he's doing while only 10% of Republicans give him good marks. Republicans dislike him at this point to a greater extent than Democrats like him and that will be a problem for him moving forward if it persists.

Romney takes advantage of those 2 points of weakness for Obama. He leads the President by 9 points with independents at 46-37. And he earns more crossover support, getting 13% of the Democratic vote while only 8% of Republicans are behind Obama.

An extremely wide electability gap has developed between Romney and all the rest of the Republican candidates. Everyone else we tested trails Obama by at least as much as John McCain's 2008 margin of defeat and in most cases more. Obama's up 7 on Michele Bachmann at 48-41, 9 against Tim Pawlenty at 48-39, 12 versus Herman Cain at 48-36, and as usual has his largest lead in a match up with Sarah Palin at 53-37.

Here's an important note on all of this early 2012 polling though: Obama's numbers are worse than they appear to be on the surface. The vast majority of the undecideds in all of these match ups disapprove of the job Obama's doing but aren't committing to a candidate yet while they wait to see how the Republican field shakes out. Here's an idea of where these various match ups might stand once all voters have made up their minds:

-In the Obama/Romney head to head 21% of undecideds approve of Obama and 61% disapprove. If you allocate them based on their approval/disapprove of Obama, Romney would lead 52-48.

-In the Obama/Bachmann head to head 10% of undecideds approve of Obama and 67% disapprove. If you allocate them based on their approval/disapprove of Obama, Obama would lead only 51-49.

-In the Obama/Pawlenty head to head 9% of undecideds approve of Obama and 75% disapprove. If you allocate them based on their approval/disapprove of Obama, the race would be tied at 50%.

-In the Obama/Cain head to head 8% of undecideds approve of Obama and 76% disapprove. If you allocate them based on their approval/disapprove of Obama, Obama would lead only 51-49.

-In the Obama/Palin head to head 5% of undecideds approve of Obama and 84% disapprove. If you allocate them based on their approval/disapprove of Obama, Obama would lead only 54-46.

So if you dig deeper into the numbers Obama's position is a lot worse than meets the eye. There's a very good chance Obama would lose if he had to stand for reelection today. If there's a silver lining for Obama it's this- he trailed Romney in our poll last July and then led him for each of the next 11 months. For whatever reason summer and particularly the month of July has not been friendly to Obama in the polls ever since he hit the national stage. So perhaps he'll see another recovery now as he has in the past. But for now he's in one of the weakest positions of his Presidency.

Full results here

And the finalists are...

2011-07-20T08:52:00.002-05:00

We have 7 choices for where we'll do our 2 polls this week. Voting is open until 5 PM today.

-California. There's been some polling showing Dianne Feinstein with weakening approval numbers. But would she actually be in any trouble against a named Republican candidate? Interested in looking at that and of course there's always plenty of good stuff to look at in our nation's biggest state.

-Colorado. There's no Gubernatorial or Senate race next year and that's why we haven't polled it that much but it could prove to be one of the most pivotal swing states in next year's election. Barack Obama won it by an impressive margin last time. How's he holding up?

-Kentucky. One of the few states with an important race in 2011- the one for Governor, which we haven't looked at since last October. Also very interested to get a first look at Rand Paul's approval numbers, and could Kentucky be the elusive state where Sarah Palin is popular?

-Michigan. This one needs no explanation- the Senate race just got a lot more interesting with Pete Hoekstra's reconsideration. Also very interested to see how Obama's doing here- if his numbers are as weak as they are in Pennsylvania that's very bad news. And has Rick Snyder's decline continued, stabilized, or has he maybe even shown a little improvement?

-Vermont. One of the few states where we've never done a public poll and there are a few interesting things worth looking at- would Tom Salmon pose a threat to Bernie Sanders in the Senate race, is Peter Shumlin going to have a trouble winning a second term?

-Virginia. Not all that interested in the Senate race- it will almost definitely be tied give or a take a few points. But this is a place where in 3 polls we've done since November Obama has held up very well...is that still the case? And since we took a first look at the 2013 Governor's race in New Jersey, we may as well do the same in Virginia.

-West Virginia. Haven't taken a look at the Governor's race since before the primary and it's always worth checking up on Joe Manchin whenever Democrats are going through a bit of a down period, as seems to be the case now, to see how he's holding up.

As always don't cheat- voting a few times on different computers is fine, creating a proxy to vote hundreds of times will get a state thrown out.

Christie on the decline

2011-07-20T06:26:00.004-05:00

Chris Christie's popularity has declined significantly over the first half of 2011 and he would have a very difficult time winning reelection if voters in New Jersey went to the polls today.

Only 43% of voters in the state approve of the job Christie is doing to 53% who disapprove. That -10 approval spread represents a 13 point decline from when PPP last polled the state in January, when Christie's standing was 48/45. Christie's numbers are steady with Republicans. But independents have really turned on him, going from approving by a 55/39 margin to disapproving by a 54/40 margin. And his crossover popularity with Democrats is on the decline as well- where 23% approved of him in January now only 16% do.

The fallout of Christie's declining approval numbers is that he would now trail Newark Mayor Cory Booker in a hypothetical 2013 match up, 47-43. Booker is an extremely popular political figure, with 43% of voters expressing a positive opinion of him to only 16% with a negative one. He still has 2 things going for him that Christie no longer does- he's very well liked with independents (a 35/13 favorability spread) and he has a lot of appeal across party lines (just as many Republicans- 26%- like him as dislike him. Booker actually leads Christie 43-42 with independents, a group GOP candidates really need to win by a wide margin to be successful statewide in New Jersey.

Christie would also find himself in a tough battle with a couple other major Democratic political figures. Congressman Frank Pallone would fight Christie to a tie at 43%. That's despite the fact that only 38% of voters in the state even know who Pallone is, and those who do don't have a particularly positive image of him. And Christie would lead his recent foil, state Senate President Steve Sweeney, only 42-40. That match up is close even though voters across the state have quite a dim view of Sweeney with only 13% saying they see him positively to 37% with an unfavorable opinion.

It's not even a given that Christie would be able to win another match up against his predecessor and the man he defeated for the job, Jon Corzine. Asked how they would vote if they could do the 2009 election for Governor all over again 48% say they would pick Christie and 48% say they would pick Corzine. Our final 2009 poll found Christie beating Corzine by 23 points with independents. Now that margin would be just 11 points. Corzine ties Christie even though he remains an unpopular figure in the state with just 39% of voters rating him positively to 47% with a negative opinion.

Finally we also- at the request of our blog readers and just for fun- looked to see how Bruce Springsteen would fare in a run against Christie. Each would start out at 42%, but there's a lot more room for growth for the Boss because while only 4% of Republicans are undecided, 23% of Democrats say they're not sure who they would vote for. If Springsteen ran and came across as a credible candidate he'd likely see a large increase in that Democratic support. Springsteen has favorability numbers any politician would die for- 50% of voters see him positively to only 22% with an unfavorable opinion. He has favorable numbers across party lines although perhaps because of his well known politics he's seen a good deal more positively by Democrats (63/10) than Republicans (38/35).

Christie has plenty of time to rehabilitate his numbers in the next two years and change but it's clear that New Jersey voters are souring on him and that he'd have an uphill battle for reelection if he was up this year.

Full results here

PA Republicans: Santorum should drop to Senate race

2011-07-19T15:53:00.004-05:00

Pennsylvania Republicans have a message for Rick Santorum: run for the Senate instead of the White House.

Santorum is in a distant 3rd in our Republican Presidential polling in the state, with only 14% of GOP primary voters saying he'd be their top choice. That puts him behind Michele Bachmann's 24% and Mitt Romney's 17%. Santorum does run ahead of Herman Cain at 10%, Ron Paul at 9%, Rick Perry at 8%, Newt Gingrich at 6%, Jon Huntsman at 3%, and Tim Pawlenty at 1%.

Bachmann's lead in Pennsylvania reinforces the advantage we showed for her nationally in numbers released this morning. As is the case everywhere she's leading primarily based on her strength with the far right, and she seems to be squeezing Santorum out with that group of voters which should be his natural base of support. She gets 30% with them to only 15% for Santorum. Bachmann also leads Romney 25-18 with 'somewhat conservative' voters, a group that he has tended to have the advantage with nationally. Romney does crush Bachmann with moderates by a 33-6 margin, but they only account for 16% of primary voters so that doesn't take him far.

Pennsylvania Republicans may not support Santorum for the White House but they would like him to be their candidate for another shot at Bob Casey next year. 47% say he'd be their choice of a nominee with no one else even registering in double digits- Jake Corman and Tim Murphy are each named by 9% of respondents, Jim Gerlach by 7%, Laureen Cummings by 5%, Charlie Dent by 4%, Marc Scaringi by 1%, and Kim Ward by 0%.

Whether Santorum ends up jumping into the Senate race or not these numbers make it pretty clear that Republicans are looking for someone new to get into the field. The two announced candidates we tested- Cummings and Scaringi- account for only 6%. That leaves a whole lot of room for someone else to jump in and win the nomination. It's safe to say GOP voters are not satisfied with the current crop of candidates.

Looking at the GOP Presidential field without Santorum included Bachmann maintains her 7 point advantage at 27% to Romney's 20% and 10% each for Paul and Perry. And if you throw Sarah Palin into the mix she surpasses Romney for second, getting 18%. That puts her behind Bachmann's 23% but ahead of Romney's 14% and Perry's 11%. No matter what permutation of the candidate field you look at Bachmann's the early favorite of Republicans in the Keystone State.

Full results here

Taking suggestions

2011-07-19T15:46:00.001-05:00

We're going to do 2 state polls this weekend- where would you like us to go? We'll take suggestions until the morning, pick some finalists, and then take a vote during the day tomorrow to pick the two states where we poll. Thanks as always for the good ideas!

New Hampshire Miscellaneous Poll

2011-07-19T14:47:00.003-05:00

-There are a million New Hampshire Republican primary polls out there right now so when we polled the state earlier this month we decided we may as well ask about the 2016 Democratic race too. The answer is not surprising: if Hillary Clinton decided to make another run at the White House she would start out as an overwhelming favorite. 52% of primary voters said she'd be their choice from the options we gave, followed by Joe Biden at 16%. No one else registered in double digits- Andrew Cuomo at 9%, Russ Feingold at 3%, Deval Patrick at 2%, Cory Booker at 1%, and Brian Schweitzer and Mark Warner each at 0%.

Those numbers largely reinforce what we found when we asked about a similar pool of candidates in Iowa in April. There 44% picked Clinton to 13% for Biden, and again no one else in double digits. If nothing changes over the next few years- and goodness knows it could- Clinton's going to be way out in front to start if she decides to make the race.

Since it seems quite likely neither Clinton nor Biden will actually run we also asked a version of the question in New Hampshire without them. In that permutation Cuomo leads the way with 30% to 18% for Feingold, 13% for Patrick, 2% each for Booker and Warner, and 1% for Schweitzer. That may be an indication that Cuomo's work in his first 6 months as Governor really has made national waves. Or it could also just be an indication that he has a famous family name.

-New Hampshire Republicans made enormous gains in the Legislature last year. Now voters appear ready to go back in the other direction in 2012. Democrats lead the generic ballot in the state by a 48-45 margin. That actually represents progress for the Republicans, who trailed by 49-41 on that count when PPP last polled the state in April. But that spread would still result in a huge number of seats- and quite possibly the majority- moving back to the Democrats. The key to the party's improvement relative to last year? It leads 42-41 with independent voters- that's a modest advantage but it's a far cry from the huge margins the GOP was winning those voters by last year.

-New Hampshire is one state where there's an outright majority in favor of gay marriage. 51% of voters in the state think it should be legal to only 38% who think it should be outlawed. Two thirds of voters under 30 support it but what might be most remarkable is that even seniors do by a 45/44 margin. That's quite a different story than we see in most states.

If you extend the question to asking about both gay marriage and civil unions 80% of voters in the state support some form of legal recognition for same sex couples with 45% saying that full marriage rights is their top choice and the other 35% preferring civil unions. Only 19% oppose all recognition.

Even among Republicans in New Hampshire 67% support legal recognition for gay couples. They largely prefer civil unions- 50% of GOP voters- with 17% in favor of marriage. These numbers suggest that gay bashing is not likely to be a winner for Republican Presidential candidates in New Hampshire next year.

-The state's 2 Senators have very similar and pretty solid numbers. Neither is overwhelmingly popular but they're both on positive ground and that's not a bad place for an elected official to be these days. Kelly Ayotte's approval is a +6 spread at 44/38 and Jeanne Shaheen's breaks down at +5 at 47/42.

Full results here

Is there an IVR/Live Telephone Interview divide in Republican primary polling?

2011-07-19T14:38:00.001-05:00

While PPP has shown a remarkable surge in Bachmann’s performance, with her pulling into a one point lead nationally, many other pollsters have found only a moderate surge. Bachmann reaches only 8% In a McClatchy/Marist poll (6/15 - 6/23), 11% in a Fox News Poll (6/26 - 6/28) and 14% in a Quinnipiac poll (7/5 - 7/11). On the other hand, Rasmussen (6/14) also found a larger surge for Bachmann, with her polling at 19% despite the poll having been conducted only right after the last debate as Bachmann’s surge was just beginning. However, the Rasmussen poll did have a large Romney lead. Nevertheless, Bachmann’s strongest showings have both been in IVR polls.

Similarly in Iowa, IVR pollster Magellan Strategies has Bachmann at 29%, almost double Romney’s 16% while live telephone interview pollsters have found Bachmann either tied or with only a small lead on Romney. In New Hampshire, the evidence is more of a mixed bag with PPP finding Bachmann closest to Romney with 18% to his 25%, while Magellan finds Bachmann with her lowest support at 10%. Magellan’s poll of New Hampshire was conducted right after the debate, so Bachmann’s showing might be stronger if they were to re-poll this week.

It’s not just Bachmann for whom IVR polls have shown stronger support. At the height of Cain’s surge, PPP showed him stronger relative to Romney than all other pollsters. No other IVR polls were conducted nationally at this time. Similarly, PPP and Rasmussen were the only pollsters to find Donald Trump alone in the lead at his height.

Bachmann, Cain, and Trump all have had appeal to the Tea Party wing of the Republican Party. It’s possible that IVR polls could be showing a stronger performance for the right wing candidates than live telephone interview pollsters, though this is far from certain. The Magellan New Hampshire poll and the recent Rasmussen national poll showing a large lead for Romney offer contradictory evidence. However, this might be attributable to both polls occurring right after the debate before her momentum could fully build. While more evidence is needed, it’s worth keeping an eye on to see if the divide persists.

Menendez shows some signs of weakness

2011-07-19T07:45:00.004-05:00

Robert Menendez might be the most vulnerable Democratic Senator up for reelection next year that no one's talking about. PPP's newest New Jersey poll finds him with an approval rating mired in the 30s and leading by only 5 points over one of his prospective 2012 opponents.

Just 37% of voters in the state approve of the job Menendez is doing to 35% who disapprove. He has awful numbers with independents, only 24% of whom approve of him to 40% who think he's doing a poor job. And Republicans (63% disapproval) are more convinced that he's doing a bad job than Democrats are (60% approval) that his performance has been good.

Of course the big challenge for Republicans is finding a candidate that can actually capitalize on Menendez's weakness and that looks like it might be a difficult task. Four of the people whose names have been bandied about as candidates- Mike Doherty, Kim Guadagno, Woody Johnson, and Joseph Kyrillos- would all trail Menendez by double digits in spite of his middling approval numbers. It would be a 13 point lead over Doherty (48-35), a 14 point advantage over Guadagno (48-34), an 18 point one over Johnson (48-30), and a 19 point spread over Kyrillos (48-29).

That quartet of Republicans all has two things in common. They're obscure, with all of them having a name recognition that falls into the 24-35% range. And they're not well liked by the few voters who do offer an opinion of them, with each having at least 9% more voters who rate them unfavorably than positively.

There does look to be one potential candidate who could really make the race competitive and that's the GOP's nominee from 2006, Tom Kean Jr. He's decently popular, with 32% of voters giving him good marks to 27% with a negative opinion. More importantly he's at 35-22 with the independent voters who any Republican needs to win by a wide margin in order to be successful in New Jersey.

Kean holds Menendez to a 44-39 advantage. He benefits from a 49-30 lead with independents, but he takes only 8% of the Democratic vote. He would likely need more crossover support than that to pull out a win. Still he's within striking range and would clearly be the Republicans' best hope for winning this race.

Menendez's vulnerability hasn't received much attention and if Republicans don't get a strong candidate into the race it probably never will. But his lead over Kean is a lot smaller than the advantages folks like Bill Nelson in Florida and Sherrod Brown in Ohio have posted over all of their prospective opponents and much has been written about their situations.

Of course there's one big difference between Menendez's situation and theirs- the GOP has actually won recent Senate races in Florida and Ohio while New Jersey has proven to be an endless tease for the Republican Party. The reaction to Menendez from voters in the state may be a 'meh' but in a Presidential year a Democratic Senator would probably have to be deeply unpopular to lose reelection- and he doesn't fall into that category.

Full results here

Bachmann continues to surge

2011-07-19T07:07:00.003-05:00

Michele Bachmann's momentum continues to build and she's taken first place by the smallest of margins on PPP's newest national Presidential poll. 21% of Republican primary voters say she's their top choice to 20% for Mitt Romney, 12% for Rick Perry, 11% for Herman Cain, 9% for Ron Paul, 7% for Newt Gingrich, 5% for Tim Pawlenty, and 3% for Jon Huntsman.

Bachmann's rise has been fueled by her appeal to voters on the far right- and their skepticism about Romney. Romney has the lead with centrist Republicans (23-17) and with those defining themselves as only somewhat right of center (24-17). But among 'very conservative' voters only 48% have a positive opinion of Romney to 34% who view him negatively, weak numbers, and Bachmann's capitalizing on that with a 26-15 lead over Romney, who's in third place with that group of voters.

Oddly enough one of the best things that could happen to Romney right now is the late entry of Sarah Palin into the race. In a ballot test including her as a candidate he leads the way with 20% to 16% for Bachmann, 12% for Palin, and 11% for Perry. 44% of Palin's voters say they would vote for Bachmann if Palin didn't run, compared to only 6% who say they would otherwise vote for Romney. So basically a Palin candidacy would take a large bite out of Bachmann's support with virtually no impact on Romney.

Republicans don't want Palin to run though. Just 29% think she should enter the race at this point to 53% opposed to that idea. It's not that GOP voters don't like Palin- 57% have a favorable opinion of her to 32% with a negative one, the best favorability spread of anyone we tested on this poll. But even among those voters who see her in a positive light only 45% think she should make a White House bid. There just continues to be a significant disconnect between Republicans liking Palin and thinking she should be President.

There's been a fair amount of speculation that this contest could end up as a two race between Romney and one of the more conservative candidates in the field, the strongest of whom at this point is looking like Bachmann. In such a scenario Bachmann would lead Romney 44-41. Bachmann would win the support of Cain voters (57-35), Paul backers (43-31), and Perry's (57-30) while Romney would get the voters of Gingrich supporters (43-29), Huntsman ones (79-10), and Pawlenty's (43-32).

The fact that 57% of Perry's supporters would otherwise prefer Bachmann to only 30% who would go for Romney suggests that his entrance into the race would have the potential to stifle Bachmann's momentum. Perry's 12% debut in our polling is a very strong entrance given how little exposure he's had so far on the national stage. Other than Bachmann he has to be seen as the biggest winner on this poll.

The losers this time around are the duo of Pawlenty and Huntsman. Pawlenty appeared to be finally getting some momentum after Mike Huckabee declined to make the race and did as well as 13% in a national poll we conducted in late May. Since then though he's declined to 9% and now 5% over the course of our last two surveys- not a good trajectory. Meanwhile Huntsman's official entry to the race hasn't done anything for him- he's still stuck at the same 2-3% level of support that he's shown in most of our polling both at the national and state levels.

These numbers also show potential signs of trouble ahead for Romney. Only 17% of Republican voters say they'd be willing to vote for someone who had supported an individual health insurance mandate at the state level, compared to 66% who say they would not be willing to support such a candidate. The funny thing about that is Romney's getting 17% right now with that latter group of voters and his favorability with them is 49/33. Your average primary voter isn't tuned in enough to the race right now to know the specifics of Romney's record.

The biggest question for his campaign is what's going to happen once Romney's opponents inevitably do make folks aware of his record- will that really be a sort of litmus test/deal breaker for GOP voters or will they forgive Romney for that because of his greater attributes and far superior electability? These numbers show the potential for big trouble down the road for Romney but there are also reasons to think he'll be able to overcome that.

Full results here

Perdue trails McCrory by 8

2011-07-15T09:36:00.003-05:00

The story with Bev Perdue's poll numbers doesn't change much: her approval rating continues to be in the mid-30s and she continues to trail Pat McCrory in a head to head for reelection by a high single digit margin.

34% of voters this month say they're happy with the job Perdue's doing while 49% disapprove. The biggest obstacle to Perdue seeing a significant improvement in her numbers continues to be a lack of support for her from Democrats, only 55% of whom give her good marks to 25% who dissent. Usually you'd expect a Governor to be at 70% or higher with voters in their own party. Perdue's numbers with independents, at 31/57, have a lot of room for improvement as well.

These are actually the best approval numbers Perdue has had during the month of July at any point during her time in office. In July of 2009 she had a 25% approval rating and in July of 2010 she was at 32%. She still has a lot of room for improvement but she's at least in a better place than she was earlier in her term.

This month Perdue trails McCrory 47-39 in a hypothetical rematch of their 2008 contest. McCrory gets 83% of the Republican vote, while only 67% of Democrats will commit to voting for Perdue. And she trails by a 57/28 margin with independents as well.

Certainly Perdue's unpopularity is the biggest reason she trails McCrory but he is also a pretty popular figure, with 29% of voters rating him favorably to 23% with a negative opinion of him. The 48% with no opinion indicates a lot of voters have already forgotten McCrory since his 2008 campaign so he will have a lot of reintroducing of himself to do once he formally enters the race.

Over the last 3 months Perdue has settled into trailing McCrory by a 6-8 point margin. That's a significant improvement from the 11-14 point deficits she showed in polling between February and April. The legislative session definitely enhanced her stature and put her in a stronger position than she's been in a long time, the big question now is whether she can keep that improvement going once her foils in the General Assembly go home.

One thing seems pretty certain: when McCrory finally does throw his hat in the ring he'll start out with the lead.

Full results here

Breaking News: Obama will not win Utah in 2012

2011-07-14T15:20:00.003-05:00

Barack Obama is not going to win Utah next year. His approval rating is 32% with 62% of voters disapproving of him. But now that we have that out of the way there was actually some pretty interesting stuff in our Utah President poll:

-Even though our numbers yesterday showed Mitt Romney would destroy Jon Huntsman in a Republican primary in the state, Huntsman is actually much stronger when tested against Obama in the state. He leads Obama by 40 points at 63-23, compared to a 32 point advantage for Romney against Obama at 63-31. The reason Huntsman does so much better in the general is that he is beloved by Democrats (69/25 favorability) and independents (61/29). He gets 28% of the Democratic vote against Obama, compared to 19% for Romney. And he wins independents by a 39 point margin against the President, compared to 8 points for Romney.

These numbers speak to the fact that Huntsman would be an incredibly formidable candidate against Obama if he made it to the general election. His appeal to Democrats and to independents is remarkable for a Republican candidate. And that's exactly why he won't even come close to smelling the nomination.

-Bill Clinton lost Utah by 19 points in 1992 and that's the closest a Democrat has come to winning the state since 1964. That makes Sarah Palin's performance against Obama truly remarkable- she leads him by only 2 points at 43-41, losing independent voters by 26 points and getting only 69% of the Republican vote while Obama takes 89% of the Democrats. We've polled Palin's favorability in 33 states over the course of the last 8 months and haven't found voters with a positive opinion of her anywhere. We thought dark red Utah might finally be the one but only 32% of voters there have a favorable opinion of her to 58% with an unfavorable one. The search continues. The fact that Palin would make Utah a swing state may be the greatest sign of her weakness yet.

Rounding out the Republican field in Utah Herman Cain leads Obama by 7 points at 43-36, Tim Pawlenty has an 11 point advantage over him at 45-34, and Michele Bachmann tops him by 14 points at 49-35.

-One final note: if the non-Mormons in Utah were a state it could very well be the bluest state in the country, at least based on the results of this poll. Only 30% of poll respondents were not Mormons so the sample size on this group is about 220, making the margin of error +/-6.6%. Nevertheless Obama's approval rating with non-Mormons is 66% with only 29% of voters disapproving of him. That's a higher approval than we've found for Obama in any other state and only Hawaii where he's at 64% even comes close. He leads Huntsman by 9 points with non-Mormons and beyond that it's landslides- 40 points over Romney, 43 against Bachmann, 46 versus Pawlenty, 47 against Cain, and a 51 point edge on Palin.

Folks who know Utah politics better than me- is the non-Mormon population in the state really this liberal Democratic? I had no idea and found these results to be pretty fascinating.

Full results here

Pennsylvania Miscellaneous

2011-07-14T13:41:00.004-05:00

-Florida's Rick Scott, Ohio's John Kasich, and Wisconsin's Scott Walker get most of the attention but Pennsylvania's Tom Corbett also belongs on the list of new Republican Governors that voters are having significant buyer's remorse about. Only 35% of voters in the state approve of the job he's doing to 46% who disapprove. Democrats are more unified (65%) in disapproving of him than Republicans are (58%) in liking him and independents split against him by a 35/40 margin as well. If voters could do it over again they say they'd vote for Dan Onorato over Corbett by a 47/44 margin. Barack Obama has a lot of problems in Pennsylvania but a popular Republican in the Governor's office is not one of them.

-The dominant sentiment toward Pat Toomey after 6 months in the Senate is ambivalence. 30% of voters give him good marks, 29% disapprove, and the largest mass of them at 41% has no opinion either way. This is perfectly good news for Toomey- you're a lot more likely to permanently damage yourself in the first few months in office than you are to set the world on fire so maintaining a low profile and not ticking everyone off is just fine. Better to be in his position than Corbett's.

-Democrats lead on the generic Congressional ballot in the state 46-40, an outcome that would almost certainly lead to the party picking up a number of seats if the election was held today. Democrats have two big things going for them compared to last year. They lead by 6 points with independents. In August of 2010 they had a 23 point gap with that voting bloc. And where last summer only 72% of Democrats were committed to supporting their party's House candidates, now 80% are. Six months of seeing what can happen with a Republican controlled House seems to have reunified the party.

I think Democrats' chances of retaking the House are being significantly undervalued by most experts right now. This finding, as well as one we made in Florida last week that Democrats led the generic ballot there by a 45-40 margin, reinforce our national polling which currently finds voters leaning Democratic 48-42 for the House next year. Voters are not happy with the new GOP majority and if there was an election today Democrats would at the least pick up a lot of seats, even if not enough to take back control.

-68% of Pennsylvania voters support some form of legal recognition for gay couples but most of them fall short of saying they would favor outright gay marriage in the state. Out of the 68%, 32% say they think gay couples should have full marriages right while another 36% say their preference would be civil unions. Asked just to say whether they think gay marriage should be legal or not though only 38% go that far with 51% of voters opposed.

We see the typical massive generational divide on this issue play itself out in Pennsylvania. A strong majority of voters under 45 support gay marriage but senior citizens are even firmer in their being against it, 69/20.

-The Steelers are Pennsylvania's favorite professional sports team. 30% of voters in the state pick them, followed by 22% for the Phillies, 12% each for the Penguins and Eagles, 6% for the Pirates, 4% for the Flyers, and 2% for the 76ers. For those keeping track that's 48% of voters in the state choosing one of Pittsburgh's 3 teams to only 40% picking a Philadelphia team even though that city has 4. Advantage Steel City on that front.

Full results here

New Hampshire Congress Poll

2011-07-14T11:55:00.002-05:00

Neither Frank Guinta nor Charlie Bass have approval numbers that are setting the world on fire in their New Hampshire Congressional districts, but Bass appears to be in much worse shape for winning another term next year.

Only 29% of voters in Bass' district approve of the job he's doing to 48% who disapprove. His numbers are bad with Democrats and independents but what really plunges them is how weak he is even with Republicans. Just 48% give him good marks to 26% who think he's doing a poor job. Those are the kinds of numbers that can make you vulnerable even in a primary. Last year Bass narrowly won the primary with less than 50% of the vote in a 5 candidate field. It would be interesting to see the outcome in a two person race.

Assuming Bass is again the Republican nominee he would find himself in a tight race with his 2010 opponent, Ann McLane Kuster. A rematch between the two would basically start as a tie with Bass edging Kuster 43-42. The reason Bass leads Kuster despite his horrid approval numbers is that even though only 48% of GOP voters are happy with the job he's doing, 80% would still choose him over a Democratic alternative. This was one of the closest House races in the country last year and it could well be again in 2012.

In the 1st District Frank Guinta has narrowly positive approval numbers. 39% of voters are happy with him while 38% dissent. Republicans approve and Democrats disapprove of him in similar numbers. What puts him over the top is a pretty decent 43/35 breakdown with independents.

Guinta leads a rematch with the former holder of the seat, Carol Shea-Porter, 48-41. He wins independents by 19 points in such a scenario. In one sense these numbers represent an improvement for Shea-Porter since she lost reelection by 12 points last year. Still there's an argument Democrats might want to go in a different direction if they want to reclaim this seat. Shea-Porter has poor favorability numbers with only 40% of voters viewing her positively to 48% with a negative opinion. And her 36/53 spread with independents is even worse than the overall number. A fresher candidate could have a better chance at returning the seat to the Democratic column.

Full results here

National/New Jersey Question Suggestion Thread

2011-07-13T18:45:00.003-05:00

This weekend we're going to do our monthly national poll and we're going to do a New Jersey poll. Please fire away with your question suggestions, particularly on who to test against Robert Menendez. Thanks as always.

North Carolina going bad for Obama

2011-07-13T15:37:00.003-05:00

Barack Obama's annual summer polling swoon has come to North Carolina. For the first time since February more voters disapprove than approve of him in the state, and for the first time since November he faces majority disapproval. His approval rating this month is down to 45%, with 51% of voters unhappy with him.

A sharp turn against him with independent voters is what's causing Obama problems in the state. Last month they narrowly gave him good marks by a 47/46 margin but now only 36% are happy with him while 62% disapprove. Obama's approval with Democrats is 77%, generally on par with what it's been over the course of his time in office. And even though receiving only 5% approval from Republicans is pretty bad for Obama it's also nothing new- he's had little crossover popularity with GOP voters since the day he took office.

Obama's declining popularity also means he's not doing as well in head to head match ups against possible Republican opponents for next year. He is now tied with Mitt Romney at 45%. Although the margins were usually small he had led Romney all eight previous times PPP polled a match up between the two of them in the state. The key here is again those independent voters- they give Romney a 17 point advantage at 50-33.

Obama does lead the rest of the Republican field but with the exception of Sarah Palin his advantages are modest: he's up 3 against Michele Bachmann at 46-43, 4 against Herman Cain at 46-42, 5 against Tim Pawlenty at 46-41, and 8 against Palin at 50-42.

The reality for Obama is worse than those topline numbers indicate. In all of the match ups the vast majority of undecideds disapprove of the job Obama's doing- it's 84% against Palin, 83% against Pawlenty, 81% against Cain, 77% against Bachmann, and 74% against Romney. In all likelihood most of those undecideds would not be in Obama's camp if they really had to vote today but are on the fence at this point while they wait to see who the GOP nominee is. If their votes broke the same direction as their feelings about the President that would leave him trailing all of them except for Palin.

If there is a saving grace for Obama it's that voters don't respond well to any of the Republican candidates on a personal level either. Bachmann has the best favorability numbers but it's still a -8 spread at 34/42. She's followed by Cain's -12 at 24/36, Romney's -15 at 32/47, Pawlenty's -21 at 19/40, and Palin's -22 at 35/57. The Republicans' poll numbers all have two things in common: independents dislike them and Democratic voters are more unified in disliking all of them than Republicans are in liking them. If the GOP had an appealing set of candidates Obama would likely be in a far worse position in the state.

This is the third key swing state in the last week, along with New Hampshire and Pennsylvania, where we've found Obama with under water approval numbers and struggling in head to heads with Romney. Obama's poll numbers have seemed to go bad every summer since he went to the heart of the American spotlight and they usually see some recovery- he'll have to hope that will be the case again this time around.

Full results here

Bad news for Huntsman, Hatch

2011-07-13T13:08:00.003-05:00

It's a good thing for Jon Huntsman that his home state of Utah isn't a terribly important one to the Republican Presidential nomination process. A plurality of GOP primary voters there have an unfavorable opinion of him and he gets absolutely crushed by Mitt Romney in the state.

Overall 43% of primary voters have a positive opinion of Huntsman to 46% with a negative one. He fares well with moderates in his party (65/21) and does ok with voters who describe themselves as just 'somewhat' right of center (46/41). But with voters who describe themselves as 'very conservative' Huntsman is a pariah. Only 29% of them rate him positively with 61% giving him an unfavorable review. His work for the Obama administration and centrist stances on some issues have clearly riled up the right wing in the state.

Romney is the first choice of 63% of Republicans in the state with Huntsman placing a very distant second at 10%. Michele Bachmann at 6%, Sarah Palin at 5%, Herman Cain, Rick Perry, and Ron Paul at 4%, Newt Gingrich at 3%, and Tim Pawlenty at 1% round out the field.

Romney's performance in Utah is the strongest we've seen for any of the Republican candidates in any individual state. The best before now was Romney in Massachusetts, where he pulled 49%. 83% of primary voters see him favorably to only 13% with a negative opinion.

Asked to choose directly between Romney and Huntsman 82% of respondents pick Romney to only 14% who side with Huntsman. Data we'll release tomorrow shows that Democrats in Utah absolutely love Huntsman and that may sum up the problem with his candidacy. He's the Republican candidate that Democrats love and filling that niche won't win you a lot of primaries.

On the Senate front 47% of Republicans would like Jason Chaffetz to be the party's nominee for the US Senate next year compared to 43% whose first choice is Orrin Hatch. The 47% supporting Chaffetz pretty closely tracks the 44% who would like to see Hatch replaced with someone more conservative next year.

What's interesting about that is only 30% of GOP voters actually express the sentiment that Hatch is 'too liberal.' There's a significant chunk of the Republican electorate that thinks Hatch is fine ideologically but just wants someone more conservative anyway. That's an indication that the Tea Party mentality that scuttled Republican chances in several Senate general elections last year still exists some places- and it has the potential to hurt the party in Utah if Jim Matheson decides to run for the Senate. Matheson polls 4 points better in a head to head against Chaffetz than Hatch.

Hatch destroys Chaffetz with moderate voters, leading 67-23. And he stays pretty competitive with somewhat conservative ones, trailing only 47-43. But with 'very conservative' voters he's at a 59-29 disadvantage and that's what puts him down overall. It's hard to say how the opinions of voters overall translates to convention goers next year but clearly Hatch is at very serious risk of losing renomination just as Bob Bennett did last year.

Full results here

Casey in good shape

2011-07-13T10:57:00.003-05:00

Pennsylvania polling we released last week showed Barack Obama in serious trouble in the state. But Bob Casey just continues to roll along, leading his actual opponents by 18-20 points and leading a bevy of potential candidates the GOP would probably rather have in the race by anywhere from 9-16 points.

Casey's approval numbers don't exactly set the world on fire, with 40% of voters giving him good marks to 32% who disapprove. Those numbers are deceptively weak though. What keeps them down is that Democrats aren't terribly enthused with Casey- only 56% of them approve of him to 18% who disapprove. You'd usually expect a Senator to be more in the 70-80% approval range with voters of his own party. But even if Democratic voters aren't enthralled with Casey 79-85% of them are still committed to voting for him in the general election and unenthusiastic votes count just the same as excited ones.

The positive side of Casey's lower than normal approval numbers with Democrats is that the comparative conservatism responsible for them simultaneously makes him unusually popular with Republicans. 23% approve of him to 46% who disapprove. There aren't a lot of Senators who are only 23 points under water with the opposite party in this era of polarization. In that sense Casey is very similar to Florida's Bill Nelson- a lack of excitement about them from the base pulls down their topline approval numbers but their unusual level of support from the GOP makes them very, very hard to defeat in a general election.

The strongest potential Republican candidate against Casey is his predecessor Rick Santorum, who trails 48-39. Although Santorum would have a very difficult time knocking off Casey that 9 point spread actually represents a significant improvement on his 17 point margin of defeat against Casey in 2006. It's probably due more to the current political climate being far different from last time around than anything else but Casey is in a weaker position now than he was then and that makes it a little curious a more serious Republican candidate hasn't moved toward entering the race.

The candidates who had lined up to face Casey at the time we took this poll are decidedly B-list. Marc Scaringi has 16% statewide name recognition and trails Casey by 18 points at 47-29. 17% of voters in the state have an opinion about Laureen Cummings and she trails Casey by 20 points at 51-31.

A cadre of prospective candidates who don't seem likely to actually make the race against Casey do better than Scaringi and Cummings, but still all trail by double digit margins. Tim Murphy trails by 12 points at 47-35, and Jim Gerlach and Jake Corman each trail by 16 points at 49-33 and 51-35 respectively.

Casey's going to be very tough to beat. It's still odd that no serious Republican candidate has stepped up to try though.

Full results here

Lynch looks hard to beat but GOP prospects good for open seat

2011-07-12T14:23:00.003-05:00

If John Lynch decides to run for reelection as Governor of New Hampshire next year he'll have a big advantage no matter who the Republicans run against him. But our polling suggests that Democrats might start at a disadvantage in an open seat situation.

57% of voters approve of the job Lynch is doing to 33% who disapprove. In addition to predictably strong numbers with Democrats (84/10), he also has majority approval with independents (52/35), and an unusual amount of crossover support with a third of Republicans giving him good marks (33/56). Lynch leads all four hypothetical opponents we tested against him by double digits: it's 11 points over John Sununu at 51-40, 18 over Ovide Lamontagne at 54-36, 19 over Jeb Bradley at 54-35, and 21 over John Stephen at 55-34. If Lynch wants another term it looks to be pretty much his for the taking.

If Lynch decides to move on though Republicans may have the advantage for this office. We tested that quartet of potential GOP candidates against three possible Democratic alternatives in the case that Lynch were to retire- Maggie Hassan, Steve Marchand, and Mark Connolly. The Republican leads in 11 out of those 12 possible match ups, with the only exception being a tie between Connolly and Stephen.

The early Republicans leads are modest in size. Sununu leads the trio of Democrats by 8-9 points, Bradley's advantage is 6-8 points, Lamontagne's is 6-7, and Stephen leads by only 1-2 points beyond his tie against Connolly. There is a very high level of undecideds in all of the match ups with 19-31% of voters saying they're not sure who they would vote for if there was an election today.

The early GOP advantage may be more attributable more than anything else to their pool of potential candidates being better known than the Democrats. All 4 Republicans we tested have higher name recognition than all 3 of the Democrats we looked at. From best known to least known it's Sununu with 82% of voters having an opinion about him, followed by Bradley and Lamontagne at 64%, Stephen at 58%, Hassan at 33%, Connolly at 27%, and Marchand at 26%. It's possible some of that early lead for the Republicans would disappear as the Democrats became better known.

One thing that's particularly interesting about the 7 folks we looked at as possible alternatives to Lynch is that they all have negative favorability numbers. None of them stand out as folks who would start out with immediate popularity and credibility with voters in the state. That leaves plenty of room for other folks to get into the mix if this actually becomes an open seat situation as well.

John Lynch can probably have this office as long as he wants it but it's going to be a tough fight for Democrats when he leaves.

Full results here

NC budget unpopularity continues to grow

2011-07-12T11:23:00.004-05:00

The public continues to react negatively to much of what the Republicans in the North Carolina General Assembly put forward. The latest thing voters have turned against is the proposed Congressional redistricting maps: only 25% support them to 37% who are opposed and 37% who have no opinion. Predictably Republicans support the new districts and Democrats are against them- what turns the overall numbers against the lines is 37/26 opposition from independents. A plurality of voters in every region of the state dislikes the current proposal.

Voter dissent on redistricting is a minor headache for North Carolina Republicans compared to continued unhappiness with the budget they passed over Bev Perdue's veto last month though. Our June poll found 23% in the state supporting the GOP budget to 41% opposed. Now public opinion has moved even further in opposition to it with just 20% supportive and 47% opposed. It's no surprise Democrats are against the budget by a 56/14 margin and independents breaking against it by a 46/26 one isn't shocking either. Where the numbers are really eye catching is with Republicans- only 26% support it to 35% opposed.

Why are voters so firmly against the budget? The jobs issue is a big one- only 18% think the budget passed last month will create them while 45% think it will lead to job losses. And those job losses are hitting close to home for a lot of voters. 48% in the state say they know someone or have themselves been laid off or forced to retire from a teaching or state or local government job in the last six months.

It all adds up to very bad numbers for the Republicans in the General Assembly. Only 33% of voters have a favorable opinion of them to 45% with a negative one. And although most voters don't know enough about Thom Tillis or Phil Berger to have an opinion about them personally those who do rate them poorly- 16/30 for Tillis and 12/27 for Berger.

And yet for all that the generic legislative ballot in the state is tied at 43%, representing movement in the wrong direction for Democrats from last month when they led 46-41. That's because as unpopular as the Republicans are, voters still aren't seeing the Legislative Democrats as a real appealing alternative. Their favorability comes out to a 36/44 spread, including an awful 22/49 breakdown with independents. Democrats have succeeded greatly in tearing down the Republicans. Now the challenge is to build themselves up in the eyes of the voters as well.

Full results here

Matheson competitive in Utah Senate

2011-07-12T09:45:00.003-05:00

Democrats really do have a chance to be competitive in the US Senate race in Utah next year, but that potential for a close contest is completely predicated on Congressman Jim Matheson taking the plunge. Other potential Democratic nominees we looked at- even though they're well liked by voters in the state- would lose by the sorts of astronomical margins Democrats are accustomed to losing by in Utah.

Matheson would lead incumbent Senator Orrin Hatch 45-44 in a head to head, and would hold a wider lead over fellow Congressman Jason Chaffetz at 47-42.

Part of the reason that Matheson would be so competitive is that there are some signs of weakness in Hatch and Chaffetz's numbers. Only 46% of voters approve of Hatch to 43% who disapprove. He is extremely weak with independents these days, as only 27% give him good marks to 60% who disapprove. And Democrats (71%) are more unified in their dislike of Hatch than Republicans (67%) are in their support.

Chaffetz does a little better than Hatch, with 43% of voters rating him favorably to 34% with an unfavorable opinion. Independents split against him 33/47, and 65% of Democrats have a dim view of him while only 61% of Republicans see him positively. In most states a 43/34 favorability spread for a Congressman looking to move up to the Senate would be a very good start. But in a small state with nearly a 30 point Republican identification advantage Chaffetz's numbers are not terribly impressive.

The main reason Matheson is so strong against Hatch and Chaffetz is Matheson though. 59% of voters in the state have a favorable opinion of him to 28% with an unfavorable one, amazing numbers for a Democrat in one of the reddest states in the country. He's viewed favorably by majorities of Democrats (76/15), independents (58/28), and Republicans (52/33) alike. There are few politicians who pull that off. Matheson manages to lead Hatch because he wins over 20% of the GOP vote and leads by 37 points with independents. Against Chaffetz he goes all the way up to 23% of the Republican vote and holds a similar 35 point lead with independents.

Matheson is the only way this race is competitive for Democrats next year. We also tested former Attorney General Jan Graham, the last Democrat elected statewide in Utah, and 2010 nominee Sam Granato. Graham (27/18) and Granato (28/22) are both decently popular, particularly for Democrats in Utah. But Graham nevertheless trails Hatch by 21 points at 55-34 and Chaffetz by 19 at 53-34. And Granato's deficits are even wider, down 25 to Hatch at 56-31 and 21 to Chaffetz at 54-33.

If Matheson runs it will certainly be the most national attention a political race in Utah has drawn in many, many years.

Full results here

Bachmann's no Palin on the polling front

2011-07-08T12:48:00.003-05:00

Michele Bachmann and Sarah Palin draw a lot of comparisons but there's one thing that's not really comparable between the two: their poll numbers. While Bachmann and Palin have similar numbers of voters with a favorable opinion of each of them, Palin's negatives in seven states we've polled over the last month are an average of 18 points higher. And while Bachmann's performance in those states against Barack Obama would be pretty much on par with how John McCain did in 2008, Palin does an average of 6 points worse than McCain did. In the long run as voters get to know her better it's possible Bachmann will become just as unpopular as Palin, but for now she doesn't have nearly the same amount of baggage.

Here's a look at their horse race numbers in the seven states we've polled since we started including Bachmann in all general election match ups:

State	Bachmann Relative to Obama	Palin relative to Obama	2008 Results
Florida	-9	-12	Obama +3
Montana	+6	+4	McCain +2
New Hampshire	-7	-15	Obama +10
New Mexico	-15	-20	Obama +15
Oregon	-18	-22	Obama +16
Pennsylvania	-7	-14	Obama +10
Texas	+3	-2	McCain +12
Average	Bachmann -7	Palin -12	Obama +6

-Bachmann does better than Palin against Obama in all seven states. Obama won the states by an average of 6 points in 2008 and Bachmann basically matches that, trailing by an average of 7 points. Palin meanwhile would be the biggest Republican loser since Barry Goldwater, lagging in this set of states by an average of 12 points.

Now let's look at their comparative favorability numbers:

State	Bachmann Fav (Net)	Palin Fav (Net)
Florida	36/37 (-1)	37/58 (-21)
Montana	34/40 (-6)	41/51 (-10)
New Hampshire	39/46 (-7)	31/62 (-31)
New Mexico	30/42 (-12)	31/61 (-30)
Oregon	30/40 (-10)	31/63 (-32)
Pennsylvania	34/41 (-7)	36/57 (-21)
Texas	39/36 (+3)	37/55 (-18)
Average	35/40 (-5)	35/58 (-23)

-Bachmann and Palin both average 35% of voters with a favorable opinion of them. But 58% view Palin negatively compared to just 40% for Bachmann. Bachmann's certainly not popular- but the door is still open for her with a lot of voters where it's pretty much been shut on Palin.

We're still finding in a lot of our polling that Palin is the most well liked potential GOP contender with Republican voters, even if she's not their top choice for the nomination. But Bachmann is more well respected and far less toxic, at least for now, to Democrats and independents. Either would probably be a disastrous nominee for the GOP, but Palin is on a whole different level from Bachmann.

Obama weak in Pennsylvania

2011-07-08T09:53:00.005-05:00

Pennsylvania is looking more and more like it could be a tough hold for Barack Obama in 2012. His approval rating in the state continues to be under water at 46/48. More voters have expressed disapproval than happiness with Obama on all three polls PPP has done in the state so far in 2011. And even though Obama took Pennsylvania by 10 points in 2008 the best he can muster right now in a head to head match up with Mitt Romney is a tie.

Obama's problem in Pennsylvania appears to be the 'Hillary Democrats' finally causing him a real issue. There was a lot of speculation in 2008 that they wouldn't vote for him in the general election but in the end they did. Now though his approval rating with Democrats in the state is only 74%, well below his national numbers, and with white Democrats it goes down even further to 70%. Meanwhile Republicans are much more unified in their disapproval of Obama (85%, with only 10% approving) and the President's not getting any favors from independents either who break down slightly negatively (44/45) in their assessments of him.

Obama's poll numbers are worse in Pennsylvania than they are in places like Virginia, North Carolina, Florida, Ohio, and New Mexico, all states that went Republican in 2004 even as Pennsylvania voted Democratic. The President's persistently poor numbers in a state that's gone Democratic in every Presidential election for the last 24 years probably make Pennsylvania the place where Obama should be most concerned about his current standing.

It does though look like the Republicans are going to need to nominate Mitt Romney to take advantage of Obama's weakness in the state. He fights Obama to a tie while all the rest of the Republicans, including home state candidate Rick Santorum, trail him by at least 7 points. Obama and Romney run even at 44% with the former Massachusetts Governor picking up 18% of the Democratic vote and holding 80% support from GOP voters. None of the other Republicans get more than 15% of the Democrats and Romney's the only one who gets 80% of his own party's vote.

After Romney the next strongest candidate is Michele Bachmann who trails by 7 points at 50-43. Then it's Tim Pawlenty down 8 at 47-39, Santorum with a 10 point deficit at 50-40, Hermain Cain 12 points behind at 49-37, and Sarah Palin as always bringing up the rear with a 14 point disadvantage at 53-39.

If there's one thing Obama does have going for him in Pennsylvania it's that voters don't think much of any of his prospective Republican opponents either. Bachmann has the 'best' favorability rating but it's still a -7 spread at 34/41. That's followed by Romney (35/46) and Cain (22/33) at -11, Pawlenty (21/39) at -18, Palin (36/57) at -21, and Santorum (31/54) at -23. Obama's able to tie Romney and lead the rest of the GOP hopefuls despite his own unpopularity because they are even more unpopular. It's just another reminder that with the economy still doing poorly Obama's best hope may be for the Republicans to put forth someone so unpalatable that he wins on a sort of 'lesser of two evils' vote.

Pennsylvania looks like it will be a lot tougher for Democrats than it was last time and Obama's struggles there are going to make keeping the Virginias and Colorados and North Carolinas of the world that much more important to his reelection prospects.

Full results here