In some sense New Mexico is seeing the same sort of bad turn for the Democrats that's occurring in other Mountain West states like Colorado and Nevada. Barack Obama's approval rating is in negative territory at 45/48, even though he won the state by a large margin in 2008. And Bill Richardson has become one of the least popular Governors in the country at a 28/63 spread.
Where New Mexico departs from its regional counterparts is that it still looks favored to vote Democratic in its most significant statewide race this year. Lieutenant Governor Diane Denish leads her top Republican opponent, Pete Domenici Jr., by a 45-40 margin and has leads of 14-18 points over the rest of the GOP field.
Denish is by far the best known of the candidates running, with 41% of voters in the state holding a positive opinion of her to just 34% who see her negatively. Domenici is the only one of the Republicans who more than half of the state has an opinion about, although it's possible people could just be conflating him with his father. Only 29-37% of the electorate has an opinion about any of the other GOP contenders.
Independents are turning toward the GOP in New Mexico, reflecting the trends we are seeing on the national level. Denish trails with them in 4 of 5 potential contests, including a 15 point deficit against Domenici. There are still a lot more Democrats than Republicans in the state though and Denish's solid popularity with her own party's voters makes her the early front runner.
Full results here
Out of curiosity, Tom, did you poll the three congressional districts in NM? As a New Mexico resident, I'd be most interested to hear about how Heinrich and Teague are doing (I'm sure that Lujan is in good shape in his northern district).
ReplyDeleteYes, out tomorrow
ReplyDeleteI'd love to know how Adam Kokesh is doing, hope the numbers will be good !
ReplyDeleteThank you so much for polling the congressional districts! I really appreciate it
ReplyDeleteElliot, you may be surprised to find that Adam Kokesh has a great chance to beat Lujan. Adam is the best candidate in 2010, and I'm apolitical (You can probably guess from there what philosophy I hold lol).
ReplyDeleteI wonder what the polling will look like. Good luck Adam!
I see that you did the polls mainly among White voters, New Mexico is very diverse. Should you conduct the polls in McKinley County you would get the most Democratic results you will see in the State, most of Northern New Mexico stays Blue, even the so call "Democrat Curse!" We as New Mexican Democrats stand by our Party, Yeego Democats Yeego!
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