Posted on 08/31/2006 11:46:13 AM PDT by .cnI redruM
U.S. Senator Lincoln Chafee may lose his seat to challenger Steve Laffey, according to a new statewide Republican primary voter poll released today by the Bureau of Government Research and Services at Rhode Island College.
The survey was conducted August 28-30, 2006, at Rhode Island College by Victor L. Profughi, director of the Bureau of Government Research and Services. It is based on a statewide random sample of 363 likely Republican primary voters in Rhode Island. The sample was proportioned among the state’s geographic regions to reflect the likely voter contribution from each portion of the state. Overall, the poll has a margin of error of plus or minus 5.1 percentage points.
If the September 12 primary were held today, 51 percent say they will vote for Steve Laffey, 34 percent support Senator Chafee, and 15 percent are undecided. A BGRS survey of Republican voters conducted in June had Laffey at 39 percent and Chafee at 36 percent. Chafee’s base is virtually unchanged since the June survey, while the number of Laffey supporters has grown 12 percentage points.
In the current poll, Laffey buries Chafee among male voters by nearly a 2 to 1 margin, 58 percent to 32 percent, with only 9 percent undecided. This gap has widened from 10 percent in June to 26 percent today. Among women, Chafee’s support has remained stagnant, while Laffey’s has increased. In June, 37 percent favored Chafee, compared with the current 36 percent. Laffey’s support among women has gone up from 35 percent in June to 45 percent.
Regionally, Laffey leads Chafee in Newport County (58 percent to 25 percent), in the Providence Suburbs (56 percent to 33 percent), Blackstone Valley (49 percent to 32 percent), Washington County (48 percent to 39 percent), and Western Rhode Island (42 percent to 37). Chafee is ahead only in the city of Providence (53 percent to 40 percent) and the East Bay (40 percent to 36 percent). Among unaffiliated voters, Chafee’s support has slipped from 49 percent in June to 43 percent now, while Laffey’s strength has gone up 10 percentage points (31 percent to 41 percent).
“Since early summer, Senator Chafee has been unable to expand his base of support from roughly one third of the likely Republican primary voters. The Lieberman phenomenon, where a partisan base closes ranks around the ‘true partisan’ candidate, seems to be at work in Rhode Island, as it was on the Democratic side in Connecticut. Laffey’s efforts to link Chafee with the extremely unpopular President Bush also appear to be paying off,” said Profughi.
Respondents polled were also asked who they would vote for in the Republican Primary race for Lieutenant Governor between Reginald Centracchio and Kerry King. Nearly half of those surveyed are either undecided or will not vote on this race (51 percent). Among voters, Centracchio has a 2 to 1 lead over King (31 percent to 18 percent).
The survey was conducted at a centralized telephone bank on the RIC campus on Monday, August 28 through Wednesday, August 30, between 5:00 and 9:00 p. m. The sample of 363 voters consisted of persons who identified themselves as likely Republican primary voters. Those interviewed were randomly chosen from most recent updated voting lists provided by the Office of the Secretary of State and were limited to registered Republicans and unaffiliated voters who said they planned to vote in the Republican primary.
The sample was controlled to reflect likely voter contribution by geographic region. Survey design, implementation, and administration were supervised by Profughi, who has nearly 40 years of experience conducting public opinion surveys in Rhode Island. He and members of his supervisory and computer analysis team have conducted more than 1,000 surveys in the state since 1970.
Overall, the current poll has a margin of error of plus or minus 5 percentage points at the 95 percent confidence level.
If Laffey can continue to get his message out, he might just pull the mother of all upsets in November.
That closet is missing quite a few spines.
Still can not believe the GOP is funding anti-Laffey commercials.
Yeh baby! Go Laffey.
According to this, the sample included 63% Republicans and 37% Independents, so it did not undersample Independents like some of the prior polls that showed Chafee in trouble in the primary. I think Chafee is dead meat, and all the NRSC attack ads and hired guns from other states won't be able to save him.
In this case, he will help the party.
I think this is only a shot of the left side of the closet. If the camera panned to the right, there would be an additional sixty or so.
Because there are not 30 red states. There are maybe 20 with the rest like Ohio, Florida Missouri, Iowa, New Mexico, Nevada are swing states where GWB won by less than 3 percent.
No. I'm not really a litmus-test guy. Yes, there are many principled conservative career politicians. Sooner or later, many do sell out, given enough time. Not in the sense of corruption, so much as in the sense of politics.
However, many do forget where they come from. Not in the silly sense of congressional pay raises or not spending enough time with the home folks or not holding their hands enough. But in the sense of forgetting our deep, painful outrage at the liberal dictatorship. Many conservative politicians come to identify psychologically more with their fellow politicians, including the liberal ones, more than with the tyrannized people. It's a subtle change, and it's not a sellout and it's not really intentional. But it does make them less articulate and effective.
Bottom line: We need to seem more eloquence and anger from these people.
Good point. Many of our simplistic brethren forget how close the 2004 election was -- what a long night it was.
You're skipping the point that there are just as many (if not more) swing 'Rat states, such as PA, MN, NM, WI, etc. You battle those out as available.
In doing so, you passed right by my point of stopping spending precious resources trying to defend obvious Blue states when there are obvious Red state seats just waiting to be captured.
Keeping the national GOP the hell out of primaries altogether would be another postive step - which they also will not do.
You meant to say "Keeping the national GOP the hell out of primaries THAT I WANT THEM TO STAY OUT OF would be another postive step "
Frankly more than a few freepers are saying "stay out of the primaries" and also saying "why the hell did the national gop not intervene in florida and get Harris out and another credible candidate in.
HYPOCRISY REIGNS EVEN FOR FR.
What's the point of "winning" the general election if the guy is going to oppose the President on all the key issues?
Forgive me for saying that not only am I not impressed, I think they are idiots.
Chaffee voted against Alito's confirmation, so how can you say that a "loss" to the Dims even makes a difference? Chaffee opposes the President on many of the key issues, so I don't see how removing him from the Senate will make a significant difference when it counts.
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