Posted on 04/22/2010 9:05:31 AM PDT by Maelstorm
Former Rep. Tom Campbell has opened up a double-digit lead over his two rivals for the Republican U.S. Senate nomination, while Meg Whitman maintains a wide margin over Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner in the GOP gubernatorial battle.
The results were part of a new Capitol Weekly/Probolsky Research poll conducted by Republican pollster Adam Probolsky with Democratic pollster Ben Tulchin in consultation. The complete survey is available here.
Whitman, a billionaire and former CEO of eBay, maintains a 28-point lead over Poizner, smaller than her lead in recent public polls. Whitman was the choice of 47 percent of likely Republican primary voters to Poizner’s 19 percent. More than one-third of Republican primary voters say they are still undecided, according to the survey.
By contrast, the most recent Field Poll showed Whitman with 63 percent of the vote compared to 14 percent for Poizner. In the Field survey, 23 percent of those surveyed said they were undecided.
The different numbers between this poll and recent public surveys reflect both timing and methodology. The poll was conducted from April 10-13, after Poizner began countering Whitman’s television ads with spots of his own.
“Poizner is just now developing his relationship with the voters,” said Probolsky. “He has been able to bring himself out of single digits in a couple of months, but she’s still beating him more than two to one.”
Pollster Ben Tulchin says the results show some potential trouble for Whitman. “She’s ahead, but compared to other polling that’s out there, her numbers have dropped,” he said. “She’s spent a lot of money and she’s under 50 percent.”
Tulchin says Whitman is still the prohibitive favorite in the GOP primary, but “she’s going to have to sweat it out for the next two months. With candidates who are particularly new to the political process, Tulchin says, “voters always take a pause and say, ‘Let me reassess. Now that someone else has entered the stage, what’s going on?’ Going to be tough for Poizner, but it is a critical moment for the Whitman campaign.”
In the Senate race, former Congressman Tom Campbell was favored by 31 percent of respondents. Former Hewlett Packard CEO Carly Fiorina was next with 17 percent, followed by Assemblyman Chuck DeVore at 14 percent. More than 37 percent of those surveyed said they were still undecided.
Unlike the governor’s race, the U.S. Senate race has not seen a barrage of paid media activity. Campbell’s strength in the poll is, in part, due to his strong ballot designation as “economist/business educator,” says Probolsky.
“It also shows the strength of the Campbell name,” he said. “These types of academic, serious ballot titles seem to carry real weight with Republican voters.” But, Probolsky added, that could all be overwhelmed in the final weeks of the campaign.
Voters will head to the polls in less than six weeks, but voting will begin much sooner. Absentee ballots will be mailed to voters in less than three weeks -- a dynamic that could be critical, said Tulchin.
“In a primary, there’s higher percentage of voters who vote by mail, and Republicans vote more by mail than Democrats,” said Tulchin. “Taking those two factors into account -- you’re talking about 70-plus percent of voters getting their ballots in the mail in less than three weeks.”
Tulchin said that doesn’t mean all votes will be cast in the next few weeks, however.
“People tend to hold on to their ballots longer in contested races, but there’s going to be a surge of voting when people first get their ballots,” he said.
The poll did not measure any hypothetical general election match-ups in either the Senate or governor’s races. But respondents were asked one question about Whitman, Poizner and Jerry Brown. When asked which candidate for governor would be best when considering jobs and the economy, 33 percent of those surveyed said Brown, 31 percent said Whitman and Poizner was the choice of 9.2 percent.
Overall, the survey finds voters are a generally unhappy lot. More than 75 percent of those surveyed said California was on the wrong track. Just 14 percent of poll respondents said the state was on the right track.
The poll surveyed 751 likely voters from April 10-13. The poll has a margin of error of 3.7 percent.
In the Senate race, former Congressman Tom Campbell was favored by 31 percent of respondents. Former Hewlett Packard CEO Carly Fiorina was next with 17 percent, followed by Assemblyman Chuck DeVore at 14 percent. More than 37 percent of those surveyed said they were still undecided.
So will the most liberal candidate, Campbell, get the nomination because the moderate and conservative candidates, Carly and Chuck, are splitting the rest of the vote?
Hope Poizner can pull it out. Better off letting Brown rule over the demise of the the People Republican than a Repub., even a far left liberal Repub. as the likes of Whitman.
I don’t have a dog in this hunt, but whoever prevails in the primary, the goal is to get rid of Boxer.
Great! Two liberals heading up the Republican ticket in California statewide races.
Business as usual for the Left Coast.
That would be my guess as an ex-Californian familiar with all the players. Thing is, Campbell’s RINO-ness never struck me anywhere so forcibly as the current Senators. I’m thinking he’s about as right-wing as a RINO gets, say, just about the center of the political continuum. That would be a vast improvement over the ‘woman’ he is looking to replace and better than any of Snowe, Collins, Hagel or Graham (to mention just a few of the ordinary RINOs).
All IMHO, to be sure.
Now, Meg...hmmmm....she could be unpredictable, sort of like Arnold is now. That would still be better than handing the state over to explicit total Democratic control, IMHO.
Exactly. Deja vu, all over again! GOP 2008 POTUS Primary redux.
IMO, when more than two GOPers are running in a primary, and it nears voting time, the party must step in and require the lower polling candidates to drop out for the good of the country (i.e. Huck and Romney should have been forced to defer to Fred). In a head to head, Fred would have cleaned McQueeg's clock (yes, either Schmuck or Mittster would have too).
I know it's CA, but ending up with Campbell would be a disaster that can be prevented by having candidates sacrifice for the greater good prior to the primary voting.
Poisoner is worse. Vomit.
Campbell took decidedly liberal stands on abortion (his television spots almost always underscored he was the “pro-choice Republican”), gay rights, gun control, and the environment. He also was for abolishing the Strategic Defense Initiative and for the quota-laden Civil Rights Act of 1991.
And add Islamic apologist to that and we have about as awful a candidate as the GOP could run.
Well he supported a tax increase as finance director under Schwarzenegger his most recent job. Does anyone think the finances of California and in good shape?
Well, isn’t that at least a sane response to legislative overspending? If you have no leverage over the spenders, then the only way to wake people up is show that their net pay is threatened by it.
Now, the objection in the other response to me is more substantial. I can’t really contradict it and it becomes yet another reason I thank God I was able to emigrate six years ago.
Good Points. Campbell isn’t as bad as some like Mark Kirk in Illinois but he is still just another Republican. If we go back to just wanting to win by electing people who don’t have our goal of cutting government and protecting life and liberty then what we will have is just a return to the same type of congress that ended up with the election of Barrack Obama. We need to stop thinking in terms of a playing field the left defines. We need to stop playing defense and start making the left give up ground and start cutting away the tentacles of the big government beast that threatens our American way of life.
I won’t vote for either one of those communists under any condition!
His stance on immigration seems pretty good to me.
I also believe that those who broke our laws to enter our country should not be permitted to stay. Amnesty programs invite future illegal entry.
The lowest reliable estimates I’ve seen are that illegal immigration costs our state 3 billion dollars a year. I’ve seen reliable estimates at twice that level, too. America, like all sovereign nations, has the right to determine whom we invite to become citizens. We should determine that on the basis of our country’s needs, not on the basis of who enters illegally. Furthermore, we should impose serious employee sanctions for those who hire those illegally here.
We should establish an “e-verify” system for employers to check the name and social security number of all new employees. If the number and name match, the employer can be given an “OK” number for her or his records. If an employer is found who does not have an “OK” number for each of her or his employees, we need to impose very serious fines on that employer. This still won’t catch everyone, but it will catch most of the illegal aliens, since the most common kind of fraud involves simply making up a social security number.
It is long overdue for us to punish the employer who breaks the law, as well as the illegal alien, and to secure our border with a fence enforced by our National Guard. Californians deserve an immigration policy that enforces its laws and protects its citizens.
I couldn’t agree more about Campbell. As liberal as they come.
No it isn’t. The response is to hold ground and have your opponents force the tax through. There is nothing gained at compromising with the liberals in the California state legislature. There was nothing gained by compromising in my home state of Virginia with the Democrat Gov Mark Warner. It just lost us more seats and more ground because people didn’t see a reason to vote for us. Finally now we are recovering in Virginia with a true conservative Governor who is cutting Government.
The problem in California has never been lack of people open to a conservative message it has been the lack of people running with enough money to articulate it persuasively. If the Prop 8 result didn’t show that a lot of what has been assumed about California is wrong then nothing will.
Chuck DeVore’s only problem is name recognition. Plus he needs to attack Campbell and tie him directly to the mess in Sacramento. Carly should use her money to do just that. Tie Campbell to Sacramento and he goes down in flames.
Also surrogates groups should attack Campbell for support of Abortions in China and national security groups should attack him for his defense of a Terrorists.
Whitman may win but she may not want the job so bad when she gets it.
CA ping. ugh.
As I stated earlier, let Brown rule over the demise of CA.....forget the gov race...it is like fighting over feces.
Persuasively argued, my FRiend. The last vote in CA I felt good about was for Dan Lundgren. Since then, it’s been downhill all the way. I found then and circumstances since haven’t change my mind, that the average CA voter operates in a different universe than the one I occupy and can see for myself. So, I have little hope that an actual conservative could ever win more than a House seat there. I tell you, I lived there 50 years, so I know what the place used to be like. I saw the trend and I left. I saw no purpose in staying to fight a pointless battle against a rising tide of leeches and vampires. I salute you for the courage to stay in such an environment, but I will not return. If you are going to support, campaign for and elect someone like DeVore, then you are part of the solution, even if one whose contribution is moral rather than effective. For now, in the primary, voting for DeVore looks like an honorable move, but if he loses, then not voting for the Republican winner is self-defeating.
If Boxer wins, then the forces of evil have another six years to play hob with the nation. Consider the alternatives and recognize the heavy weight of selfishness that pervades your once-great State.
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