Posted on 03/18/2010 7:11:08 AM PDT by GOPGuide
Longtime incumbent John McCain now leads conservative challenger J.D. Hayworth by just seven points in Arizona’s hotly contested Republican Senate Primary race.
The latest Rasmussen Reports telephone survey of likely Arizona GOP Primary voters shows McCain ahead 48% to 41%. Three percent (3%) favor another candidate, and eight percent (8%) are undecided.
Following the announcement that Sarah Palin would campaign for his reelection, McCain opened up a 53% to 31% lead over Hayworth in January. The two men were in a near tie in November.
But now Hayworth, a former congressman turned popular local talk radio host, is a formal candidate, and anti-immigration activist Chris Simcox has quit the race and endorsed him. For McCain, the new numbers also show him dropping again below 50%, and incumbents who poll less than 50% at this stage of a campaign are considered potentially vulnerable.
(Want a free daily e-mail update? If it's in the news, it's in our polls). Rasmussen Reports updates are also available on Twitter or Facebook.
Hayworth leads by seven points among male primary voters but trails by 23 among women. He edges McCain by five points among party conservatives, but the incumbent holds substantial margins among Republicans who identify themselves as moderates or liberals.
Hayworth has been attacking McCain as not conservative enough, but the senator, who just two years ago was the Republican presidential nominee, has been countering with a number of heavyweight endorsements from the right. Palin will attend a McCain rally in Tucson later this month.
Polling last fall found that 61% of Arizona Republicans felt McCain was out of touch with the party base.
Arizona Republicans will choose their Senate nominee in an August 24 primary, and for now that’s the major battle of this Senate cycle since no major Democrat has announced yet as a candidate.
Twenty-nine percent (29%) of GOP Primary voters have a very favorable opinion of McCain, who has represented Arizona in the Senate since 1987. Fifteen percent (15%) view him very unfavorably.
Hayworth is seen very favorably by 25% and very unfavorably by 15%.
While both candidates are well-known among likely primary voters, Rasmussen Reports considers the number of people with strong opinions more significant than the total favorable/unfavorable numbers at this point in a campaign.
Just 11% of Republicans in the state approve of the job President Obama is doing, while 88% disapprove.
Forty-seven percent (47%) approve of the performance of the state’s GOP governor, Jan Brewer, who is in a tough reelection battle this year. Fifty percent (50%) disapprove. These findings include six percent (6%) who strongly approve of how she’s doing her job and 17% who strongly disapprove.
In 2008, Rasmussen Reports projected nationally that Obama would defeat John McCain by a 52% to 46% margin. Obama won 53% to 46%. Four years earlier, Rasmussen Reports projected the national vote totals for both George W. Bush and John Kerry within half-a-percentage-point.
In Arizona during the 2008 campaign, Rasmussen Reports polling showed McCain winning the state by a 51% to 45% margin. McCain defeated Obama 54% to 45%. In the 2006 Arizona governor’s race, Rasmussen polling showed Janet Napolitano defeating Len Munsil 58% to 37%. Napolitano won 63% to 35%. In the 2006 race for U.S. Senate, Rasmussen polling showed Jon Kyl leading Jim Pederson by nine, 51% to 42%. Kyl won by nine, 53% to 44%.
See all Rasmussen Reports 2008 state results for president, Senate and governor. See 2006 results for Senate and governor. See 2004 state results for president.
As one who sincerely admires the Governor's courage, accomplishments, intuitive feeling for American ideas and principles of liberty and responsibility, and unquestioned devotion to Creator-endowed life, there remains for us a dilemma.
Most of us on this site will condemn Democrats who use "loyalty" to the President as a reason for voting for this so-called "health care" legislation. We expect that loyalty to be directed and devoted to "what's best for America?" and "which decision advances the cause of liberty for future generations?".
We must be consistent, or we lose credibility, no matter how strongly we dislike the President or how strongly we admire the Governor.
Loyalty to friends and family at a personal level is to be admired.
Loyalty to public officials is to be admired--if it preserves (conserves) the ideas on which the Republic depends for its survival. If that is the Governor's sincere belief, then admiration is due. We should not diminish her decision by attributing other less than valid political reasons, however, lest we risk weakening her future viability as a potential statesman of substance.
Thanks for these excellent lists.
I guess that’s that. Too bad.
Thank you!
Keep working hard, J. D., you’re heading in the right direction.
Dump McPain. Send a consistent conservative to the Senate. Support J. D. Hayworth:
About freaking time! Thanks for the good news.
Have you noticed that she’s *never* in AZ? She’s also never where McCain is. She is everywhere else. She is roped into supporting him. It will reflect poorly on her if she doesn’t. I suspect she’ll do a couple of appearances and do them well because that’s the only way she ever does anything. Following that, nada.
I didn’t like her response to the JD question: “I don’t know him.” Well, dammit, inform yourself! Having said that, I think she’s navigating this minefield as well as it can be navigated.
I know some older conservatives, *real* conservatives, who support McCain. They can*not* overlook his service and his sacrfice. Speaking of JD’s candidacy, one of them said to me, “It’ll never happen.” I fear older AZ conservatives.
When you put it like that, ;-)
She's already on tap to do so next week. I guess she'll never have your vote, then.
I hope they do the latter. Give me a Democrat any day. Accept no fakes. The Democrat Lites exhaust me.
“Following the announcement that Sarah Palin would campaign for his reelection, McCain opened up a 53% to 31% lead over Hayworth in January. The two men were in a near tie in November.”
“Longtime incumbent John McCain now leads conservative challenger J.D. Hayworth by just seven points in Arizona’s hotly contested Republican Senate Primary race.”
Moving the right direction, GO JD!
You can say that ad infinitum.
Go, J.D., GO!
What an awful thing to say! You denigarate all women with that comment, including this one.
For an incumbent, particularly as well-known as McCain, a 48% number is not very good. It means 52% think there’s a better choice out there. Now Hayworth just needs to tap into more of the 11% who are not yet in his camp. Ans he has about five months to do it.
For an incumbent, particularly as well-known as McCain, a 48% number is not very good.
Seems like I remember a fellar in Texas that was well known and never broke 50% in the polls leading up to the primary but still won with about 52%...... I think if McCain holds the 48% it will be easier for him to get the 2% as opposed to JD getting the larger number. It’s a shame but it is damn hard to defeat an incumbent but we can hope.
“Seems like I remember a fellar in Texas that was well known and never broke 50% in the polls leading up to the primary but still won with about 52%...... I think if McCain holds the 48% it will be easier for him to get the 2% as opposed to JD getting the larger number. It’s a shame but it is damn hard to defeat an incumbent but we can hope.”
I believe the Hayworth/McPain match-up will be more like the Rubio/Suntan Charlie match-up. Rubio started out being far behind in the polls and with just a fraction of the money that Suntan had. By hammering away at his own conservative credentials and the shallowness of Suntan’s conservative credentials, Rubio eventually took the lead and is now considerably ahead of Suntan Charlie.
In this very angry anti-incumbent, anti-Washington, anti-RINO year, I think McPain is in big trouble and I fully expect J. D. to be even or ahead of McPain in a couple of months. Perhaps sooner if amnesty gets put on the front burner.
Some people should point out to the “older conservatives”
(I am one) that BENEDICT ARNOLD did outstanding service to his country at Saratoga, the march to Quebec and before the walls of Quebec.
NOW, they are not honoring a man for his service, they are selecting a legislator and political leader.
And as a legislator and political leader, John McCain is a Benedict Arnold to the Republican Party, to Arizona and to his Country.
Exactly...this is why women gravitate toward RINO's and Democrats...almost any poll taken will indicate this...look at how many female politicians fall into either of those two categories. However; when there ARE exceptions to the rule; you get damn good ones. Palin, Cheney, Bachmann, Blackburn...we just need MORE of them.
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