Posted on 06/08/2012 7:17:12 AM PDT by AuH2ORepublican
FARGO – A new independent poll released today indicates North Dakota’s U.S. Senate race is a dead heat between Republican Rep. Rick Berg and Democrat Heidi Heitkamp.
Fargo-based Valley News Live and Bismarck-based KFYR-TV commissioned a poll of 625 likely North Dakota voters this week, just days before the statewide primary election.
The poll found Heitkamp with 47 percent of the support from likely general election voters, while Berg had 46 percent.
Seven percent remain undecided in the race, with about five months left until November.
Mason-Dixon Polling & Research, of Washington, D.C., conducted the telephone survey June 4-6. The results have a margin of error of plus or minus 4.5 percentage points.
Berg, the Republican-endorsed candidate, faces a challenge Tuesday from Republican Duane Sand, who’s making his fourth bid for Congress this year.
In a poll among only likely Republican primary voters this week, Valley News Live found 73 percent said they’d vote for Berg on Tuesday, while 16 percent said they favored Sand. Eleven percent were undecided at the time of the poll.
Meanwhile, in the other possible general election matchup, Heitkamp led Sand by several percentage points among likely voters.
The Valley News Live poll found 46 percent would vote for Heitkamp, while 38 percent would vote for Sand and 16 percent were undecided.
Valley News Live, which operates KXJB and KVLY in Fargo and Grand Forks, is owned by Texas-based Hoak Media.
Valley News Live’s poll is the second independent survey released on North Dakota’s U.S. Senate race, and it offers a different snapshot of the race than a poll last month by Forum Communications Co.
Forum Communications surveyed 500 likely primary voters in its poll con-ducted May 3 to May 8 by Essman/Research of Des Moines, Iowa.
The Forum poll found voters statewide favored Berg over Heitkamp, 51 percent to 44 percent, if the general election were held at the time of that survey.
Five percent were still undecided in that matchup.
The Forum’s poll results had a margin of error of plus or minus 4.3 percentage points.
The Forum poll also found Berg leading Sand by a wide margin in the primary, 65 percent to 21 percent, with 14 percent undecided.
Similarly, the Heitkamp-Sand matchup also indicated a Democratic advantage.
Heitkamp garnered 48 percent of likely voters support in the Forum poll, compared to 45 percent for Sand, with 8 percent undecided.
The Forum received criticism from Democratic groups because its poll asked likely primary voters about a general election contest.
Incumbent Democrat Kent Conrad is retiring from the U.S. Senate this year after representing North Dakota since 1987.
State and national Democrats released internal polling this spring, which showed Heitkamp leading Berg by several percentage points as recently as April.
However, ratings from political experts and national media continue to gauge the race as intensely competitive, with many outlets saying Berg has the slight advantage so far.
I’d like to see the party breakdown of this poll.
This was one of those purported “slam-dunk” races for the GOP. What’s happening up there in ND??
managed to find the demographics here...
http://www.valleynewslive.com/story/18732767/kvlykfyr-poll-demographics
PARTY IDENTIFICATION:
Democrat 181 (29%)
Republican 239 (38%)
Independent or Other 205 (33%)
AGE:
18-34 116 (19%)
35-49 183 (29%)
50-64 176 (28%)
65+ 146 (23%)
Refused 4 (1%)
SEX:
Male 302 (48%)
Female 323 (52%)
REGION:
Fargo/Cass County 140 (22%)
Eastern North Dakota 190 (30%)
Bismarck/Mandan 110 (18%)
Western North Dakota 185 (30%)
Clintonfatigued has been warning us for a while that the U.S. Senate race in ND was uncomfortably close, and I never paid it much heed. I certainly am now. If the GOP can’t win an open-seat Senate race in freaking North Dakota, how can it win races in MT, NM, WI and VA?
Democrat 181 (29%)
Republican 239 (38%)
Independent or Other 205 (33%)
Yet Heitkamp still leads?? That’s a bit disturbing.
While I understand the polls, I disagree that they are any kind of harbinger right now, two things, 1. It’s summer. 2. While I’m not personally a big Romney supporter, I feel that the Tea Party is going to have coat tails, and it will be them that create a landslide for the republican party and against democrats. It’s just a feeling I have right now! Unfortunately we could have elected a real conservative this time around we should not have settled for a moderate north eastern republican. i.e. RINO.
Let’s hope we picked the right guy, and he’s more conservative than he appears.
Every race is different.
Berg is a weaker candidate than anyone imagined. Sand is worse as this is his fourth attempt. And Heitkamp is apparently stronger than anyone thought.
MT, WI, and VA are all doable but I have concerns that NM is too blue.
from what i found out its because the Dem has a 51/36 lead with independents.
does anyone know what the actual breakdown is in the state %age wise with reps, dems, inds.
Agreed. Berg has to do more to stand out as a Conservative. Just being the neighborhood nice guy isn't enough. He is effectively being primaried from the right by Sand.
Some of it may not be all his fault as his time in the House was too short to accomplish much.
Info. from exit polls. Have yet to find 2008 and 2010.
Party ID 2004:
Democratic: 27%
Republican: 41%
Independent: 32%
Party ID 2006:
Democratic: 29%
Republican: 38%
Independent: 33%
Party ID 2008 estimate:
Democratic: 32%
Republican: 38%
Independent: 30%
Female: 51%
Male: 49%
White: 98%
African American: 0%
Hispanic: 1%
Other: 1%
Ages:
Under 30: 20%
31-64: 65%
Over 65: 15%
Yes, every race is different, but Senate elections tend to go in the same direction (usually the lion’s share of pickups go to the same party—to the Dems in 2000, 2006 and 2008, to the Republicans in 2002, 2004 and 2010). Besides, Berg is a pretty basic Republican and Heitkamp is nothing special and a pretty basic Democrat, so the general mood is probably a big part of the equation. I have to assume that the sample in that ND poll would have placed Romney well ahead of Obama, so voters’ rejection of Obama’s policies may not be affecting their view of other Democrats, even when they’re also liberal and/or have supported Obama’s agenda. If Heitkamp beats Berg, it would be shocking if Rehberg beats Tester in next-door MT, and I wouldn’t be too bullish on some of the other races.
I’m not panicking yet, but I had Berg penciled in for a 58-42 victory, which would be consistent with a Rehberg 54-46 victory over Tester in MT, a Mourdock 54-46 victory in IN, a Heller 53%-47% victory in NV, a Mandel 52-48 victory in OH, an Allen 52-48 victory in VA, a Wilson 51-49 victory in NM, etc. With Heitkamp polling at 47%, I have to question whether I’ve misread the national mood and whether Democrat Senate candidates won’t be facing as bad of an environment as I had assumed.
Rassmussen has Steelman up 51 to 37 on McCaskill, today.
Mandel has Brown below 50 and within the margin of error.
This may be more likt 1998 where you had much more localized races: R in IL and D in NC.
Plus there is usually one outlier.
Right now my pick ups ae (NE, MO, WI) my tossups are (MA, MT, VA, and now ND) then I have (FL & OH as lean D but should be R on election day)
Hoeven won North Dakota with 76% in 2010.
If Berg got 36% of independents, and guesstimating that he got 8% of Democrats, then he got less than 84% of Republicans. Berg needs to get that to at least 90%, as well as increase his share of independents to at least 45%; just doing that would increase his overall percentage to 51%. Hopefully he’ll bring more Republicans home after the primary is over.
To get to 58% of the vote, as I assumed he would get, Berg would need 15% of the Dem vote, 55% of the independent vote and over 93% of the Republican vote. Barring some extraordinary event, I don’t think he can get there.
I know, which is one reason why I thought that Berg would win without breaking a sweat.
Heitcamp has a brother running a radio show at least 3 hours a day touting his sister or her platform so the name recognition is ways up there. Further, to hear Heidi, she sounds like a conservative Republican somewhere to the right of Goldwater.
Berg is a Rino supreme having voted with the Rats to raise the debt ceiling when he said he would not. His performance in the house has been un noticed and generally unremarkable.
The voters in North Dakota are strange. I just do not understand how a voter can flip between Rs and Ds like that unless they are completely clueless.
That explains it.
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