Research 2000 for Daily Kos (2/9-11, registered voters):
Byron Dorgan (D-inc): 57
John Hoeven (R): 35
(MoE: ±4%)
Conventional wisdom seems to dictate that in the 2010 North Dakota senate race, Byron Dorgan is safe despite North Dakota’s red-state status… unless popular Republican governor John Hoeven runs, in which case we’d have an epic battle. There’s been no indication, however, that Hoeven intends to run, and based on R2K’s first poll of this race, he may not want to bother.
Despite the fact that he’s just as well-known and popular as Dorgan (Hoeven’s favorables are 68/27, while Dorgan’s are 67/30), Hoeven loses by a substantial margin, losing every part of the state and every demographic category except “Republicans.” As Kos speculates, North Dakotans, like other small-staters (consider Alaskans’ attachment to Ted Stevens), know well how linked their local economy is to federal appropriations, and seem unwilling to trade in Dorgan’s decades of seniority and powerful committee posts.
That poll really is a shocker. I’d expect a popular Governor liek Hoevan to poll at least within single-digits. Gives me a little hope for North Dakota in the future.
You’re not rustling this one up.
When Hoeven passed on challenging Conrad I figured Dorgan was safe, but not THIS safe. Wow, those numbers are insane. Cross this one off the “to watch” list.
Republicans seem to be hoping for miracles in states that Obama won in landslides (Illinois, Connecticut, Nevada, Colorado). But I don’t think they’ll find their miracle candidates.
I love that we have control of both Senate seats and the lone House seat, but those guys aren’t going to be around forever and considering we have a minority status in both chambers of the legislature and have not won the Governor’s race since 1988 who’s on deck?
You can take this off all lists of Dem. sen. seats to be contested…Hoeven sees this and he won’t even run…that being the case, Dorgan wins with 70+% of the vote…sorry sad-*ss republicans