NJ-Gov: Quinnipiac Bears Good News

Quinnipiac (10/20-26, likely voters, 10/7-12 in parentheses):

Jon Corzine (D): 43 (40)

Chris Christie (R): 38 (41)

Chris Daggett (I): 13 (14)

Don’t know: 5 (5)

(MoE: ±2.8%)

Yet another twist in the roller coaster ride that the New Jersey gubernatorial race has become as it races through the final stretch. Yesterday was a stomach-clenching drop as PPP and Rasmussen gave a small edge to Chris Christie, helped along by Chris Daggett losing momentum. But today Quinnipiac finds a 5-point Jon Corzine lead (even with Daggett pulling in the same 13 that PPP saw yesterday), the first time they’ve seen Corzine on top. 38% of Daggett supporters say they might change their mind, with 43% saying Christie is their 2nd choice and 27% saying it’s Corzine.

Corzine seems to have made a bit of improvement on his still-lousy favorables as well: he’s up to 41/52, while Christie has sunk to his lowest marks, 37/42. This points to a race that couldn’t be more of a tossup; if there’s any doubt, Pollster.com‘s regression line today (with the new Quinnipiac included — and, unfortunately, that Suffolk outlier too) averages it all out at a 41-39 Corzine lead.

RaceTracker: NJ-Gov

41 thoughts on “NJ-Gov: Quinnipiac Bears Good News”

  1. Who was going to win in the NJ & VA races a few months ago, I would have said Deeds and Christie would win.  Kinda funny how their trend lines changed in the last few months.

  2. They’ve been polling the state since the 80s and PPP just started doing polls with the 2008 and this is the NJ-gov race is the first race that PPP has ever done polls in NJ. Since NJ is the toughest state in the country to poll and QU has the most experience and the highest sample size, I think we need to take the QU poll more seriously. I want to make a point that last year PPP was extremely accurate, especially with the North Carolina polls and final presidential polls. PPP predicted a Franken win in MN, and a Obama win in NC and IN. PPP was also one of the few polls the predicted that Dole could loose even when she was ahead by double digits. However, when it comes to New Jersey, due to how complicated the state is, it takes a lot of experience polling that state over the years in order to be able to predict an accurate result.

  3. and still predict a very slim Christie lead.  I just dont think that many people are going to be voting for Dagget and will instead shift to Christie when they actually have the ballot in front of them.

    Id love to see a poll where they only polled between Christie and Corzine and discluded third party candidates.

    But then again, you have the NJ effect where the general ideology of voters is quite Democratic.  (I believe this is why Kanjorski just barely hung on in 08).  These voters who sway elections simply by virtue of the electorates ideology are also probably the voters least likely to turn-out for an off-year election.

    Cant wait til next Tuesday!  Good thing I have a Property mid-term that next Wed so I’ll be up studying anyway!

  4. But I’m not too sure. They both get the same amount of their party base, but Christie leads by 15 with independents. How does that equal Corzine +5? ( I know Democrats outnumber Republicans, but by that much when the GOP is much more enthused?)

  5. The election is no longer the biggest thing going on in Jersey. The state is stuck right smack in between an epic sports battle for the next week or so. lol

  6. Like every close race this is about GOTV. That’s why I think Daggett may significantly under perform his polling numbers. He has no GOTV operation and could suffer for it

  7. This race like all close races will be about GOTV. Because of that I could see Daggett significantly underperforming his poll numbers because he has no real GOTV operation

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