NH-Sen: Ayotte Up 7 on Late-Surging Lamontagne

Public Policy Polling (9/11-12, likely voters, 4/17-18 in parens):

Kelly Ayotte (R): 37 (43)

Ovide Lamontagne (R): 30 (5)

Bill Binnie (R): 13 (19)

Jim Bender (R): 12 (11)

Tom Alciere (R): 1 (1)

Dennis Lamare (R): 1 (-)

Gerard Beloin (R): 1 (-)

Undecided: 5 (21)

(MoE: ±2.9%)

“Sen. Lamontagne” may be a fridge too far, but there’s no doubt that he’s made a dramatic late run against front-runner Kelly Ayotte. Do you think the Tea Party Express is kicking itself for not making an investment here?

Meanwhile, in the gube race, ex-state HHS director John Stephen leads Jack Kimball by 45-24. No drama there.

44 thoughts on “NH-Sen: Ayotte Up 7 on Late-Surging Lamontagne”

  1. But I’m even more sad to hear from PPP’s twitter that Both poll the same with Hodes. I guess if I were able to pick one, to win the primary, I’d choose Ayotte.  I do no know of any glaring negatives with Lamontagne, except that he is more conservative.

    🙁  I really hope Hodes pulls it out in Nov…

  2. are so divided here, I think that’s one of the big stories of the primary. Ayotte’s got Palin and according to this poll a lot of rank-and-filers. Lamontagne’s got Laura Ingraham and the Union Leader. And so on.

  3. Ayotte’s biggest problem isn’t Lamontagne. It’s Binnie and Bender. She runs even with Lampntagne among conservatives–no small feat, given the cycle–and beats him 39-17 among moderates. But Binnie pulls 19 percent of the moderate vote and Bender pulls 15, and both do better their than with conservatives. Knowing Lamontagne’s stances, most of those moderate Binnie/Bender voters would prefer Ayotte in a one-on-one.

    Also, Ayotte leads 40-31 with registered Republicans. Yet she only leads 31-29 among Independents (NH allows unenrolled voters to pick a ballot on primary day) because Binnie and Bender are at 17 and 15.

    Lamontagne has a very avid base of supporters that “woke up” as the campaign progressed. He’s not a good statewide candidate but is very good at appealing to and turning out social conservatives. But he has a cap, even in a primary, and I think that without Binnie and Bender Ayotte would win by 58-42 or so.  

  6. – but there’s an interview with Scott McAdams in, of all places, the Miami Herald.

    The good thing about it is that it focuses squarely and solely on the issues – basically, it’s a list of questions about where he stands on issue X, Y and Z. No hype-of-the-day nonsense.

    The bad thing – but now I’m really getting OT – is that his answers are, well, somewhere between meh and ugh. I guess that’s just a question of the kind of things you have to say to get elected in Alaska. Sucks that it’s like that though. I guess he’s going for Clintonite triangulation, but  it sounds a little awkward to me, to be honest – but what do I know about Alaskans.

    Maybe the explicit promise to be a Senator “in the tradition of Ted Stevens” will help him – he hits the “will work for pork” theme a bunch of other times too. Do you think that will help him attract the pork vote without losing Dem enthusiasm? (How do Alaska Dems feel about Stevens?) And will that be enough?

    http://www.miamiherald.com/201…

  7. While in some ways the race has been kind of like the California race (where a liberal Republican enters and instantly gives the establishment pick some conservative credentials) another parallel could be Indiana where you had two candidates on the right fringe making sure neither would topple Coats.

    But hopefully Ovide has better luck.

Comments are closed.