Public Policy Polling (9/30-10/2, likely voters, 8/7-8 (RVs) in parentheses, gubernatorial numbers here):
Michael Bennet (D-inc): 46 (46)
Ken Buck (R): 45 (43)
Undecided: 9 (12)John Hickenlooper (D): 47 (48)
Dan Maes (R): 13 (23)
Tom Tancredo (C): 33 (22)
Undecided: 7 (7)
(MoE: ±3.4%)
Michael Bennet has the slimmest of leads in Colorado according to PPP, the pollster who’ve tended to be the most favorable to him. It’s an enthusiasm gap thing, although not as bad as in the midwest: if their August RV model were used, Bennet would lead 47-44 (and if the 2008 turnout model were used, he’d lead 50-41). Bennet’s approval is 35/49, while Buck is at 41/46.
On the gubernatorial front, Dan Maes has collapsed even further as his amateur-hour campaign leaks air; he’s down to 12/58 favorables (from 23/38 in their last poll). In a way, that’s bad news for John Hickenlooper, who needs a healthy split between the two conservatives instead of seeing Maes dwindle down into single digits, which may actually be possible given the current trajectory. Hickenlooper’s personal popularity (51/37) seems like it’ll be enough to help him weather even a complete Maes collapse, though.
Harstad Strategic Research (10/3-4, likely voters, no trendlines):
Michael Bennet (D-inc): 44
Ken Buck (R): 41
Other: 3
Undecided: 13
(MoE: ±4.4%)
For good measure, there’s also a poll of the Senate race out from Democratic pollster Harstad giving Michael Bennet a 3-point lead, and also finding Ken Buck with a 31/41 favorable. (Apparently this poll is from the Bennet campaign, though the memo doesn’t explicitly say.) I’m still not feeling terribly optimistic about this race, given that most other pollsters looking at this race have given Buck a mid-single-digits lead — and a leaked Dem poll with a 3-point lead doesn’t do much to encourage more optimism, but at least it plus the PPP poll show that the race is still in tossup territory.
One one hand, you have Nate Silver still rating Ken Buck as a 73% favorite to win despite this poll. On the other hand, Charlie Cook talks today about what a crappy campaign Buck is running, which makes sense to me because it feels like Buck should be doing better than he is.
I always thought Buck had the advantage over Angle because he seems less crazy, but it’s odd to think that right now polls are showing Angle and Buck pretty much in the same place.
I’d probably still put Buck as the favorite. But if he makes a gaffe (as he is occasionally prone to do)the advantage could turn to Bennett quickly.
Instead, we’re seeing Bennett surprisingly competitive, and certainly a more likely hold than, say, Pennsylvania or even, regrettably, Wisconsin. If Dems can retain 1 or 2 of these races in the polls, it all but seals the deal for the Senate, since the West Coast Firewall (TM?) is proving to be somewhat resilient in light of the brutal numbers in the Midwest.
If we just saw Harstad (for Bennet) putting him ahead this week, I’d also be skeptical. But since PPP shows similar results, I can believe it. As I said above, my experience with the many craptastic Nevada polls is starting to make me wonder if many of the public polls are also getting Colorado wrong.
Michael Bennet has been running a pretty solid campaign so far but Buck has his base extremely fired up to vote for him and that is propelling him right now. Despite this poll almost all other polls give Buck a narrow lead. I still believe that this is going to be a very close race decided by a few percentage points and this is one that does not appear to have slipped away from team blue. Buck has some negatives and Bennet has been wisely exploiting them. To keep a reasonable majority this is one of the must wins of the cycle and I know that the airwaves in Colorado are getting pounded with ads. I really hope that Bennet can pull this out in the end but he is going to need to GOTV in the Denver/Boulder area and I’m skeptical of his abilities to pull this off.
Washington is evening up again and WV is looking bad also. Feingold has got to make a successful move soon, or he will be out of luck and chances.
Dems need at least 52 seats to have genuine control of the chamber, and only having 49 seats is a distinct possibility. If the could only invest in one race, I would make it this one.
DSCC should concentrate on beating the Tea Party candidates: Angle, Buck, Paul, Ayotte, Toomey.
BTW, there seemed to be a pause in polls on this race, until these two. Is that true?
Dan Maes because if he falls below 10%, they would be demoted to a third party status and get crappy ballot positions and potentially be much more restricted in the amount of money they can raise in the future. Dick Wadhams must be very angry right now.
Written up here: CO-Gov: Tancredo endangering Colorado GOP’s future
Summarizing, if Maes receives <10% of the vote in November, the GOP becomes a minor party for the 2012 and 2014 cycles.
The consequence 1) is the GOP won’t get one of the top 2 ballot lines (Tancredo’s American Constitution Party will be the other major party in CO), but will be relegated to the bottom, mixed in with the various minor third parties. That includes the POTUS election plus all state legislature races, and in 2014 the Senate and other statewide races.
2) Also there’s also a fund-raising consequence in CO. An unchallenged minor party candidate isn’t included on the primary ballot whereas the major party always is. That apparently precludes them from raising money for their primary elections, cutting the allowed fundraising in half.
Hickenlooper is close enough to 50 that I’m not too worried and having the GOP be a minor party in CO would be hilarious.