Quinnipiac (1/14-19, registered voters):
Alex Sink (D): 15
Kendrick Meek (D): 13
Ron Klein (D): 9
Allen Boyd (D): 8
Dan Gelber (D): 1
Don’t know: 54
(MoE: ±4.7%)Bill McCollum (R): 22
Connie Mack IV (R): 21
Vern Buchanan (R): 10
Marco Rubio (R): 6
Allan Bense (R): 2
Don’t know: 39
(MoE: ±4.3%)
If the primary elections for the Florida senate race were held today, “Don’t know” would sweep both nominations in a landslide. At this point, this is a name recognition test, and Floridians seem to have no idea who these candidates are. At any rate, there seems to be something of a hierarchy here: statewide officials (Sink, McCollum) fare best, then U.S. Representatives, with state legislative leaders down in no man’s land.
On the Dem side, Kendrick Meek has the edge among current candidates. But assuming that he comes in with fairly high name rec from being in the state’s largest media market, and that he’s probably already consolidated the state’s African-American vote, he may not have as much room to grow as the other candidates.
Unfortunately, this poll has a major wrinkle; it was in the field when Alex Sink announced that she wasn’t going to be a Senate candidate, so presumably some respondents were operating under the assumption that Sink was a likely candidate while others knew that she wouldn’t be. In fact, the only head-to-head Quinnipiac tried out involved Sink as the Dem nominee (McCollum 36, Sink 35, with 29 don’t know). Here’s hoping they try again soon with some other permutations.