Tag: Ted Strickland

Public Policy Polling (PDF) (6/17-19, registered voters, 1/17-18 in parens):

Ted Strickland (D-inc): 44 (45)

John Kasich (R): 42 (39)

Undecided: 14 (16)

(MoE: ±3.9%)

Those numbers certainly ain’t pretty, but then again, PPP’s first batch of results weren’t exactly a thing of beauty for Teddy Ballgame either. And they’re a stark contrast to Quinnipiac, which has given Strickland twenty-point leads in its last two polls.

So what gives? F.O.S. (Friend of SSP) Tom Jensen takes stock of the situation:

Four pollsters have released approval numbers on Ted Strickland since last November.

Two of them – Quinnipiac and the Ohio Poll – show Strickland in a strong position. The most recent Quinnipiac showed Strickland at 57/29 for a net of +28. The latest Ohio Poll showed it at 56/34, or +22.

SurveyUSA and PPP show a very different picture. SUSA’s most recent numbers were 45/44, or +1 and our release tonight finds 43/42, also +1.

It’s worth noting that Quinnipiac and PPP are showing the same trend. In January Quinnipiac had Strickland at +38, so his +28 now is a ten point drop. We had him at +13 in January and now at +1 for a similar 12 point drop. So while we show very different pictures on Strickland’s overall popularity we do both find it declining.

Tom notes that PPP and SUSA both use IVR, while Quinnipiac and the Ohio Poll use live telephone interviewers – but he’s not sure what accounts for the wide discrepancy. Hopefully some other pollster will get in the mix here soon.

RaceTracker: OH-Gov

• MO-Sen: I’m not sure if Roy Blunt’s task just got easier or harder. Tom Schweich, a law professor and former ambassador, who started exploring the Missouri Senate race and landed some surprisingly hard blows on Blunt, yesterday decided not to run and instead endorsed Blunt. Schweich was a friend of moderate ex-Sen. John Danforth and was understood to be something of a Danforth proxy in the race. So Blunt should be happy to be free of that challenge, right? No, because he’s still likely to face a challenge from former Treasurer Sarah Steelman, who hasn’t formally announced her candidacy but has been stepping up her attacks on Blunt as an unprincipled insider. Without Schweich in there splitting the outsider anti-Blunt vote, Steelman becomes more viable.

• FL-Sen: Here’s an endorsement from a key player for Rep. Kendrick Meek: he was endorsed by Miami mayor Manny Diaz, who’s recently been associated with possibly running in FL-25 or for Lt. Gov. next year. Another interesting Meek tidbit that just came out: Meek has gotten more tobacco industry money than anyone else in the 2010 election cycle (more than, say, Jim Bunning or Richard Burr). Meek has close ties with the Tampa-based cigarmaking industry.

• OH-Gov: What’s that? An endorsement from a puny mortal like Manny Diaz? Screw that, because John Kasich just got an endorsement from Chuck Norris. (Which is odd, because I thought the fact was that Chuck Norris didn’t endorse politicians; politicians endorse Chuck Norris.) Ted Strickland was reportedly last seen running in terror on the shoulder of I-70, trying to get out of Ohio before sunset.

• CA-03: A second credible Dem has gotten into the race against the newly-vulnerable Rep. Dan Lungren in this R+6 district in the Sacramento suburbs. Bill Slaton, director of the Sacramento Municipal Utility District (and overseer of the electrial grid for 1.5 million people), filed to enter the race, joining confusingly-named fellow Dem (and Elk Grove city councilor) Gary Davis.

• CT-04: The GOP has landed an interesting challenger to go against freshman Rep. Jim Himes: 24-year-old Will Gregory, a “young, fiscally conservative, socially moderate Republican” activist who applied for a White House job during the Bush administration and, when asked to name two administration policies he agreed with, couldn’t provide an answer. State Senate minority leader John McKinney also seems likely to get in the race for the GOP and would bring a bit more, um, gravitas.

• NY-29: Tom Reed, the mayor of Corning, New York, announced that he won’t run for a second turn but that he was looking at another public service opportunity that he couldn’t be specific about, but that sounded suspiciously like running in the 29th against freshman Rep. Eric Massa.

• FL-Ag. Comm.: Ordinarily even we at SSP wouldn’t get so far down into the weeds as to post results of a poll of the GOP primary for the Florida Agriculture Commission race, but the results are too unbelievable to pass up… unbelievably funny, that is. The idea that the guy who used to be #3 on the House leadership ladder would try to demote himself to Florida Agriculture Commissioner is odd enough, but Rep. Adam Putnam is trailing a state Senator, Carey Baker, 26-17, in that race.

• NY-St. Senate: As everyone sits and waits to see whether state Senator Hiram Monserrate should stay or go (he’s vacillating on his coup participation, meaning the whole thing turns on him now), two interesting new developments. One is that the coup may lead to ouster of Dem leader Malcolm Smith and his replacement with John Sampson, who apparently has a better relationship with the dissidents. Also, there’s buzz (though nothing confirmed) that Barack Obama himself has been on the phone with not just Monserrate and Pedro Espada, trying to get them back into the fold, but also with Darrel Aubertine (although it’s unclear whether Obama would encourage Aubertine to stay in the Senate as the Dems try to get their narrow edge back or to get into the NY-23 race that Obama opened up for him by promoting John McHugh).

Quinnipiac University (4/28-5/4, “Ohio voters”, March in parens).

Republican gubernatorial primary:

Mike DeWine (R): 35 (32)

John Kasich (R): 23 (27)

Kevin Coughlin (R): 2 (2)

Undecided: 37 (37)

(MoE: ±4.9%)

Democratic & Republican Senate primaries:

Lee Fisher (D): 20 (18)

Jennifer Brunner (D): 16 (14)

Tyrone Yates (D): 4 (6)

Undecided: 59 (46)

(MoE: ±4.7%)

Rob Portman (R): 29 (31)

Mary Taylor (R): 8 (14)

Tom Ganley (R): 8 (n/a)

Undecided: 54 (52)

(MoE: ±4.9%)

Gubernatorial general election matchups:

Ted Strickland (D-inc): 51 (51)

John Kasich (R): 32 (31)

Undecided: 16 (15)

Ted Strickland (D-inc): 48 (50)

Mike DeWine (R): 36 (34)

Undecided: 14 (12)

(MoE: ±3%)

Senate general election matchups:

Lee Fisher (D): 42 (41)

Rob Portman (R): 31 (33)

Undecided: 26 (24)

Lee Fisher (D): 41 (41)

Mary Taylor (R): 29 (31)

Undecided: 28 (25)

Jennifer Brunner (D): 40 (39)

Rob Portman (R): 32 (34)

Undecided: 27 (25)

Jennifer Brunner (D): 38 (38)

Mary Taylor (R): 29 (31)

Undecided: 31 (28)

(MoE: ±3%)

Not a whole lot of motion in the ocean, but nice to see the Dems doing well. One caveat: Fisher and Brunner are both unknown to about 50% of the population, but Portman is unrecognized by two-thirds.

• KY-Sen: It wouldn’t occur to me to assign great meaning to Jim Bunning’s decision to skip attending the Kentucky Derby this year, but apparently that’s a big deal, as there’s lots of behind-the-scenes elbows-rubbing with potential donors. It’s one more clue in the retirement puzzle, in view of GOP SoS Trey Grayson’s formation of an exploratory committee, supposedly with Bunning’s blessing, and the likelihood that Grayson’s emergence will further dry up Bunning’s fundraising.

• FL-Sen: With Gov. Charlie Crist poised to make a decision on whether or not to run for Senate upon the end of the Florida legislative session Friday, former state House speaker Marco Rubio has kept turning up the heat on him, suggesting that he’s running in the primary with or without Crist. Regarding Crist’s support for the stimulus package, said Rubio: “If you agree with Susan Collins or Olympia Snowe on some of these issues, you might as well become a Democrat.”

• LA-Sen: David Vitter posts some mediocre numbers in a new poll from Southern Media & Opinion Research. He gets an approval rating of 58%, but only 30% say they would definitely vote to re-elect him (with 28% saying definitely not and 35% open to an alternative). Most ominously, only 35% of white voters said they would definitely vote to re-elect. In related news, potential primary challenger Stormy Daniels is embarking on a “listening tour” of Louisiana. I got nothing here; make up your own lascivious pun.

• OH-17: Turns out that Gov. Ted Strickland talked the 36-year-old Rep. Tim Ryan out of jumping out of a promising House career and into the #2 slot on his ticket. (Strickland said that when he does announce his Lt. Gov., it’ll be a “huge surprise.”)

• Redistricting: Dave’s Redistricting blog is about to release a new feature that should keep SSP’s many redistricting fans awake into the wee hours: a free and allegedly easy-to-use Flash-based online redistricting tool. It sounds like it’s only based on Census population data and not precinct-level voting data, but even that would be a huge help for tinkerers like us. Keep your eyes peeled for the tool’s launch some time this week.

The Swamp:

In Ohio, Republican John Kasich, a former longtime congressman and also commentator for FOX News Channel, plans to file papers today for a bid for governor, according to a well-placed source.

Republicans wanted Kasich to run in 2006, he demurred, but has been planting the seeds for 2010 since them – in March 2008, he suggested that Ohio’s income tax should be “phased out.” He served last year as honorary chairman of “Recharge Ohio,” a group committed to finding leaders who could “get our state back on track.”

I do find it a bit of a stretch to imagine a warmed-over retread like Kasich giving Strickland much of a scare, but with Ohio’s economy as bad as it is, one can never be too careful.

Final thought: What’s Mike DeWine gonna do now?

(H/T: Taegan)

Quinnipiac (3/10-3/15, registered voters, 1/29-2/2 in parentheses):

Lee Fisher (D): 41 (42)

Rob Portman (R): 33 (27)

Lee Fisher (D): 41 (41)

Mary Taylor (R): 31 (27)

Jennifer Brunner (D): 39 (38)

Rob Portman (R): 34 (28)

Jennifer Brunner (D): 38 (38)

Mary Taylor (R): 31 (26)

Ted Strickland (D-inc): 51 (56)

John Kasich (R): 31 (26)

Ted Strickland (D-inc): 50 (54)

Mike DeWine (R): 34 (32)

(MoE: ±2.7%)

John Kasich (R): 27 (22)

Mike DeWine (R): 32 (37)

Kevin Coughlin: 2 (3)

Rob Portman (R): 31 (33)

Mary Taylor (R): 14 (11)

(MoE: ±4.6%)

Lee Fisher (D): 18 (18)

Jennifer Brunner (D): 14 (16)

Tim Ryan (D): 12 (14)

Tyrone Yates (D): 6 (n/a)

(MoE: ±4.4%)

Quinnipiac polls both the 2010 senate and gubernatorial races in Ohio in one sample (the gubernatorial race got a separate release, though); Democrats have to be fairly pleased with the results in each. There’s been some erosion in their positions since early February, but every permutation currently points to a Dem victory.

In the senate race, both Lt. Gov. Lee Fisher and SoS Jennifer Brunner are basically holding steady; the gains have mostly come from a few points worth of undecideds moving to the Republicans. Brunner/Portman is the only configuration that’s polling within the margin of error. Despite the conventional wisdom that recruiting ex-Rep. Rob Portman was some sort of GOP coup, he remains largely unknown, with 67% of the sample not knowing enough about him to form an opinion. (Of course, that also means that he has a lot of room to grow, if Dems don’t quickly define him and his Bush administration links.)

The Democratic primary is also largely undefined at this point, with 46% still undecided, plus another 12% for Rep. Tim Ryan, who has announced that he won’t run and has endorsed Fisher. The entry of Cincinnati-based African-American state rep. Tyrone Yates into the race doesn’t seem to have produced any major changes.

On the gubernatorial side, while Ted Strickland’s approvals and head-to-heads have dropped a bit (56/30, down from 63/25 in early February), he’s still in positive territory, which differentiates him from, well, just about every other governor as the economic climate forces them to contemplate draconian cuts and/or tax hikes. (Voters now disapprove of his handling of the state economy 39/45, the first time he’s been negative on that measure.) With ex-Sen. Mike DeWine reportedly becoming more interested in running for state attorney general, Strickland may be left facing the seemingly weaker ex-Rep. John Kasich.

Quinnipiac (1/29-2/2, registered voters):

Ted Strickland (D-inc): 56

John Kasich (R): 26

Ted Strickland (D-inc): 54

Mike DeWine (R): 32

(MoE: ±2.9%)

Mike DeWine (R): 37

John Kasich (R): 22

Kevin Coughlin (R): 3

(MoE: ±5.1%)

Ted Strickland is starting to look fairly secure in his 2010 bid for re-election as Ohio governor, posting double-digit margins against two top-tier challengers. Strickland is well-liked (60 favorable/19 unfavorable), while ex-Sen. Mike DeWine inspires a whole lot of “meh” and people seem to simply not remember anything about ex-Rep. John Kasich (21 favorable/6 unfavorable, with 71% don’t know). Although Kasich has been the name most closely linked to this race, he loses the primary to DeWine, probably on the strength of the two-term senator’s statewide name recognition, although he still fares better than State Sen. Kevin Coughlin, the only declared candidate at this time.

You may remember that a few weeks ago, a PPP poll gave Strickland only a 6-point margin over Kasich for 2010. One of these polls must be way off. (Considering that the PPP poll found only 52% African-American support for Strickland, my money is on PPP being more of an outlier.)

PPP (1/17-18, registered voters):

Ted Strickland (D-inc): 45

John Kasich (R): 39

(MoE: ±4.1%)

Ted Strickland has a lead going into the 2010 election against likely opponent ex-Rep. John Kasich, but it’s a surprisingly small lead (6 points, and under the 50% mark informally assumed to be the safety zone). Strickland started out extremely popular, but has perhaps suffered a bit in tandem with Ohio’s dismal economy.

Strickland’s favorables aren’t that bad (he’s at 48 favorable/35 unfavorable, compared with 34/24 for the dimly-remembered Kasich, who was a House GOP up-and-comer in the 90s but oddly retired in 2000). As PPP themselves point out, part of the problem with the topline may be a screwy sub-sample of African-Americans; only 52% support Strickland, while Democratic candidates typically pull 80-90% of the black vote in Ohio.

(H/t conspiracy.)

http://www.publicpolicypolling…

I expected Kasich to competitive but to be within single digits is somewhat of a surprise. Strickland is in positive territory with his approvals (+13) but this looks like being a bit of a battle if Kasich pulls the trigger.

“One good piece of news for Strickland is that he gets more support from white voters than Kasich in a hypothetical match up. Any Democrat in Ohio who wins the white vote will easily win statewide. The race is only as close as it is at this point because Strickland gets just 52% of the black vote. Polling far away from an election tends to underestimate African American support for Democratic candidates, and it seems likely Strickland will end up earning closer to 80-90% of the black vote when the election actually comes.”

Let us hope so.