Tuesday, June 02, 2009

New Va. Polls: Governor Nomination Free For All

For the past month, it has appeared that Terry McAuliffe's well-oiled campaign machine was pulling away from the pack for a victory in the June 9 Democratic primary.

Three polls released over the past day or so, however, suggest it's anybody's race.

Public Policy Polling, which has consistently had McAuliffe in the lead in the past few weeks, now had Creigh Deeds leading, although not by much. In the PPP poll, it's Deeds 27%, McAuliffe 24% and Moran 22%. PPP speculates that Deeds is benefitting in Northern Virginia from his endorsement by the Washington Post, while McAuliffe is being hurt by Moran's negative advertising in other parts of the state.

In a poll taken by Moran's pollster he not surprisingly leads (otherwise they wouldn't release it). In this poll, taken by Greenberg, Quinlan, Rosner, Moran leads what statistically is a tie: Moran 29%, Deeds 27%, McAuliffe 26%.

Finally, a Survey USA poll looked just at Northern Virginia (Arlington, Fairfax, Prince William and Loudoun Counties), and found Moran in the lead by 43%, with McAuliffe at 27% and Deeds at 20%. Unfortunately, there have been no similar polls taken in the past, so this one is difficult to compare.

Together, these polls suggest that the race is still quite fluid. With turnout expected to be low, any one of the three candidates could still win.

Our feeling--and it's just a gut one at this point--is that the race is really between McAuliffe and Deeds at this point. We'll know in one more week.

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