Following their GOP primary poll, Rasmussen has released another general election matchup; the previous one, from only two weeks ago, is here. For the most part, it’s not any different:
A new Rasmussen Reports telephone survey of likely Texas voters finds incumbent Republican Governor Rick Perry leading former Houston Mayor Bill White 48% to 39%. Five percent (5%) like some other candidate, and eight percent are undecided.
Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison still runs best against the Democrat, leading White by 13 points, 49% to 36%. Seven percent (7%) prefer another candidate, while another seven percent (7%) are not sure.
The findings for both these match-ups are little changed from mid-January.The surprise, as in the new Rasmussen Reports survey of the GOP gubernatorial primary, is the growing strength of Debra Medina, a businesswoman active in the state’s Tea Party movement. Medina now edges White 41% to 38%. Last month, White had a 44% to 38% lead on her. In this contest, six percent (6%) favor some other candidate, but a more sizable 16% are undecided.
I wouldn’t read too much into the Medina/White result. She’s had a couple of good weeks, thanks mostly to the two debates, which gave her the chance to do her thing without taking on much fire. It’s basically a honeymoon bounce, and should any of the other candidates start attacking her, as KBH may need to in order to draw closer to Perry, she’ll probably drop a bit. And let’s be honest, she ain’t gonna be the nominee, so these numbers are for academic interest only. White, meanwhile, is more or less still at “generic Democrat” levels, having just now started to advertise. I’d expect him to get a bit of a post-primary bounce, assuming nothing horrible happens, then he’ll have to deal with whatever comes as the attention turns to the general election race.
As always, it would be nice to get more data points, if only to see if there’s any agreement on the state of this race or not. For all we know, Rasmussen is making assumptions no one else is about the electorate. It would also be nice to see a poll that pits the Republicans against Farouk Shami, for comparison if nothing else. Finally, one wonders if the GOP electorate will take a closer look at KBH’s so far consistently better showings against White than Perry, especially in the event of a runoff. Given how inept the KBH campaign has been, I wouldn’t put too much stock in this, but it could still sway some folks if they think about it in those terms. Mary Benton has more.
Andrew Sullivan of The Atlantic’s blog The Dish has found the results of Rassmussen polls to be well to the right of the results of other major polls.
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