Another poll has Terry McAuliffe opening up a double-digit lead in the race for the Democratic Party gubernatorial nomination. This time it’s Public Policy Polling, which on March 31 had former Northern Virginian state lawmaker Brian Moran two points ahead of McAuliffe among likely Democratic Party primary voters.
The PPP poll released today has the former Democratic National Committee chair at 30 percent among those likely primary voters with Moran at 20 percent, Bath County State Sen. Creigh Deeds at 14 percent and a little more than a third of the voters still undecided.
The March 31 Public Policy Polling survey had Moran at 22 percent, McAuliffe at 18 percent and Deeds at 15 percent.
A SurveyUSA poll released last week had McAuliffe at 38 percent and Moran and Deeds both at 22 percent.
“This is the fourth time PPP has polled this contest, and the first time one of the candidates has broken away from the pack,” said Dean Debnam, the president of Public Policy Polling.
Getting inside the numbers:
– McAuliffe’s favorability rating went up 10 points, from 32 percent to 42 percent, between the March 31 poll and the one released today. His unfavorable rating dropped slightly from 29 percent to 25 percent. Moran went from 34 percent to 39 percent on the favorable rating and from 15 percent to 11 percent on the unfavorable. Deeds went from 31 percent to 33 percent on the favorable number and from 12 percent to 11 percent on the unfavorable number.
– A majority of the self-identified likely primary voters – 55 percent – consider themselves moderates, with 34 percent calling themselves liberals and 11 percent identifying as conservatives. Eighty percent identified themselves as Democrats, 2 percent as Republicans and 18 percent as other.
– Seventy-nine percent said they would support whoever the eventual Democratic Party nominee ends up being.
In the lieutenant governor race, former Finance Secretary Jody Wagner leads with 18 percent to 7 percent for former Mark Warner and Tom Perriello staffer Mike Signer and 6 percent for Southwest Virginia businessman Jon Bowerbank, with more than two-thirds of voters still undecided among the three.
– Story by Chris Graham
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