SEN-MD: Steele ahead of Cardin on primary bounce
SUSA Poll shows 48-47 statistical tie.
By Adam C Posted in Archived — Comments (12) / Email this page » / Leave a comment »
According to a new SUSA poll, the MD Senate race is a statistical tie:
Steele (R) 48
Cardin (D) 47
Rep. Cardin has polled in the 45-50 range for almost a year. However, this is the highest mark for Lt. Gov. Steele from any major pollster. SUSA has not polled the race before so no trend is available.
The numbers could reflect several recent incidents that have helped the Steele campaign. First, a senior Cardin staffer "Persuasionatrix" kept a blog that contained racial remarks about Mr. Steele and accused Cardin funders of sexual harassment. The story was broken by blogger Kevin Aylward of Wizbang. Second, Steele's latest ads have caught the eye of many pundits and voters. They are different from the standard fare and have received a warm welcome from those disillusioned with partisan politics.
Read below for analysis of the poll.
For all intents and purposes, this poll shows the baseline support Steele needs from groups to win the election. Here are some key breakdowns with Steele listed first.
White 54-41
Black 33-63
Hispanic 61-37
Repub 85-10
Demo 22-74
Ind 45-39
18-34: 50-38
35-49: 49-45
50-64: 44-52
65+: 48-50
Also note that there is no difference based on income, Steele leads by 1-3 points in all groups.
Parsing these data, the most important number is the fact that Steele is winning 33% of the black vote who make up 25% of the electorate in this sample. Winning over 30% of the black vote is probably a necessary condition for Steele winning. That increase in the black vote also explains the 22% of the Democrats who are expecting to vote for Steele. That is important because Steele need only win a slim majority of independent voters if he can win 20+% of Democrats.
Interestingly, the Simmons ads and the new ads seem to appeal to young voters. Steele is winning a majority of the under 35 crowd which makes it his strongest age bracket.
The final piece of the puzzle is a very strong 58-37 lead in the Baltimore suburbs which helped propel Governor Erhlich into office 4 years ago. These moderate voters warmed to Erhlich/Steele and they are the other key (besides middle class black voters) to a Steele victory.
This poll helps validate the successful campaign strategy of the Steele campaign thus far. And if Mfume tacitly or directly supports Steele, the Lt. Gov. would become the favorite in the race.
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SEN-MD: Steele ahead of Cardin on primary bounce 12 Comments (0 topical, 12 editorial, 0 hidden) Post a comment »
I live in Northern Virginia, in the DC ad market, so I get alot of Maryland ads. Steele's ads, quirty and original, are really outstanding. The most recent one with the spinning headline "Steele Hates Puppies," and then ending the ad with him holding a puppy. Its really funny and I think his super-independent movement will do very well for a fairly conservative Republican in Maryland. It takes a lot for a Republican to win in Maryland. One formula, which catapulted Bob Ehrlich to the governorship, is a corupt incumbant (Glendenning) and a lackluster opponent (KKT). The other is to completley divorce yourself from insider politics, and that is what Steele is doing. He's counting on the anti-incumbancy, and he is doing a very good job.
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"As nations can not be rewarded or punished in the next world they must be in this."
- George Mason
Ok everbody, lets send him some money so he can keep his ads up. lets not loose this momentum. He is a great candidate, can you imagine the look on the liberals faces if Steele & kean win in november?
You can donate through RightRoots here. Steele is the last candidate listed.
I've never been pessimistic about our chances this fall, but I hadn't been expecting MD to be quite so competitive for a while now (though I did still retain a slight hope that Steele might pull it out in the end). this one may just have moved back to tossup!
and wow, look at that split on hispanics! Steele is almost doing as well there as Cardin does with blacks
They are only 2% of the sample which means a very large margin of error on that reading. In fact, now that I noticed the sample size I wouldn't have included in my post. That being said, it wouldn't surprise me if Steele does win the majority of the small Hispanic vote.
So we are losing support somewhat rapidly in Virginia, in a dead heat in Tennessee, and struggling in some other states where we have been generally successful in recent years (Missouri, Ohio and Montana), but we're in prime position to pick up a senate seat in the great Garden state and this poll looks like Blue Maryland is more in play than pundits have led us to believe.
Obviously there are local/candidate factors in play in Virginia, Montana, and Ohio, but the fact that we could swipe a seat or two in the other team's backyard is pretty amazing. People are predicting gloom and doom, and I'm more in line with that prediction than most others on this site, but polls like this really make me think twice.
And being in the Washington, DC area, the daily set of ads during Jeopardy show a stark contrast between the very charismatic Steele and the boring Cardin. Hopefully folks around here vote for the candidate and not the party, because in this race, Steele is proving to be the more appealing candidate.
...that's running through this year's election cycle. It hurts us worse, because we're in charge; but the Democrats aren't immune, either. To put it mildly.
November 7th should be one heckuva night.
The Fuzzy Puppy of the VRWC.
Even when there is a strong mood towards one party, the other still makes a couple of gains. Larry Sabato was writing recently about the one or two House seats the Democrats gained in 1994. It happens.
Quentin Langley
Editor of http://www.quentinlangley.net
That the national party will have to step in and devote considerable resources to these state is not good. Ideally, those resources would have been available for races in states like Maryland, NJ, Ohio, Michigan, and Missouri.
At this point, one has to admit that Ford Jr has been largely successful in duping the electorate of Tennessee into thinking he is a moderate (and a bonafide conservative on social issues). I never quite bought that Corker was the strongest general election candidate as Rasmussen said, largely because Rasmussen based that on the last poll he did before the Tenn primary which showed Corker doing better than the other two Republicans. But most of the polls leading up to that one showed the other two guys in better shape against Ford Jr.
I don't know what else to say about Montana. If Burns had gotten out of the way for Rehberg, then this would probably be a done deal for the GOP.
Allen was of course unfairly treated by the media for the macacca incident, but as a conservative Republican he should have known that he will be held to different standards. I wonder how his somewhat leftist-style attacks on Webb for the whole 'women can't fight' article will help. That type of pandering is usually most effective with Democratic voters.
Basically, if we must rely on upsets in Maryland and NJ to prevent a Leader Reid, then it will still be a disaster, albeit a lesser one, because the chances of confirming another known conservative to the Sup Court will be close to zero. We'd probably have to hope for a stealth conservative, and seeing as how that's never happened, I wouldn't count on it.
Still, I hope Steele can pull it off. He'd be a welcome addition to the Senate, and a vast improvement what we're used to from Maryland.
I'm so sick and tired of analysts and the MSM going on about how we're going to lose so much ground this year. This poll proves just how competitive Maryland and all the other states are. This is absolutely NOT where the Dems want to be at this stage in the campaign. And a Quinnipiac University poll found Kean up 3 points (48%-45%) in New Jersey yesterday as well.
The races where we're struggling (MO, OH, PA, RI, MT and TN) are generally very close, suggesting that it's still very likely the Reps will many or most of them. I'm having faith that we can actually make gains in the Senate this year and, who knows, maybe even in the House! I'll at least show some optimism there. But, truly, the individual House polls have been FAR more encouraging of late.
On a different note, I find it interesting that perhaps Mfume wouldn't have been a choice candidate for us to face after all. Initially, I thought so but perhaps the black factor will sink Cardin. As has been noted, it's possible that many black voters are ticked off by Mfume's rejection and will punish the Dems by voting for Michael Steele. Of all the major black Republicans running for statewide office this year (i.e., including Swann and Blackwell) I would say that Steele is by far the most impressive and professional. While I generally don't think that blacks can win statewide, I really think Michael Steele can do this. Let's support him in any way we can.
I agree with most of your post. I, too, think that gains are possible. Outside of the moonbat fringe, who's going to vote for the Democrats in an off-year election? There are far more politically active conservatives than liberals. I think grassroots have been underestimated in this race.
However, your comment "While I generally don't think that blacks can win statewide..." needs further explanation. Are you speaking of Republicans or politicians generally? I tend to think an exciting, intelligent candidate can win statewide, or even nationwide. Steele seems to be that kind of guy. JC Watts is that kind of guy. Condolezza Rice is that kind of person, though I don't think she's interested. Some blacks are not capable of winning statewide (much like some whites), but I think that has more to do with their merit as candidates than their race. I don't mean to criticize your viewpoint (yet). I just don't think I understand it.
Brent Money
-- Power corrupts. Absolute power corrupts absolutely. But it rocks absolutely, too. --
One could also compare Steele's numbers to Gov. Erhlich's in the same poll. Ehrich is behind 44-51, Steele leads 48-47. Steele does markedly better among the following groups:
18-34: 50 to 41 (+9)
Blacks: 33 to 15 (+18)
<$40K: 45 to 36 (+9)
Baltimore*: 27 to 8 (+19)
Urban: 31 to 19 (+12)
*Baltimore City
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