FDU Poll: Corzine +1 (or -2, or +5)

by: Hopeful

Fri Oct 30, 2009 at 05:30:00 AM EDT

According to the most recent poll by Fairleigh Dickinson University's PublicMind™, Democratic incumbent Jon Corzine and Republican challenger Chris Christie continue in a close contest in the race for New Jersey governor, with Corzine holding a lead among likely voters by a statistically insignificant thread of 44% to 43%. Another 6% volunteer they will vote for independent Chris Daggett and 4% are undecided. "At this point, anyone who says their vote doesn't count is mistaken," said Peter Woolley, a political scientist and director of the poll. "And no one knows that better than the campaigns."

Now, after that question they ask "Now let me ask that question in a slightly different way... if the election were held today, who would you vote for in a race between Jon Corzine and Chris Christie and Chris Daggett?" (again with the names rotated.)  For half, they ask about Gary Steele instead of Daggett.

That gives two results: Corzine 39, Christie 41, Daggett 14 and Corzine 46, Christie 41, Steele 3. It's fun to think about, but as the sample sizes are cut in half and are the same people who answered the previous result I'm not sure if it tells us much, except that Daggett does better when mentioned.

It's a little amusing that 19% of people correctly identify Daggett as the candidate endorsed by the Star-Ledger, but 17% name Corzine. Daggett supporters tend to know about the endorsement, but which way does the causal connection run? In any case, only 18% haven't heard of Daggett, way down from 50% in FDU's October 6 poll.

The other indicators are in line with what we've seen before: Corzine is at 39-54 favorable-unfavorable. Christie is 41-44 favorable-unfavorable. Daggett is at 28-23. Corzine is at 37-52 job approval. Barack Obama is at 52-37 job approval.

Public Question 1 on open space bonds is at 52% yes, 33% no. The question uses the word "bonds" not "borrow." Every pollster that uses that wording finds the bonds being approved.