SurveyUSA is out with a new poll on the Virginia governor's race. Here's what the pollster has to say:Former Democratic National Committee chair Terry McAuliffe continues to run strongest of the 3 candidates for Democratic nomination for Virginia Governor, according to a SurveyUSA poll conducted exclusively for WDBJ-TV Roanoke and WJLA-TV Washington DC. In a vote today, 05/20/09, three weeks to the Primary, it's McAuliffe 37%, Creigh Deeds 26%, Brian Moran 22%. Compared to an identical SurveyUSA poll three weeks ago, McAuliffe and Moran are flat, Deeds is up. 57% of likely Democratic Primary voters today say they may change their mind -- down from 64% three weeks ago - but high enough to describe a fluid electorate still evaluating its options.A few thoughts on all this, to the extent we believe the polls that is. First, it looks like Deeds' advertising in Central Virginia is paying off for him, but how much money does he have to keep it going through election day? Also, Deeds is pulling only 10% of the vote in NOVA and 19% in Southeastern Virginia, almost certainly not enough to win the election. Still, I'm not writing Deeds off, that's for sure.
McAuliffe, who ran Hillary Clinton's 2008 presidential campaign, is 11 points atop Deeds, a state senator -- but Deeds is the only candidate with momentum, and today leads McAuliffe in Central Virginia by 12 points, a 19-point swing to Deeds in the past 3 weeks. Deeds and McAuliffe remain tied in the Shenandoah; McAuliffe remains in command in the southeastern portion of the state. In Northern Virginia, Moran's 23-point lead three weeks ago is today a 10-point lead.
As for Brian Moran, there's no good news here that I can find. Among voters whose minds are "made up," Terry leads with 41% to 28% for Creigh and just 26% for Brian. This compares to 34% for Terry, 33% for Creigh, and 29% for Moran in SurveyUSA's late April poll. In other words, among voters whose minds are made up, Terry's up 7 points since April, Creigh's down 5 points and Brian's down 3 points. Among people whose minds "might change," Terry leads with 34% (down 6 points from April) to 25% for Creigh (up 10 points) and just 19% for Brian (down 1 point).
Finally, in the head-to-head against Bob McDonnell, Brian does the worst of the three candidates, trailing by 10 points (47%-37%) compared to 6 points each for Terry and Creigh (46%-40%). The bottom line is that Terry's gaining ground in the general election as we get closer to June 9 and the number of undecideds shrinks. How Brian turns this around when he's likely to be outspent and out-GOTV'ed by Terry in the last 20 days is beyond me, but of course you never know in sports or in politics.
P.S. Confirming that Creigh is the most conservative candidate in the race, he leads among "pro-life" voters (41%-28% over Terry, with Brian at 20%) and among McCain voters (35%-34% over Terry, with Brian at 17%). Creigh also leads among voters who describe themselves as "conservative" by 10 points over Terry and 12 points over Brian. Terry leads by wide margins among "moderates" and "liberals."
UPDATE: SurveyUSA significantly changed its assumptions for who will turn out from a few weeks ago. For starters, they have fewer woman and fewer African American this time (57% women in April, 52% now; 29% African Americans in April, 26% now). Terry is winning both of those groups big time, so the change in the SurveyUSA internals is either correct or it understates Terry's support. Also, SurveyUSA lowered their assumptions for 18-34 voters significantly (from 25% in April to 17% now) but raised their assumption for 35-49 voters (from 27% in April to 34% now). The candidates are all bunched together on 18-34, so the change in internals doesn't seem to matter much there. On 35-49 voters, this is where Creigh showed his big gains (from 13% in April to 29% now), so that definitely matters. Finally, SurveyUSA raised their assumed percentage of voters living in Shenandoah by 3 points, lowered NOVA by 3 points, raised SE Virginia by 3 points, and lowered Central by 2 points. That seems like a wash to me, pretty much.
