Democratic candidate John Hickenlooper now holds a double-digit lead in the three-way race for governor of Colorado. The latest Rasmussen Reports telephone survey of Likely Colorado Voters finds Hickenlooper, the mayor of Denver, with 43% support. Businessman Dan Maes, the winner of Tuesday’s Republican Primary, captures 31% of the vote, while American Constitution Party candidate Tom Tancredo trails with 18%. Three percent (3%) prefer some other candidate in the race, and five percent (5%) are undecided. This is the first poll conducted since Maes won the Republican primary.
It shows Maes with a bit more support than he had before the primary and Tancredo with a bit less support.
Hickenlooper’s level of support has been fairly steady for months, but he has clearly benefitted from Tancredo’s entry in the race which splits the Republican vote. The Democrat had run roughly even with Maes in two earlier surveys.
Colorado is now ranked Solid Democrat in the Rasmussen Reports Election 2010 Gubernatorial Scorecard.
Maes edged longtime front-runner Scott McInnis in Tuesday’s primary after the latter was felled by a plagiarism scandal. McInnis held a small lead over Hickenlooper for months prior to the scandal. Tancredo, a former GOP congressman, jumped into the race after the plagiarism charges broke, saying neither McInnis nor Maes could beat Hickenlooper. Maes has won only lukewarm support from state Republicans since the primary.
Just 59% of Republican voters in the state now support Maes, while Hickenlooper picks up 82% of voters in his own party. Tancredo, an outspoken opponent of illegal immigration, captures 25% of GOP voters. Among voters not affiliated with either party, Hickenlooper earns 35% of the vote, Maes 28% and Tancredo 24%.
(Want a free daily e-mail update? If it's in the news, it's in our polls). Rasmussen Reports updates are also available on Twitter or Facebook.
The survey of 750 Likely Voters in Colorado was conducted on August 11, 2010 by Rasmussen Reports. The margin of sampling error is +/- 4 percentage points with a 95% level of confidence. Field work for all Rasmussen Reports surveys is conducted by Pulse Opinion Research, LLC. See methodology. Additional data from this survey will be released at www.rasmussenreports.com/Colorado.
The first Rasmussen Reports post-primary telephone survey of Likely Voters in Colorado shows a close U.S. Senate race between Republican challenger Ken Buck and incumbent Democratic Senator Michael Bennet.
Colorado voters express serious pessimism about the economy. Only four percent (4%) describe the economy as good, while 65% think it’s poor. Twenty-five percent (25%) say the economy is getting better, but 50% believe it is getting worse.
Seventy-seven percent (77%) of those who say the economy is improving support Hickenlooper. The plurality (47%) of the larger group who say the economy is worsening favor Maes. Seventy-six percent (76%) of all Colorado voters say the U.S. economy is in a recession. Hickenlooper is viewed Very Favorably by 35% of voters in the state and Very Unfavorably by 24%. For Maes, Very Favorables are 12% and Very Unfavorables 20%
Fourteen percent (14%) have a Very Favorable opinion of Tancredo, but 32% view him Very Unfavorably. At this point in a campaign, Rasmussen Reports considers the number of people with strong opinions more significant than the total favorable/unfavorable numbers.
Forty-four percent (44%) of Colorado voters now approve of the job Democratic Governor Bill Ritter is doing, up five points from earlier this month. Fifty-four percent (54%) disapprove.
