All State Polls Taken October 10th through November 7th Democratic Nomination, At a Glance
State
Est. Date
# Polls
Clinton
Obama
Edwards
Richardson
Biden
Kucinich
Dodd
Net Avail Cash
Sep 30
Q3
$32.2M
$30.5M
$23.4M*
$5.1M
$0.8M
$0.3M
$2.4M
Iowa
Jan 03
5
30.0%
23.6%
19.6%
7.8%
5.0%
0.7%
1.4%
New Hampshire
Jan 08 (?)
4
38.8%
22.2%
13.0%
6.8%
2.8%
4.0%
2.3%
National
Feb 05
NA
46.7%
23.1%
12.0%
2.9%
2.1%
1.8%
0.5%
* = Includes public funds. Significant spending limits apply to Edwards’s remaining cash
In terms of trends, since the last update on October 30th, the national race has tightened by 3.1%, New Hampshire has tightened by 2.6%, and Iowa has tightened by 0.8%. Now, poll averages that go back to October 10th are going to include a significant amount of pre-debate information, so as of yet we do not have a thorough measure of the post-debate shift in the campaign. Personally, I would caution against expecting anything too large. Throughout this campaign, I have seen a small amount of isolated polls repeatedly indicate that the campaign is tightening, only then to see several new polls show the exact opposite. This has happened so many times that I have grown pretty insensitive to the occasional poll supposedly showing bad news for Clinton. I mean, she is ten points ahead of Edwards in Iowa now, a swing of 13.8% since only July 29th, while Obama has only gained 0.6% on Clinton in Iowa in time. Don’t tell me things are getting tighter unless several new polls all confirm that trend. I’m tired of false signs of a closer campaign. It is possible, but I remain skeptical.
Republican Nomination, At a Glance
State
Est. Date
# Polls
Romney
Giuliani
Hukabee
Thompson
McCain
Paul
Net Avail Cash
Sep 30
Q3
$9.2M
$11.4M
$0.6M
$6.4M
-$0.1M
$5.4M
Iowa
Jan 03
5
29.2%
13.2%
15.4%
11.6%
7.8%
2.8%
New Hampshire
Jan 08 (?)
3
31.3%
20.7%
7.7%
6.3%
16.0%
4.0%
South Carolina
Jan 19
2
23.0%
20.0%
5.0%
14.0%
11.0%
3.0%
National
Feb 05
NA
12.3%
31.3%
7.8%
16.2%
15.5%
2.7%
This was a good nine days for Romney. While his lead in Iowa and South Carolina is stagnant, and Giuliani is even further ahead nationally than he was before, Romney has extended his New Hampshire lead by 2.6%. But really, Romney doesn’t lead his early state leads to increase in order to have a good spell for his campaign. Instead, he needs things like Huckabee passing everyone else in Iowa, and also passing Fred Thompson in New Hampshire. Also, Thompson is struggling so badly right now (fourth in Iowa, fifth in New Hampshire, third in South Carolina, almost dropping behind McCain nationally) that is it tempting to drop him behind McCain in the overall rankings. And what is bad for Fred Thompson is very good for Mitt Romney. A weakening top tier makes Romney’s already strong early state position even stronger.
Early state polls can be found here and here. Net available cash means cash on hand for the primaries minus debts owed by the campaigns (info here and here). The primary calendar is still not fixed for Democrats in South Carolina, or for both parties in New Hampshire. Nomination at a glance archives can be found here.
