Friday, May 7, 2010

Poll: Kasich, Strickland in Ohio Dead Heat

For the second month in a row, Democratic incumbent Ted Strickland and Republican challenger John Kasich are essentially even in Ohio’s hotly contested race for governor.

The latest Rasmussen Reports telephone survey of likely voters in the state, taken Wednesday, finds Kasich again with 46% support and Strickland with 45%. Three percent (3%) of Ohio voters favor some other candidate, and six percent (6%) remain undecided.

Until last month, Kasich had led Strickland by anywhere from six to 11 points in surveys stretching back to December. Both candidates were unchallenged for their party’s gubernatorial nominations in Tuesday’s state primary. According to news reports, informal vote tallies show Strickland with 620,953 votes from Democratic Primary voters, while GOP Primary voters cast 735,771 votes for Kasich.

Additional information from the survey will be released over the next week at RasmussenReports.com/Ohio.

The survey of 500 Likely Voters in Ohio was conducted on May 5, 2010 by Rasmussen Reports. The margin of sampling error is +/- 4.5 percentage points with a 95% level of confidence. Field work for all Rasmussen Reports surveys is conducted by Pulse Opinion Research, LLC. See methodology.

Fifty-nine percent (59%) of Ohio voters favor a law like the one just adopted in Arizona that empowers local police to stop and check the immigration status of those they suspect of being illegal immigrants. Thirty-two percent (32%) oppose such a law. This is in line with views of the Arizona law nationally.

Kasich earns 62% of the votes of those who favor the immigration law. Strickland gets 74% support from those who oppose the law cracking down on illegal immigration. The political dynamics of this issue were highlighted in a CNN interview yesterday by Strickland warning national Democratic leaders about the potential political fallout of passing immigration reform or climate change legislation before the elections.

Forty-eight percent (48%) of voters in Ohio approve of the job Strickland is doing as governor, while 49% disapprove. This marks a very slight improvement from a month ago. This includes 13% who Strongly Approve of the job he is doing and 23% who Strongly Disapprove.

Fifteen percent (15%) of Ohio voters have a Very Favorable opinion of Strickland, while 22% view him Very Unfavorably. Just six percent (6%) have no opinion of the current governor.

Kasich is viewed Very Favorably by 21% and Very Unfavorably by nine percent (9%). But 22% of voters in the state don’t know enough about him to venture any kind of opinion.

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