You can’t always put too much faith in polls released partisan sources, but if the new Magellan Strategies offering has any validity the opportunity is wide open for Bill Cassidy, or another Republican, to knock Louisiana’s senior senator out of her comfy DC perch next year.
The release the GOP-leaning polling firm put out this afternoon…
Magellan Strategies BR’s most recent statewide Louisiana survey results indicate that U.S. Senator Mary Landrieu’s reelection campaign faces an uphill climb. Louisiana’s senior Senator will be seeking a fourth term on the November 2014 ballot. When asked if Landrieu had performed her job well enough to deserve reelection, only 39% of likely midterm voters agreed that she had (33% definitely reelect), while 51% felt that it is time to give a new person a chance (37% definitely new person).
“It appears that Mary Landrieu will be in for the fight of her political life next year,” said John Diez, Jr., Principal of Magellan Strategies BR. “Her close association with and support of some of the more unpopular policies of President Obama along with the continuing Republican lean of the state are strong currents working against her.”
Landrieu’s weak reelection support repeats survey results from a Magellan Strategies BR survey released last fall. The October 2012 poll also found that over 50% of respondents would prefer a new candidate over Landrieu with only 33% definitely supporting her reelection.
The latest survey found that Louisianans continue to be most concerned about the economy and job creation (34%), national debt and government spending (27%), and health care (26%). According to respondents, Landrieu’s support of tax increases, Obamacare, and former Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar, who instituted the oil drilling moratorium, further erode her base of support.
Magellan Strategies BR surveyed 1,800 likely Louisiana voters between July 29th and July 30th, 2013. The margin of error was 2.3% at a 95% confidence interval. This survey was not authorized or paid for by any campaign or political organization. The survey was conducted using automated telephone technology.
A 39-51 re-elect number is a terrible re-elect number. If that number holds up to Election Day next year, she can’t win against hardly anybody.
This is a Republican poll, mind you, so what’s in it isn’t necessarily gospel but none of these numbers should be a colossal surprise. But it wasn’t put out by Bill Cassidy’s campaign or Rob Maness’ campaign or the NRSC; Magellan paid for it themselves just to gauge the race.
And there were some interesting numbers in it. For example, here’s an indication of where party ID stands in Louisiana at present…
If the election for U.S Senate were being held today, and all you knew about the two candidates was that one was a Democrat and the other was a Republican, for whom would you vote?
TOTAL REPUBLICAN…….44.7%
TOTAL DEMOCRAT……….39.1%DEFINITELY REPUBLICAN…..32.3%
PROBABLY REPUBLICAN……..12.5%
PROBABLY DEMOCRAT………..8.8%
DEFINITELY DEMOCRAT……..30.2%
UNDECIDED………………………..16.2%
And a few questions about Landrieu’s positions on issues and whether they’d make the respondents more or less likely to vote for her. Yes, these questions are framed in ways Mary Landrieu’s people would object to, but that’s how polling works…
Mary Landrieu recently voted to support immigration reform legislation that offers amnesty to illegal aliens.
MORE LIKELY……………..28.1%
LESS LIKELY……………….50.1%
NO DIFFERENCE…………15.4%
UNDECIDED………………..6.4%Mary Landrieu has voted to raise taxes on Louisiana families by over 2500 dollars a year in order to pay for the more than 10 trillion dollars of debt that the government has rung up while she’s been in office.
MORE LIKELY……………..17.9%
LESS LIKELY……………….62.3%
NO DIFFERENCE…………11.2%
UNDECIDED………………..8.6%Mary Landrieu has voted in support of President Obama’s agenda more than 95% of the time.
MORE LIKELY……………..33.6%
LESS LIKELY……………….55.0%
NO DIFFERENCE…………..7.4%
UNDECIDED…………………4.0%Mary Landrieu cast the deciding vote in support of Obamacare which in some states has increased insurance premiums by 88% for people who buy their own health insurance.
MORE LIKELY……………..28.9%
LESS LIKELY………………..59.7%
NO DIFFERENCE……………6.2%
UNDECIDED…………………..5.2%Mary Landrieu supported President Obama’s nominee for Secretary of Interior – the very same Obama bureaucrat that instituted themoratorium on oil drilling which cost Louisiana over 1.2 billion dollars and more than 4,700 jobs.
MORE LIKELY……………….25.6%
LESS LIKELY…………………58.1%
NO DIFFERENCE…………..10.3%
UNDECIDED…………………..6.0%
A few other things in the poll might give some more insight as to the state of politics in Louisiana. Namely…
- 69.9 percent of the respondents identified as white, while 28 percent said they’re black.
- 29.5 percent said they’re registered Republican, with 58 percent saying they’re registered Democrats and 12.5 percent as independents; but…
- 41.6 percent identify themselves as Republican voters, while 40.7 percent identify as Democrat voters.
The party registration numbers from the Secretary of State’s office say that Louisiana’s electorate is 47.8 percent Democrat, 27.7 percent Republican and 24.5 percent independent. The fact that so many registered independents think they’re Democrats (there isn’t a lot of statistical difference between the 27.7 percent actual Republicans on the books and the 29.5 percent in the poll, but that 10-12 percent swing is from indies to Dems) could be an indication of how attuned some of Landrieu’s traditional voters are to politics. But event more interesting than that is the 17-point swing in the poll between how many registered Democrats there are and how many see themselves as Democrat voters. That’s a number which seems to hold up pretty well, given that even well-funded Dems in statewide races have trouble getting much above 35-40 percent despite their holding about 48 percent of the vote.
Which is trouble for Landrieu, because what it means is the organizational structure she’s relied on to win election three times is crumbling. The Dems’ voters in the state are drying up and getting irritated with the party nationally, and it doesn’t help her to have a voting record which lines up awfully well with the national party.
That means there’s a pretty good chance this election will be fought as a referendum on Landrieu and whether she can represent the voters of Louisiana. If that’s how it goes, she’s going to lose. Her challenge is to find something else the election can be about.
Advertisement
Advertisement
