A plurality of Republican voters in California are up in the air about the 2010 Senate, but those who have an opinion are split evenly between GOP candidates Carly Fiorina and Chuck DeVore, according to a USC/Los Angeles Times Poll conducted Oct. 27 through Nov. 3 by Greenberg Quinlan Rosner Research.

Forty percent of registered Republicans said they were undecided about whom they want to take on Democratic Sen. Barbara Boxer next November. Twenty-seven percent each said they would back former Hewlett-Packard CEO Fiorina, who officially entered the race last week, and Devore, a state assemblyman from Irvine, Calif. who has been campaigning for several months.

Fiorina has a far higher profile in political circles and the media than DeVore given her past leadership of tech titan H-P and a stint as advisor for 2008 Republican presidential nominee John McCain, but that doesn't appear to have trickled down to the average California voter. The pair had some of the lowest name recognition rates among a long list of California politicians and candidates -- 29 percent could identify Fiorina and just 19 percent could identify DeVore.

Former eBay CEO Meg Whitman is outpacing the other GOP candidates for the nod to run for California governor, says a new poll conducted Oct. 26-28.

According to the poll by Capitol Weekly/Probolsky Research Whitman leads former Rep. Tom Campbell 34.3 percent to 12.5 percent, with Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner a distant third at 5.5 percent.

About 7 percent of the 750 respondents said they preferred someone else and 35 percent were undecided.

On the Democratic side, the poll tested only Attorney General Jerry Brown and San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom, who has dropped out. Brown was ahead, as he was in other polls, 43 percent to 18 percent.

There’s no clear leader in the California Republican primary for governor and nearly half of registered GOP voters are unsure about whom they support, according to a Field Poll conducted Sept. 18 to Oct 5.

Former Ebay CEO Meg Whitman leads in a three-way match-up with 22 percent of the vote, former five-term Rep. Tom Campbell earns 20 percent and state Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner comes in at 9 percent. Another 49 percent of Republicans said they were undecided. The margin of error was 4.5 percent.

All three remain unknown to the majority of California voters - 68 percent have no opinion of Whitman, 61 percent no opinion of Poizner and 59 percent no opinion of Campbell.

The prospective Democratic candidates are much better known to the electorate - approximately 60 percent of voters had an opinion of Attorney General Jerry Brown or San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom.

California Attorney General Jerry Brown is outpolling his likely opponents for the Democratic gubernatorial nomination and for the 2010 general election, according to a Rasmussen Reports survey taken Sept. 24.

Brown, who served two terms as governor in the 1970s, has a higher favorability rating than San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom, who also is seeking the Democratic nomination, 53 percent to 45 percent.

And in a hypothetical general election race, Brown leads former eBay CEO Meg Whitman, a Republican candidate, 44 percent to 35 percent, and two other candidates now seeking the Republican nomination, state Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner 45 percent to 32 percent, and former U.S. Rep. Tom Campbell 44 percent to 34 percent, according to Rasmussen.

California Sen. Dianne Feinstein would be the clear favorite in a Democratic primary for governor in 2010 if she chooses to make the run according to a Field poll conducted Feb. 20 - March 1.

Attorney General Jerry Brown and Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa tie for second at 16 percent and San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom registers 10 percent. All others are in single digits.

Should Feinstein not run, Brown would be out front by 26 percent followed by Villaraigosa at 22 percent, Newsom at 16 percent and Lt. Gov. John Garamendi at 8 percent.

SurveyUSA tested the appeal of a slate of potential or announced candidates for California's governorship in 2010 and didn't find any of them firing up voters with enthusiasm, but the poll did not include two big names, Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and Sen. Dianne Feinstein.

The survey asked voters to rate seven people on a scale of one to 10 with "10" meaning the individual had the "highest qualifications" and "1" signifying "completely unqualified."

The only name to garner a double-digit response in the "10" category was Attorney General and former Governor Jerry Brown who also had the highest favorability rating at 31 percent. However, only 10 percent graded Brown as a "10" compared to 20 percent who considered him completely unqualified, and those that viewed him unfavorably, at 34 percent, exceeded his favorable numbers.