President Obama is so far averaging 65 percent job approval which ranks him fourth among the last eight presidents elected to their first terms, according to a Gallup poll conducted May 1-27. Only Presidents, Reagan, Kennedy and Eisenhower did better.
The Quinnipiac question was worded somewhat differently, asking whether registered voters approved or disapproved of Obama's decision.
Christie leads Lonegan 46 percent to 35 percent with 4 percent preferring some other candidate and 15 percent undecided in a Rasmussen Reports poll conducted May 27. The margin of error is 5 points. The primary is next Tuesday.
Out of the favorable responses, the number saying "excellent" was 19 percent.
Fifty-two percent of Republicans called the choice only fair or poor, while 29 percent gave it positive marks. Democrats reacted positively by 72 percent to 17 percent and independents by 40 percent to 36 percent.
Same-sex marriages are now legal in Massachusetts, Connecticut, Maine, and Iowa, and will be legal in Vermont in September.
Schwartz's Quinnipiac University poll found that Dodd's job approval rating among registered voters rose from a low of 33 percent in April to 38 percent in May, while his disapproval rating dropped from 58 percent to 53 percent. The biggest factor in the disapproval numbers was the perception Dodd was dishonest or lacked integrity - a reflection of voters' dissatisfaction with the way he has handled questions about his personal financial dealings and his role in insurance firm A.I.G's bonus scandal.
Registered Democrats said they would vote for Cuomo over current Democratic Gov. David A. Paterson, 70 percent to 19 percent. In a hypothetical match-up Cuomo would soundly defeat Republican Rudy Giuliani, 53 percent to 41 percent. If the Democrats nominate Paterson, however, voters said they would go for Giuliani, the former New York City mayor, 59 percent to 31 percent. Reiterating the incumbent's low public standing. Just 15 percent of voters said they would vote for Paterson in 2010, while 71 percent said they would prefer to elect someone else as governor. Paterson's 27 favorable rating matched Siena's April poll findings, and is his lowest rating since he took over the state's reigns in March 2008.
That being said, Burr polls less than 50 percent against all the Democrats measured in the survey, which is not a strong position for an incumbent.
"This race is shaping up very similarly to 2008," said PPP's Dean Debnam. "Although it's taking Democrats a while to get a candidate, Burr's standing is still tenuous, and getting someone with a lot of name recognition isn't necessarily that important to winning next year."
If you take all Americans, Powell wins hands down when it comes to favorable-to-unfavorable scores, and while he doesn't place first among Republicans, he comes pretty close, according to a CNN/Opinion Research poll conducted May 14-17.
Among the general public, Powell, the former Secretary of State in President George W. Bush's first term, is viewed favorably by 70 percent. That compared to 30 percent for conservative talk show host Limbaugh (53 percent regard him unfavorably) and 37 percent who view former Vice President Cheney favorably (55 percent view him unfavorably).
Sixty-six percent of Republicans see Cheney favorably, but Powell is a close second at 64 percent and Limbaugh follows up at 62 percent. The margin of error was three points.
Cheney and Powell have traded shots in recent weeks on CBS' "Face the Nation," with Cheney going first on May 10, saying, "I think my take on it was Colin had already left the party." Powell got his turn yesterday, saying "Mr. Cheney was misinformed. I am still a Republican" and warning that the party would dig itself an even deeper electoral hole if it didn't broaden its base. Limbaugh has said that Powell needed to "close the loop and become a Democrat instead of claiming to be a Republican interested in reforming the Republican Party."
The survey, by Public Policy Polling was conducted May 19-21 and has a 3.9 percent margin of error. It sides with a poll by SurveyUSA in attributing some momentum to Deeds who has made strong gains in many parts of the state but is struggling in the metro DC area where a big chunk of the votes are. The outlier this week was Research 2000 which had Deeds in third place at 13 percent.
The most competitive contenders are Minneapolis Mayor R.T.Rybak who is within five points of Pawlenty and former Sen. Mark Dayton is within four points. (One hallmark of Dayton's career is that he defeated Sen. Eugene McCarthy in a Democratic primary in 1982, although he later lost the general election).
Pawlenty has leads ranging between 11 and 19 points over state Rep. Paul Thissen, state Sen. Tom Bakk, state Sen. John Marty, Minnesota House Speaker Margaret Anderson Kelliher, Ramsey County Attorney Susan Gaertner, former Minnesota House Leader Matt Entenza and St. Paul Mayor Chris Coleman.
A SurveyUSA poll, released earlier today, had McAuliffe leading Deeds 37 percent to 26 percent with former Virginia House member Brian Moran running third at 22 percent. The pollster emphasized, though, that McAuliffe's and Moran's numbers were flat since its last poll, while Deeds was showing momentum.
SurveyUSA says compared to its poll of three weeks ago, the numbers for McAuliffe and Moran are flat while Deeds is up.
Forty-three percent of voters say their minds are made up while 57 percent say they might change their decision. McAuliffe has the greatest percentage of supporters who say their minds are made up at 41 percent, with 28 percent saying that of Deeds and 26 percent of Moran.
Forty-seven percent disapprove of the performance of Pelosi, who has been the center of a what-did-she-know-and-when-did-she-know-it controversy and who also stirred the pot by accusing the CIA of misleading Congress. Republicans have since been pounding on her over the issue. Thirty-one percent approve of her performance and 23 percent have no opinion.
Republican Rep. Mary Fallin and former Rep. J.C. Watts both lead potential Democratic opponents, Lt. Gov. Jari Askins and Attorney General Drew Edmondson.
Quinnipiac University poll conducted May 12-18 put Christie ahead 56 percent to 33 percent. Assemblyman Rick Merkt got only 2 percent and 9 percent were undecided. Last month, Christie led Lonegan 46 percent to 37 percent.
A Monmouth University/Gannett New Jersey survey, conducted May 13-18, had Christie leading 50 percent to 32 percent with 2 percent for Merkt and 16 percent undecided.
Driven mostly by Republicans adopting more conservative stances, the public overall has inched to the right on a number of moral issues, according to a Gallup poll conducted May 7-10.
Gallup had already reported earlier this month that, for the first time in its polling, more Americans called themselves "pro-life" than "pro-choice."
On other issues, the percentage of the public that considered divorce acceptable dropped from 70 percent to 62 percent since May 2008, acceptance of stem cell research fell from 62 percent to 57 percent, gambling from 63 percent to 58 percent, abortion from 40 percent to 36 percent, having a baby outside marriage from 55 percent to 51 percent and sex between an unmarried man and woman from 61 percent to 57 percent.
Florida Attorney General Bill McCollum may have become the first big name to announce a run for governor now that Charlie Crist has opted for a Senate race, but if the GOP primary was held today, he'd run second to "undecided," according to a Mason-Dixon poll conducted May 14-18.
Matched against state Agriculture Commissioner Charles Bronson, who said he would "hopefully" make a decision on running this week, McCollum leads 39 percent to 12 percent, but 49 percent are undecided. Bronson suffers from the fact that 42 percent don't recognize his name compared to only 18 percent who don't know of McCollum.
If he chooses to run, Republican Sen. Tom Coburn will cruise into next year's re-election campaign with a high approval rating and no Democratic opponent who clearly could unseat him, according to a new poll.
Coburn, a physician and former three-term House member, has a 59 percent approval rating among Oklahoma voters, according to a survey by Public Policy Polling. And in head-to-head matchups with possible Democratic opponents Gov. Brad Henry, Rep. Dan Boren, Coburn leads Henry 52 percent to 40 percent and Boren 53 percent to 36 percent, the PPP survey said.
PPP also polled Boren and Henry in possible matchups with former Rep. J.C. Watts, R-Okla. In both cases the Republican comes out ahead, although by a much narrower margin, 46 percent to 41 percent against Boren and 45 percent to 44 percent against Henry.
Half of those polled had an unfavorable view of Reid compared to 38 percent who regarded him positively and 11 percent who had a neutral opinion.
Taking note of the fact that 55 percent had a favorable view of President Obama, Mason-Dixon's Brad Coker said, "Obama so far has been able to stay out of the fray and let Reid and (House Speaker Nancy) Pelosi get their hands dirty. Obama's so popular, he's a hard person to take a shot at right now, so Reid and Pelosi become the punching bags."
Coker added, "Reid's fortunes are going to hinge on two things: Does he draw a strong challenger, and what does the economy do?" So far, that strong challenger has not emerged.
Obama addressed the abortion issue on Sunday in delivering the commencement address at Notre Dame, where he drew a small crowd of anti-abortion protestors.
Fifty-seven percent of those polled say Obama's position on abortion has no effect on their opinion of him. Twenty-seven percent sede him less favorably because of it while 14 percent see him more favorably.
The precipitous decline in voter identification with the Republicans party over the last few years has been noted in several polls, but an analysis by Gallup of data collected from January through April shows that the GOP has suffered losses in nearly every major demographic subgroup.
Overall, for 2009, Americans leaned towards the Democrats over Republicans by 53 percent to 39 percent compared to a statistically even 45 percent to 44 percent in 2001 (this is the figure that takes into account the partisan leaning of independents).
Eighty-two percent of voters are very or somewhat concerned about the current situation in Pakistan and 56 percent believe there is a chance the Taliban will get control of the nation's nuclear weapons, according to a Fox News/Opinion Dynamics poll conducted May 12-13.
The poll results were released on the heels of a report in the New York Times saying that Pakistan is "rapidly adding" to its nuclear arsenal even while struggling to contain the Taliban insurgency.
Forty-three percent say it is very or somewhat likely that Pelosi's allegation is true while 41 percent say it is not very likely or likely at all and 16 percent are not sure. CIA Director Leon Panetta has disputed Pelosi's claim.
Fifty-nine percent of those surveyed said it was very or somewhat likely that harsh interrogation techniques helped secure valuable intelligence information while 30 percent rejected that notion. Sixty-three percent voiced a favorable opinion of the CIA while 24 percent viewed it unfavorably.
Biden beat out Bo 45 percent to 28 percent with 10 percent saying "both" or "neither" and 17 percent undecided.
Republicans picked Biden over Bo by 56 percent to 24 percent, Democrats by 37 percent to 32 percent and independents by 46 percent to 27 percent.
More Americans classify themselves as "pro-life" on the abortion issue than "pro-choice," 51 percent to 42 percent, according to a new Gallup poll. This is the first time in the 14 years Gallup has been polling on the subject that the "pro-life" designation has pulled ahead.
While opinion among people describing themselves as Democrats or leaning Democratic has remained relatively steady over the years, with roughly two-thirds "pro-choice" and one-third "pro-life," the shift came among Republicans, where there was a 10 percent increase in those calling themselves "pro-life," rising from 60 percent to 70 percent.
In the same survey a year earlier, Gallup found 50 percent calling themselves "pro-choice" and 44 percent "pro-life."
Mike Huckabee is the top choice right now among Republicans to be the party's presidential nominee in 2012 followed closely by Mitt Romney, but among all voters, Huckabee, Romney and Rudy Giuliani are all knotted up at the top of the field, according to a Fox News/Opinion Dynamics poll conducted May 12-13.
Huckabee leads Romney 20 percent to 18 percent among GOP voters with Newt Gingrich following at 14 percent, Sarah Palin at 13 percent and all others at 4 percent or less. The margin of error is 6 points.
Among all voters, Giuliani garners 16 percent, Huckabee 15 percent, Romney 14 percent, Palin 9 percent and Gingrich 7 percent. The margin of error for this ranking is 3 points.
The most angst-stricken victims of the recession are Americans in the boomer 50 to 64 age group who have seen their net worth shrink the most while adults over 65 have weathered it better and younger adults, under 49, remain "relatively upbeat" about their future despite the current lumps they are taking in the job market, according to a Pew Research poll conducted Feb. 23 - March 23.
Pew says that because so many older adults have retired and already downsized their lifestyles, they are less likely than middle-aged people to say they have cut back on spending, suffered losses in their retirement or having trouble paying for essentials like housing or medical care. Three-quarters even say they expect to be able to leave money to their children, although the amount may be reduced because of the impact of the economic downturn.
The Public Policy Polling survey results, released on Thursday, found voters evenly divided in their approval of Burr, with 36 percent approving, 32 percent disapproving, and 32 percent saying they weren't sure.
In a trial matchup with Durham attorney Kenneth Lewis, Burr would win 45 percent to 31 percent, according to the poll.
Hodes leads former Sen. John Sununu, who lost his seat to Jeanne Shaheen last year, by 37.9 percent to 35.4 percent with 26.7 percent undecided. Hodes holds an even smaller lead over former Rep. Charlie Bass - 31.1. percent to 30.1 percent with 38.8 percent undecided. Hodes beat Bass for New Hampshire's 2d district seat in 2006. The margin of error is 5 points.
The poll also measured voter sentiment on the issue of same sex marriage, finding them 44.8 percent to 40.8 percent against it. The New Hampshire Senate voted to legalize same-sex marriage by a narrow 13 to 11 vote last month.
Given Paterson's 28 percent approval rating, outpolling him right now is not such a difficult feat, but Giuliani also closed within single digits in a prospective match-up against Attorney General Andrew Cuomo, the favorite should he decide to run. Giuliani trailed Cuomo, a Democrat, 41 percent to 47 percent, an improvement over the April Quinnipiac poll, which had Giuliani losing 36 percent to 53 percent.
Liberal interest groups are clamoring for President Obama to appoint a woman or minority to the Supreme Court, but the public doesn't share their ardor about the issue, a new Gallup poll found.
Roughly two thirds of those surveyed said it doesn't matter to them whether Obama appoints a woman, African-American or Hispanic to the court.
Just six percent of those polled said that it was "essential" that Obama appoint a woman, while another 26 percent agreed it would be "a good idea, but not essential." That combined tally of 32 percent is considerably smaller than the 43 percent who considered it essential or a good idea in September 2005 regarding a replacement for Sandra Day O'Connor.
As he heads towards his 2010 re-election campaign, Arizona Sen. John McCain is regarded favorably by 65 percent of voters compared to 35 percent who see him negatively, but Republican voters say by 45 percent to 38 percent that McCain has lost touch with them, according to a Rasmussen Reports poll conducted May 6.
Congress is considering a controversial environmental proposal called cap-and-trade, but a new Rasmussen poll shows few voters actually know what the term means.
Broadly speaking, cap-and-trade proposals involve having the government set limits on what pollutants can be emitted. Then it auctions off permits for certain emissions and allows companies to trade the permits as needed
The poll gave respondents a choice of three options. Just 24 percent correctly identifed the cap-and-trade proposal as something that deals with environmental issues. A slightly higher number, 29 percent, believe it has something to do with regulating Wall Street, while 17 percent think the term applies to health care overhaul. And 30 percent have no idea. The poll's margin of error was plus or minus 3 percentage points
Americans think driving is already painful enough without boosting fuel taxes to encourage them to buy a car that gets better mileage, according to a poll released Monday.
Eighty-one percent opposed higher gas taxes to nudge people toward fuel-efficient cars, while 10 percent would support such a tax increase, says the nationwide survey by Rasmussen Reports. The poll's results are in line with one taken two years ago that showed 86 percent opposing a proposed 50-cent increase in the tax on a gallon of gasoline.
Opposition to raising the fuel tax cuts across political and generational lines, although Democrats and the young were less opposed - but only slightly so.
President Obama has gone into his second100 days doing slightly better in his job approval ratings than he did during the first 100, according to a Gallup tracking poll conducted May 7-9. Sixty-six percent approved of how he was doing his job during this short stretch compared to an average 63 percent from January through April.
At this early juncture, 53 percent of adults say they would definitely or probably vote for him in 2012 compared to 37 percent who would not. But the those who "definitely" would vote for or against him are matched up at 25 percent each. The figures for registered voters are about the same. Among independents, those definitely or probably for Obama number 46 percent to 40 percent who are probably or definitely against. But when "definites" are matched together among this group, those against outnumber those for Obama by 26 percent to 15 percent.
Democrats lead Republicans among every age group of the American electorate, according to the polling firm Gallup.
A Gallup analysis of its polls between Jan. 2 and May 5 shows younger voters, between the ages of 18 and 29, tend to identify with the Democrats or to be independent. As the age increases, voters gravitate toward one political party or the other.
Also, Republicans show gains among voters approaching middle age in their 30s and 40s, and again as they reach retirement age. Even among those age groups, though, Democrats still hold the advantage.
Americans seem to lack a strong appetite to investigate or prosecute people for interrogation methods used during the war on terror under the Bush administration, according to a new poll.
Forty-six percent of Americans were opposed to creating a bipartisan commission to investigate the interrogations of detainees who were captured during the war, said the Ipsos-McClatchy poll conducted April 30-May3. Forty-one percent favored such a commission, and 13 percent were unsure.
Similarly, 48 percent opposed prosecuting those who authorized the interrogations, with 43 percent saying prosecution would be justified, and 9 percent unsure.
More bad news for the Republican Party: Now men have jumped ship, too.
Gallup reports that the Democratic Party now holds a 5 percentage point advantage over the GOP among male voters.
"In the most recent quarter, 47% of men identified as Democrats or leaned Democratic, compared with 42% who identified as Republicans or leaned Republican," Gallup concludes in its new report.
The figures were based on aggregated quarterly results from nationwide Gallup polls. Each of the polls between January and March of this year surveyed of 1,000 adults, and each carries a margin of error of plus or minus 3 percentage points.
Regardless of whether Lt. Gov. Lee Fisher or Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner wins the nomination, a Democrat is favored to replace retiring Republican Sen. George V. Voinovich in Ohio, according to the latest Quinnipiac University poll.
As expected this far out before an election, the poll of 1,079 voters conducted April 28-May 4 contains a large percentage of undecided. But Fisher would edge Brunner for the nomination and beat Republican Rob Portman, the former U.S. trade representative and congressman, in a general election matchup by 41 percent to 31 percent.
Fisher also would beat Republican State Auditor Mary Taylor, 41 percent to 29 percent. If Brunner turned out to be the Democratic nominee, the poll found she would also defeat either Portman or Taylor by eight to nine points.
The nation's not exactly content, but the number of Americans who say they're pretty satisfied with how things are going has doubled from 17 percent to 34 percent since President Obama took office, according to a new Gallup poll.
The telephone poll of 3,500 adults ending May 3 found, not surprisingly, that Democrats and, to a lesser degree, Independents accounted for the increase. Still, the poll represented the highest level of satisfaction among Americans found in its weekly tracking since early 2007.
With barely a month to go before the June 9 Democratic primary, Terry McAuliffe has taken a 10-point lead over Brian Moran in the race for Virginia governor.
According to a survey of 583 likely Democratic primary voters conducted May 1-3 by Public Policy Polling, McAuliffe drew 30 percent support to Moran's 20 percent, while Creigh Deeds dragged behind with just 14 percent.
The lead margin for McAuliffe, a former Democratic National Committee chairman, represented a huge jump from the end of March, when he registered just 18 percent support from poll respondents.
A new poll shows Republican Rep. Michael N. Castle with a strong lead over Delaware Attorney General Beau Biden in a possible Senate matchup.
In the poll, conducted by Susquehanna Polling and Research, respondents chose Castle by a margin of 21 percent. The GOP incumbent polled 55 percent to Biden's 34 percent, with 8 percent indicated they are undecided.
Among Republicans, Castle leads Biden by a margin of 82 percent to 12 percent and among independents he leads 55 percent to 28 percent. Biden, the son of Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr., leads among Democrats 52 percent to 36 percent.
Sen. Arlen Specter has something to worry about if former Homeland Security Secretary and Gov.Tom Ridge gets into the 2010 Senate race, new polling shows.
In a survey of 1,019 registered voters by Susquehanna Polling & Research, Specter drew 42 percent to Pat Toomey's 36.
But against Ridge, Specter got 38 percent support to Ridge's 39, making that potential race a statistical dead heat. However, the poll indicated that many voters aren't ready to focus on a Senate election that's still a year and half away. At least 20 percent of those surveyed said they were undecided about who they plan to support next year.
Kentucky Sen. Jim Bunning's standing with Kentucky voters isn't exactly All-Star caliber, according to new polling numbers that are certain to add to the growing speculation that Bunning will choose not to run in 2010.
His approval rating clocked in at 34 percent in the latest Survey USA poll of 600 adults, conducted April 24-26.
Fully 52 percent of those responding to the poll said they disapprove of the job Bunning is doing, with 14 percent saying they weren't sure.
The margin of error was plus or minus 4.1 percent.
If either former Republican Sen. John E. Sununu or current Republican Sen. Judd Gregg run for the Senate in New Hampshire next year, the GOP would be narrowly favored to hold the seat in the Democratic-trending state, according to a new poll.
A Granite State Poll conducted by The University of New Hampshire Survey Center found Democratic Rep. Paul W. Hodes narrowly trailing Sununu in one potential match-up and significantly trailing Gregg in another.
Sen. Arlen Specter's switch to the Democratic Party may have insulated him from being unseated by former Rep. Pat Toomey, considered a likely candidate to run as a Republican against Specter, according to a new poll.
But if former Republican Gov. Tom Ridge runs against Specter, the margin narrows considerably.
Toomey, a former three-term congressman from eastern Pennsylvania, would lose to Specter by 20 percentage points, but Ridge, who also served as Homeland Security secretary in the Cabinet of former President George W. Bush, would lose by 3 percentage points, says the poll conducted by Quinnipiac University.
New York voters seem to be taking time to make up their minds about their appointed senator, Democrat Kirsten Gillibrand.
Fully 43 percent of respondents in the latest Marist poll couldn't rate her job performance, while 19 percent said she was doing an excellent or good job and 38 percent said she was performing either fair or poor in her new office.
In hypothetical head-to-head matchups, Gillibrand trailed former Republican Gov. George Pataki -- of the 1,029 registered voters surveyed on April 28 and 29, 38 percent preferred Gillibrand while 46 percent favored Pataki. When pollsters asked the same question in March, the outcome was 45 percent for Gillibrand and 41 percent for Pataki.
Sen. Johnny Isakson is looking a mite vulnerable as the 2010 election season begins, according a Research 2000 poll for the Daily Kos that shows possible challengers close on his heels.
The Georgia Republican was paired against several possible Senate contenders, including former Democratic Gov. Roy Barnes and Democratic Rep. Jim Marshall. According to the poll of registered voters conducted April 27-29, Isakson would pull 47 percent of the vote against Barnes' 43 percent if the election were held this week, while doing better against Marshall, 48 percent to 40 percent.
The poll also found Isakson's "favorable" ratings to be about 47 percent.
President Obama's high approval ratings seem to cut across denominational lines.
Eighty-five percent of Muslims, 79 percent of Jews and 67 percent of Catholics give the president favorable approval ratings, according to Gallup Poll daily tracking results released Friday.
Obama's performance in office was rated favorably by 73 percent of people who described themselves as nonreligious, which includes atheists and agnostics. Fifty-eight percent of protestants rated him favorably, as did a plurality of Mormons -- 45 percent.
The results are based on a sample size of 99,494 adults surveyed between Jan. 21 and April 29. The margin of error is plus or minus 0.5 percentage points.