Democrat Bill de Blasio leads Republican Joe Lhota among likely voters by 43 percentage points in the nascent general-election race for New York City mayor, an enormous starting advantage for Democrats who are seeking to recapture City Hall for the first time in 20 years, a Wall Street Journal-NBC 4 New York-Marist poll released Tuesday showed.
Mr. de Blasio, the city's public advocate, is outpacing Mr. Lhota, a former deputy mayor in Rudy Giuliani's administration, 65% to 22% among likely voters, including those who are undecided but leaning toward a candidate. Adolfo Carrion, a former Bronx borough president who is running on the Independence Party line, is trailing with 3%.
The poll found 9% are undecided and 1% support another candidate. Among those voters with a candidate preference, 54% said they strongly support their choice and 13% said they might vote differently.
Ariel Edwards Levy notes the following:
Same as QPac from January-April http://t.co/hGnE9EMN7g RT @ForecasterEnten: de Blasio 65 , Lhota 22... And the long good night.
— Ariel Edwards-Levy (@aedwardslevy) September 17, 2013
In a June Marist poll, de Blasio was beating Lhota 52%-14%.
Lhota has his work cut out for him.
The WSJ article says he needs a "game change":
"It's a very lopsided contest at this point," said Lee Miringoff, director of the Marist College Institute for Public Opinion. "Coming out of the starting blocks, it is playing de Blasio's way in a big way."
In the coming weeks, Mr. Lhota needs a "game change" to have a chance at beating Mr. de Blasio, Mr. Miringoff said. "He may close the gap," he said, "but right now this is not competitive."
Bloomberg, of course, needed a "game change" in 2001 as well in order to win his race.
On September 11, he got that "game change."
God knows, we don't need that kind of "game change" again.
But I put that out there just to remind you that a 43 percentage point lead in September, mirroring a similar 43 percentage point lead in another poll taken back January-April, does not mean the race is over.
Lots will happen before the election.
Lots more can happen.
But it's a good sign early on that Lhota has to fight some serious headwinds.
Why is Lhota meeting with Al Sharpton? According to a short item in the Daily News today by Celeste Katz--they are meeting tonight in Harlem at Sharpton's House of Justice.
ReplyDeleteThis makes me nervous. what's Rev. Al up to?
You don't think the Reverand Al, who used to ride around in a limo with Joel Klein and Newt Gingrich to tout education reform, would sell out to Lhota, do you?
DeleteYou bet he would.
But I doubt he will, because Lhota's numbers are very, very bad.
Al likes to ride a winning horse as much as anybody outside of the UFT does.
If Lhota's numbers get better, that's when I'd worry about the Rev Al and Joe Lhota.