Third Party Candidate Makes Cuomo/Astorino Race As Close As 13 Points

No wonder Cuomo and his henchmen are trying to talk WFP leaders into endorsing him and not, say, Howie Hawkins (or putting some other third party candidate on their ballot line):

ALBANY— Gov. Cuomo’s huge lead over Republican challenger Rob Astorino would drop to 13 percentage points if the Working Families Party puts up its own candidate in the governor’s race, a polls shows.

A Quinnipiac University survey to be released Wednesday has Cuomo ahead of Astorino, 57 percent to 28 percent.

But if the ultra-liberal third party decides not to give the governor its ballot line and runs someone else, Cuomo’s lead would shrink to 37 percent to 24 percent, with the hypothetical WFP contender grabbing 22 percent.

Some officials of the WFP are upset with Cuomo for not adopting their entire “progressive” agenda, which includes public financing for all statewide campaigns.
 
The WFP is scheduled to pick its candidate at a May 31 nominating convention.

The Daily News covered this poll too, but gave it a more Cuomo-friendly frame than the Post - a third party candidate would take a chunk out of Cuomo's lead but the governor would still be "poised" to win.

That's true - but you can bet a win with under 50% of the vote is not what Andy is dreaming about for this November.

That won't set him up too well for a 2016 presidential bid if he wins re-election with less than 50% of the vote.

Now the truth is, I don't believe that WFP is going to run a third party candidate and even if they did, I have a difficult time seeing that candidate grab 22% of the vote in the election.

People will talk smack about a candidate from their party that they think isn't sufficiently emblematic of that party, but when push comes to shove during a campaign, they often come back home and vote for that candidate anyway.

Barack Obama is a perfect example of that.

Lots of teachers and liberals complained about Obama during the first term, especially for Race to the Top, but in the end, when faced with the election against Mitt Romney, they got scared and voted Obama anyway.

In the end, I don't think the WFP is going to nominate anybody but Cuomo - the leadership is already set to do just that.

So I have a feeling that Cuomo has a little less to worry about than you might think from these polls showing a WFP candidate taking 22% from him and making his election closer than a two-man race would be.

Still, it is a sign of dissatisfaction with Cuomo and it is something that he will worry about going into a 2016 White House bid.

And he should - truth is, he has the rep among liberal activists for being a very conservative anti-union, pro-Wall Street politician and that's not the kind of rep that is going to help him win Democratic presidential primaries.