State of the Race: New Jersey Governor (8/19/09)

Yeah, it has been a while -- almost a month in fact -- since the last polling update in the New Jersey gubernatorial race. I moved. What can I say? Anyway, here are the polls we've yet to incorporate:

New Jersey Gubernatorial Polls (July 31-Aug. 18)
Poll	Date	Corzine	Christie	Daggett	Undecided
Democracy Corps [pdf]	Aug. 11-12, 2009	35	40	10	15
Quinnipiac	Aug. 5-9, 2009	40	46	7	6
Daily Kos/Research 2000	Aug. 3-5, 2009	40	48	--	9
Rasmussen	Aug. 4, 2009	37	50	--	8
Monmouth/Gannett [pdf]	July 29-Aug. 2, 2009	36	50	4	8
Public Policy Polling [pdf]	July 24-27, 2009	36	50	--	14

Before I get into the specifics, let me make a note on the inclusion of one poll (Democracy Corps) and the exclusion of another (Global Strategy Group). I'll admit, I wrestled over including the Democracy Corps poll, but ultimately fell back on what I did regarding the polling outfit during the presidential campaign. I included them. Again, I'm cognizant of the fact that what were dealing with here is an organization that leans left, but I draw the line between partisan leaning and partisan aligned in these cases. FHQ would not, for instance, use the numbers from a Republican Governors Association poll, but we are in the habit of accepting the numbers from right leaning Strategic Vision. The same is true in this case. The Democracy Corps numbers are included while the New Jersey Democratic Assembly sanctioned Global Strategy Group poll is not.

And yet, despite its inclusion, the Democracy Corps poll is not putting Corzine in the lead, or even closing the gap substantially with Christie.

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Over nearly a month's time, then, Corzine has remained stationary while Chris Christie has dropped less than half a point. And most of the latter's drop is attributable to the most recent poll, which it is safe to say is an outlier given the state of most of the other polls. Corzine has gotten more aggressive in terms of pushing the Bush/Christie link of late and that will have to stick to some significant degree for the incumbent to pull Christie back down to earth. I will say this: If Corzine can string together a series of good polls, it will be much easier for the media to take up the "comeback" story (as something different in the race) and for the race to fall into line with "this is the Democrats coming home to Corzine" pattern we've all been primed to expect. Of course the competing storyline is that this race and the Virginia race are harbingers of a Republican resurgence at the national level. Virginia will have something to say about that, but FHQ will have more on the state of the race in the commonwealth tomorrow.

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The trendlines above aren't terribly exciting, so I may try and add in the actual polling fluctuations along with the FHQ average trendline to provide a more informative picture of the progress. Be on the lookout for that in the next update.


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State of the Race: New Jersey Governor (7/31/09)

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Let's play some catch up on the 2009 governors races. First, New Jersey. On Tuesday, Public Policy Polling released its first batch of new numbers for the race in the Garden state since late June and not much has changed.

...for Chris Christie.

The Republican held steady around the 50% mark in both the June and July iterations of the poll, but incumbent governor, Jon Corzine, dipped from what had been his high water mark in the June poll (41%) all the way back to 36% in July. And no, PPP doesn't ask a question with independent Chris Daggett included. In other words, this is Corzine's position before Daggett is even considered.

The relevant data:

Chris Christie: 50%
Jon Corzine: 36%
Undecided: 14%

Margin of error: +/- 4.2 points
Sample: 552 registered voters
Conducted: July 24-27, 2009

A few notes:
1) PPP is seemingly the only polling outfit still using a sample of registered, and not likely, voters in this race. I don't think that Corzine would have gained all that much on Christie if likely voters had been sampled, but there could have been some differences. If anything, though, the spread in the poll likely would increased in a likely voter sample given the state of the race.

2) Another thing to eye here is that the sample size from PPP's June poll (1094 registered voters) was cut in half in this poll. Again, this isn't a killer for the poll, but it is a noticeable difference from the June poll that could explain some of the changes witnessed.

3) The 1977 Brendan Byrne comparison may be dead. The position the former Democratic governor was in 1977 was more advantageous than Corzine's now (among registered voters). With less than 100 days left in the race, it is incumbent (no pun intended) upon Corzine to mount some sort of charge. As it is now, he's headed in the wrong direction.

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State of the Race: New Jersey Governor (7/22/09)

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This morning, Strategic Vision released the numbers from a survey of New Jersey. For Chris Christie, the results of the gubernatorial trial heat are another feather in the Republican's cap. But for Jon Corzine, they offer yet another ominous sign.

Christie: 53%
Corzine: 38%
Daggett (I): 5%
Undecided: 4%

Margin of Error: +/- 3 points
Sample: 800 likely voters
Conducted: July 17-19, 2009

Sadly, there are no attendant crosstabs, so digging down can only go so far. However, here are a few thoughts. This is the first poll since independent candidate, Chris Daggett was added to the questioning that Christie has cleared the 50% barrier. In fact, the Republican has not topped that mark since the calendars were flipped to July. To break through, then, and hit the highest point he has had throughout all the polling conducted on this particular match up since the beginning of the year is telling for Chris Christie. Of course, the flip side of this result is that, at 4%, the undecideds are at their lowest level of any poll as well.

But those sorts of fluctuations are why FHQ applies its weighted average to the polling results. Christie did jump (over a point) in the average to extend his lead over the incumbent Democrat to nearly ten points. [And incidentally, the undecideds are sitting right around the 11% mark when averaged. Sure, but doesn't that include the data from polls where the undecideds were over 20 points back in the earlier part of the year? Yes, but the graduated weighted scheme takes care of that. For transparency's sake, however, if we look at just the polls conducted since the New Jersey primary on June 2, that number drops to about 8.5%. In other words, still above the 4% we see in this current Strategic Vision poll.] If we look at just the polling done since Christie's primary victory, the Republicans advantage grows to just 10.5 points.

Christie, then, is ahead and comfortably so at that. But what about Corzine? The thing that is most troubling for the incumbent is that he is seemingly stuck in a rut. There has really been no movement in his numbers -- good or bad. The governor has settled into the 37-41% range and hasn't really budged. That tempts me to stop making comparisons between this race and the Brendan Byrne comeback victory in the 1977 gubernatorial election. At a similar point in that race Byrne, trailed his Republican opponent (Raymond Bateman) 53-36 among likely voters. Eerily similar, right? Yes, and even though there was only scant polling in that 1977 race prior to that point in July, the fact that Corzine has basically not moved all year -- other than his March swoon -- is troubling to say the least. It is still relatively early in this race (most voters may not be paying attention yet), but not as early as it once was.

Just to throw another number out there, Obama's approval in New Jersey in this poll was right at 50%.

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State of the Race: New Jersey Governor (7/16/09)

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On the day President Obama is to arrive in New Jersey to appear at a Corzine rally, the incumbent Democrat continues to lag almost ten points behind Chris Christie based on a new Monmouth poll [pdf]. Jon Corzine trails his Republican counterpart by a count of 45-37 (with independent candidate, Chris Daggett, polling at about 4%), but will an Obama visit help or is Corzine too far gone? The polling has been consistent in this race recently, thus the relative stability of FHQ's graduated weighted average. However, despite all this July evidence, there is at least some hope in this poll that Cozine can mount some modicum of a comeback.

Monmouth was at least kind enough to score respondents' answer on a 7 point scale similar to that of the traditional party identification measure. And that provides us with some measure of who remains persuadable as summer inches toward fall. Among those who named a candidate and are strongly behind their choice, Christie led in this poll 29-25, leaving 46% as either undecided or weak/leaning toward one of the candidates. When and if that particular number begins to drop, keep an eye on Corzine's numbers. If the incumbent is not gaining ground then, he's in for a long autumn.

*As was the case in the Quinnipiac poll two days ago, Christie is pulling in an above average share of the minority vote. The Q poll showed him at 29% among African Americans while this Monmouth poll has the Republican just under the one-quarter mark (24%) among African Americans and Hispanic combined. On the surface that makes it look as if many of those Democrats who are undecided or for Christie at this point are minority voters. And those might be two groups among which the president could help Governor Corzine.

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State of the Race: New Jersey Governor (7/14/09)

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Quinnipiac has a new poll out in the New Jersey governors race, and like the recent Rasmussen poll offers some choices. Instead of a leaners/without leaners distinction, though, Quinnipiac provides us with both a two-person and three-person race perspective. Coincidentally, the two-way race with independent candidate, Chris Daggett, excluded, looks an awful lot like the "with leaners" version of the Rasmussen poll last week. [Both polls show a 53-41 advantage for Christie.] With Daggett included, Christie's and Corzine's numbers trail off a bit. Christie maintains a fairly significant advantage either way, but with Daggett in the picture, the Republican's advantage is 47-38 over the incumbent Democrat. [Daggett comes in at 8%.]

A few of notes:
1) FHQ's policy has always been to include the polls that account for third party candidates when available. The third party candidate is in the race, after all, and as such, the version with said candidate included is theoretically the more accurate depiction of reality. [Yeah, we could probably debate that logic.] We employed the same methodology in last year's electoral college updates as well.

2) That said, Daggett's share of the "vote" in this survey strikes me as a touch high. In other polls since the beginning of 2009, "someone else"/generic "other" candidate (other than Corzine or Christie) has never exceeded 6%. That's a poor comparison, but Daggett has yet to be included in any Quinnipiac poll prior to this just-released survey.

3) Just for the sake of transparency, if the numbers from the two-way race were used, the same 47.2-38.2 spread from the last New Jersey update would have been maintained (as opposed to the drop you see both above and below in the graph).

The major take-home message from this poll is that, the independent polls in this race are not showing the same things Corzine's internal polling seems to be indicating. Christie may be back under the 50% mark (a level the Republican exceeded for much of June after his primary victory), but Corzine does not seem to be breaking that 40% barrier anymore either. Just after the June 2 primary, FHQ got in its time machine and took a trip back to the two most recent instances of incumbent Democrats seeking re-election in New Jersey. Of those two instances, Corzine's current position is still closer to Byrne's (1977) than Florio's (1993) simply because Corzine, like Byrne, is trailing by double digits in July. Whether Corzine can repeat the Byrne comeback is yet to be seen. The climb is an steep one, but not an unmanageable one.

NOTE: The Quinnipiac poll also did not have a question about how firm respondents were in their current choices or the likelihood they would switch candidates between now and November. That was the one silver lining for Corzine in the Rasmussen poll last week.

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State of the Race: New Jersey Governor (7/9/09)

Just over a week since the last update, there is little perceptible movement in the New Jersey governor's race. Republican Chris Christie still maintains a nearly ten point lead over incumbent, Jon Corzine, but the latest poll from Rasmussen on the race adds a twist. Yes, Rasmussen is back with the leaners/without leaners distinction the polling outfit used during the mid- to late summer last year during the presidential race (Read more here and here). The goal of the leaner distinction is to provide a glimpse into a race if some of the undecideds were categorized as for one candidate or another. In the New Jersey race, the leaners had Christie ahead 53-41, which isn't that out of line with where the polling the race has been. That places the Republican slightly higher than he has been in any other poll, but, again, it doesn't stray that far from where he's been.

With the leaners numbers excluded, Corzine hovers around that 40% mark, but Christie drops to 46%. Rasmussen calls the five point drop from its previous poll of the race an end to Christie's post-primary bounce. That may be the case, but the without leaners numbers basically mirror FHQ's graduated weighted average in the race. In other words, Christie is ahead, but Corzine is still within striking distance; especially with so many respondents in this poll either undecided or open to the idea of switching candidates between now and November.

Before I close, let me add one more note on these Rasmussen polls. FHQ's policy is to use the without leaners data in our updates, but to also mention how the averages would be affected had the leaners been "pushed" into one or the other candidate's categories. For this poll, Christie would have gained a few tenths of a percentage point and Corzine would have inched up even less (47.8-38.3).


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State of the Race: New Jersey Governor (7/1/09)

What is this? A presidential race? Another day brings another new poll in the New Jersey gubernatorial race. There's no real news here other than the fact that Chris Christie is below the 50% mark against Jon Corzine for the first time since his Republican primary victory on June 2. But I'm not reading too much into that. For one thing, Fairleigh Dickinson, if you look across the full list of polls conducted in this race since the first of the year, has been an outlier in terms of the number of undecideds that are revealed in each poll. There's no reason to doubt the FDU results, but it is clear that both Christie's numbers in this poll and the undecided proportion of the responses are different from what we've witnessed in the most recent polling of the race in the Garden state. Oddly enough, Corzine's numbers are fairly close to where they have been in other polls.

Does that mean Christie is being undervalued or that there is some evidence of the "Democrats and independents will come home to Corzine in November" hypothesis in this undecided figure? I'd have to say the former. FDU's final poll of the presidential race in New Jersey last year had Obama up 18 points with about a week to go (which wasn't too far off), but with 10% still undecided. That's a pretty substantial number of undecideds that late in any presidential race, much less 2008 (in a blue state). No other polling organization covering the New Jersey race (other than Strategic Vision) had anything approaching that high a number that late in the contest.

In other words, despite the low total in this most recent poll from Fairleigh Dickinson, Chris Christie is likely still at or above that magic 50% mark. And just for the sake of comparison, the Republican challenger's weighted average only dropped by two tenths of a point from yesterday's update.



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State of the Race: New Jersey Governor (6/30/09)

Status quo.

That's all you can really say. As June closes on the New Jersey race for governor, the best you can do to sum things up is to say that Chris Christie won the month. The Republican candidate for governor led in all four post-(June 3)primary polls and cleared the 50% barrier in each of them. If Christie maintains that level of support throughout the summer, it won't matter if Corzine gains the support of all the undecideds down, the incumbent governor will still come up short in his bid for re-election. Of course, there's a long way to go and the campaign has yet to heat up (as it will in the fall). And the Democratic National Committee has entered the fray by trying to repackage the "McCain has a short fuse" narrative for New Jersey voters with Christie as the principal. That's clever, sure, and it is certainly better coming from the DNC than from Corzine at this point, but countering the "Corzine's to blame for the state of things in New Jersey" will be a tough proposition.

Long story short, though, how does the new poll from Public Policy Polling (pdf) affect FHQ's graduated weighted average for the race? As was mentioned already, Christie is still hovering over the 50% barrier in polling, but lost in that is the fact that Corzine is at his highest level of support in any head-to-head poll (against Christie) for all of 2009. It is a high water mark for Corzine, but the governor continues to trail his challenger by about ten points. In other words, Corzine is rising (ever so slightly), but that gain is coming from undecideds and not at the expense of Christie. Again, that won't be a means to an end here. Corzine won't win this race if all he's doing is securing undecideds while taking nothing away from Christie. There is no evidence to suggest that Corzine is pulling in undecideds at any great clip -- it could just be statistical noise between polls at this point. If, though (and this is a big if), Corzine were able to make substantial gains among those undecideds (something that likely will not happen until the fall), then that closing polling margin may put pressure on the "weaker" Christie supporters (I'll define that as independents for the moment.) to rethink things.

That, as I said though, is a big if. Where things stand entering July is that Christie maintains a substantial lead in a potentially anti-incumbent race and that Corzine's chances may hinge on making the race about Christie and not himself. That's easier said than done, though.


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State of the Race: New Jersey Governor (6/25/09)

It has been a couple of weeks, and things still don't really look any different in the race for New Jersey governor. Jon Corzine still trails Chris Christie by nearly ten points in FHQ's graduated weighted average of the race even after a new Strategic Vision poll was released last night. And while that isn't necessarily a death knell for the incumbent Democrat, the fact that all three post-primary polls have had Christie above the 50% mark does not bode well for Corzine. Of course, conventional wisdom continues to tell us that Democrats and some independents will come home to roost in time for the November election. Time will tell. [Recall that the state silhouette above gets bluer/redder depending upon how the average fluctuates. With no decided change since the original version, the color stays as red as it was two weeks ago.]

In the meantime, here is a graphic that ties together the first two iterations of the averaging on this race's polling. As was the case in the Virginia version, this one will look better once we have more polls come out. You have to start somewhere though. Unlike the Virginia example, undecideds in New Jersey are actually following the pattern we'd expect: decreasing as the election draws closer. But we have more polls in the New Jersey race than for Virginia's.



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State of the Race: New Jersey Governor (6/11/09)

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Now that the general election showdown is set in the New Jersey governor's race, the time has arrived to dust off the ol' graduated weighted average of electoral college fame and apply it to the 2009 elections. The ground rules are the same as they were last year during the presidential election: recent polls are given full weight while past polls are given a progressively smaller weight. You can get a better ideas of the calculations here.

That said, FHQ should probably add a few caveats.

First, the map of New Jersey above is scaled on a red-blue gradient. The greater an advantage Chris Christie has, the redder the map will become. With a nearly ten point edge, that map is fairly red. Should the race tighten, the map will trend purple before becoming bluer in the event that Corzine is able to mount a comeback.

Also, we should note which polls are being considered. Our first inclination was to simply use the polls released since the primary phase was completed. However, given that Christie had been the frontrunner in the GOP race and polling ahead of the governor for most of 2009, it may be more instructive to include some of the past polls. For now we've included any poll conducted and released in 2009. That provides us with seventeen polls instead of the two we would have if we took just the post-primary polls. As such Christie's lead is a shade under ten points. [Incidentally, if FHQ were to have used just the two most recent polls, Christie's advantage would have stretched to 50.5% - 39.0%. It isn't, then, an inconsequential move to include the other polls. However, the extra information from the other polls allows us to control for any poll to poll fluctuations that may not reflect the true nature of the race.]

Finally, both races in New Jersey and Virginia (coming soon) will be updated when new polling becomes available. If 2005 polling is indicative, updates will be sporadic through the rest of the summer and pick up in September and October. I would also expect Virginia polling to increase in frequency this time around.

*The aggregation of polling comes to FHQ via the good folks at Pollster.com.

Also, if you haven't already checked, the final, unofficial results from Tuesday's Democratic primary in Virginia are now up. The link is just below in "Recent Posts."


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