Polls: Governor, Senate races neck and neck

[OC Register]

September 13th, 2010, 11:07 am
posted by Martin Wisckol, Politics reporter



California’s governor and U.S. Senate races are both a virtual tie, according to the latest CNN-Time poll as well as the polling trends aggregated by RealClearPolitics.com.

The CNN poll conducted Sept. 2-7 showed Republican Meg Whitman with a 48 percent to 46 percent lead over Democrat Jerry Brown. That’s within in the +/- 3.5 percent margin of error, but continues the general trend showing the two in a dead heat for the past two months, as charted by RealClearPolitics.

Recent polls by Rasmussen and Survey USA showed Whitman up by 3- and 7-percentage points respectively. While those two polls are sometimes criticized for leaning GOP, the CNN poll supports the idea the thinking that the race is deadlocked or that Whitman has a bare lead. However, Brown just began advertising last week and actively campaign the previous week, so we’ll see if that helps his numbers in upcoming polls.Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-California, barely led Republican challenger Carly Fiorina in the CNN poll, 48-44. This reflects the RealClearPolitics chart showing Fiorina closing slowly but steadily.