Monday, June 16, 2008

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Barack Obama continues to gain ground on John McCain in Virginia, for the first time edging ahead of his Republican opponent for the presidency in a state Democrats are increasingly hopeful of peeling away from the GOP.

The latest Rasmussen Reports telephone survey of Virginia voters finds Obama with a statistically insignificant one-percentage point lead over McCain, 45% to 44%. Five percent (5%) favor a third-party candidate, and 7% are undecided. Last month, with Hillary Clinton still in the race for the Democratic presidential nomination, McCain led Obama 47% to 44%. (See Video)

This marks the fourth time in five polls that the two candidates have been within five points of each other in Virginia, confirming the state’s competitive status. The one exception came in March, at the height of the initial Jeremiah Wright coverage, when McCain was up by eleven points.

McCain has lost ground among both male voters over the past month. He leads Obama among men 49% to 41%, but a month earlier his lead was nearly twice that size (15%). Women voters currently favor Obama 48% to 39%, little changed from a month ago.

The Republican candidate’s lead among unaffiliated voters has vanished. Last month McCain had a 19% lead over Obama among these voters. Now the two candidates are essentially even.

With Mrs. Clinton’s departure from the race, the question remains whether her voters, especially women, will move into Obama’s column. The new survey also shows only a marginal increase for the candidate from state Democrats overall – 76% now as opposed to 75% in May. McCain’s support among Virginia Republicans is at 82%, also up 1% from last month.

Obama has experienced a modest bounce in support nationally since he clinched his party’s nomination two weeks ago. But given his status as the first African-American presidential candidate of a major national political party and the general public dissatisfaction with President Bush and his party, Virginia is one of the traditionally Republican states that Democrats see as trending their way. Democrats have not won in the state since 1964.

Obama is also experiencing an uptick in his favorability ratings—54% of Virginia voters have a favorable opinion of him, up from 51% a month ago. For the second month in a row, 44% of state voters view him unfavorably, but those who rated their view of him as Very Unfavorable is down from 31% in May to 28% now.

McCain is now seen favorably by 59% of Virginia voters and unfavorably by 37%.

Many conservatives nationally have expressed concern about a McCain presidency, but 70% of self-designated conservatives in Virginia back his candidacy, just as 80% of liberals support Obama. Moderates split in Obama’s favor 56% to 30%.

Virginia has cast its thirteen Electoral College votes for the Republicans in 10 consecutive presidential elections dating back to 1968. Rasmussen Markets data currently gives the GOP a % chance of continuing that streak. George W. Bush carried the state by eight percentage points in each of the last two elections. At the time this poll was released, Virginia was ranked as “Leans Republican” in the Rasmussen Reports Balance of Power Calculator.

Economic issues are the number one concern of 38% of Virginia voters, with another nine percent (9%) citing fiscal issues as preeminent; 28% rate national security as most important.

Fifty-three percent (53%) of voters say bringing the troops home from Iraq is more important than winning the war (41%).

For 65%, government has become a special interest group of its own, with 19% opposed. By similar margins, 69% of Virginia voters think government does not represent the will of the people, but 19% think it does. These figures are similar to the national average.

The new survey also finds that in the race for the U.S. Senate Democrat Mark Warner is stretching out his lead over Republican candidate Jim Gilmore. Republicans have many potentially vulnerable Senate seats in Election 2008, but none appears a safer bet to switch parties than Virginia.

Right now only 37% of Virginia voters say Bush is doing a good to excellent job as president, with 48% rating his performance as poor.

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