Take that, Martin Heinrich: Less than three weeks after the Democratic 1st Congressional District candidate released a poll showing him leading Republican opponent Darren White by three points, White has his own poll showing him in command with a six-point lead.
The new poll, conducted by the Republican firm Public Opinion Strategies for the White campaign, has White leading 47 percent to 41 percent. The survey of 500 likely voters was conducted Tuesday and Wednesday and has a margin of error of 4.4 percent. The question that was asked of voters is not included in the polling memo, which you can read by clicking here.
“Democrats may find they have to salivate over this seat a while longer. A well-known and very popular county sheriff, Darren White is poised to keep this seat in GOP hands,” the memo states.
Though the poll doesn’t claim a huge lead for White, he is in a strong position, according to the polling memo, because he hasn’t spent any money on advertising to date, while Heinrich spent hundreds of thousands of dollars in the primary. White had 78 percent name recognition and was viewed favorably by 48 percent of those surveyed, while Heinrich’s name recognition was 65 percent and he was viewed favorably by 29 percent.
White is even viewed more favorably than Heinrich among members of Heinrich’s party, according to the White poll: Some 46 percent of Democrats said they viewed White favorably, while 35 percent said they viewed Heinrich favorably.
In early July, the Heinrich campaign released its own internal poll that showed him leading White 47 percent to 44 percent. That poll, conducted by the left-leaning Greenberg Quinlan Rosner Research, surveyed 518 likely voters, was conducted June 29 to July 2 and had a margin of error of 4.4 percentage points, so Heinrich’s lead was within the margin of error.
The only other publicly released poll of the race came in October, when a poll conducted for the White campaign had White leading Heinrich in what was then a theoretical match-up by 18 points, 51 percent to 33 percent. That poll, also conducted by Public Opinion Strategies, surveyed 400 likely voters, was conducted Oct. 8 and 9 and had a margin of error of 4.9 percent.
There has been no independent polling of the race between Heinrich and White.
Update, 4:25 p.m.
Rachel Wolin, Heinrich’s communications director, had this to say:
“What I find interesting is that three weeks ago Darren White and the NRCC were touting a poll that put White up 18 points above Martin Heinrich,” she said. “Now, they’re releasing a poll that only shows a six-point lead. What happened to that 12 percent of likely voters? Seems like they have no confidence in Darren White and his candidacy.”