New Polls 07.01.08: FL, NC, NY, LA, National

Posted by Ashish on 07.01.2008

New Florida poll shows Obama ahead while North Carolina remains close...

We have a lot of new polls today...

-- In Florida, polls continue to be all over the place. Today, Public Policy has Obama ahead of McCain 46% to 44%. Public Policy's last poll of Florida back in March had McCain ahead by 11%, so this is a notable swing. Florida is turning into a real head scratcher. Just yesterday, we had Rasmussen showing a 7% led for McCain in Florida. We've now have pollsters split on the state. Some show an Obama lead, some show a McCain lead. The main reason for the differing view has to do with party ID and turnout. If Obama can get all the people who are now saying they are Democrats to turn out and vote, he will probably not only win Florida, but win the election in a landslide. If many of them don't show up, the election will be much closer. One thing that we can say is that Obama is doing better in Florida than expected. Most figured Florida would be somewhat safe for McCain, and that is clearly not the case as the RealClearPolitics average of Florida polls has McCain only up 0.3%. It's also worth noting that since the Democratic primary has ended, four pollsters have done polls of Florida and only one (Rasmussen) has shown a McCain lead while the other three (Quinnipac, ARG, Public Policy) have shown Obama leads.

-- In North Carolina, Public Policy has McCain holding on to a slight lead over Obama, 45% to 41%. Obama is keeping the state close but has yet to lead in any poll. The reason that this state could flip though is that in this poll, Obama is only down by 4% despite getting just 67% of Democrats. If that number goes up to around 80%, which is where it should land, suddenly the state is a dead heat because McCain is already getting 83% of Republicans so he doesn't have too much room to grow. Interestingly enough, the poll does have Bob Barr getting 5%.

-- In New York, SurveyUSA has Obama leading comfortably over McCain, 57% to 37%. New York is obviously not going to be close. The poll did test VP picks and Michael Bloomberg polled as the strongest pick for BOTH Obama and McCain.

-- In Louisiana, Southern Media has McCain up comfortably over Obama, 52% to 36%. I thought Louisiana might be a bit closer, but that doesn't appear to be the case at this point. It's safe to say that beyond Virginia, Obama is going to have an uphill battle in the South.

- And CNN has new national numbers showing Obama ahead of McCain 50% to 45%.