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Hynes does better than Quinn vs. Republicans, but Ryan wasn’t tested

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* As I told subscribers this morning, Rasmussen has a new poll pitting the two Democratic gubernatorial candidates against three different Republicans. Dan Hynes does better than Pat Quinn against the Republicans. The problem, though, is that for whatever reason Rasmussen didn’t test Jim Ryan against the Democrats. Bizarre.

From the narrative

The top two Democratic hopefuls in Illinois’ 2010 race for governor both beat three leading Republican challengers in the latest Rasmussen Reports telephone survey of likely voters in the state.

But state Comptroller Daniel Hynes, who hopes to wrest the Democratic nomination from Governor Pat Quinn, runs slightly stronger against all three Republicans. Among just Democratic voters, Hynes draws slightly more support than Quinn.

That’s pretty interesting considering that Hynes is losing so badly to Quinn in the Tribune’s primary poll.

More

Quinn, who became governor in January following the impeachment of Rod Blagojevich, beats former state Republican Party Chairman Andy McKenna 41% to 33%. Hynes bests McKenna by even more, 43% to 30%.

Against GOP State Senator Kirk Dillard, Quinn wins 41% to 30%. But Hyines takes Dillard 42% to 29%.

State Senator Bill Brady, who unsuccessfully sought the GOP gubernatorial nomination in 2006, fares the worst of the three Republicans. He loses to Quinn by 15 points – 45% to 30% - and to Hynes by 19 – 46% to 27%.

Around 20% of voters remain undecided in all of Hynes’ match-ups, with slightly fewer saying the same when Quinn is the Democrat in the race. […]

Quinn is viewed favorably by 52% and unfavorably by 44%. Just five percent (5%) have no opinion of the incumbent governor. Fifty-two percent (52%) also have a favorable view of Hynes, while 30% regard him unfavorably. But 18% don’t know enough about him to venture even a soft favorable or unfavorable opinion.

McKenna has the highest favorables (42%) among the GOP candidates, while 34% view him unfavorably. Thirty-eight percent (38%) have a favorable opinion of Dillard, with another 36% who see him unfavorably. Brady is regarded favorably by 36% and unfavorably by 37%.

But roughly one-in-four Illinois voters don’t know any of the Republican contenders well enough to express an opinion of them.

Toplines are here.

Crosstabs (subscribers only) are here.

From the crosstabs, here are the Quinn-McKenna party support numbers…

And here are the Hynes-McKenna party support numbers…

Methodology

Illinois Survey of 500 Likely Voters Conducted December 14, 2009 By Rasmussen Reports. Margin of Sampling Error, +/- 4.5 percentage points with a 95% level of confidence

* Meanwhile, a Dan Hynes spokesman claims that yesterday’s endorsement of Quinn by Secretary of State Jesse White looks like it was held back in order to spring at the most opportune moment

[Hynes spokesman Dan McDonald] said the governor wants to change the subject as questions arise about an unpublicized early release program for state prisoners. He charged that Quinn has flip-flopped on his knowledge of the program and let criminals off easy.

Earlier this week, Quinn ordered a “top-to-bottom” review of the release program, but said it was a Department of Corrections issue.

Since then, the Hynes campaign has continued to raise questions about it, first in connection with a plan to bring Guantanamo detainees to Illinois and now in light of the timing of White’s endorsement.

“I think it says that the governor doesn’t want to talk about his convoluted policies,” McDonald said. “He’d rather try to roll out an endorsement than answer questions.”

And Quinn’s campaign has a new video of the White endorsement. Watch it


* Related…

* Topinka stages political comeback

* 2 congressmen weigh in on Cook County Board president race

* Daley, Preckwinkle at same event

* Anti-Semite booted from ballot in 10th District race

* Congresswoman Melissa Bean Says Imposters Posing As Her on Facebook

* Republicans endorse candidate in 5th District

* Three GOP lt. governor candidates resigned to Gitmo move

* Congress can stop plans for prison, GOP rep says

* Madigan: Quinn has authority to close Thomson deal

* Illinois attorney general rules Gov. Pat Quinn can sell Thomson prison

* Attorney general says governor may sell prison

* Click here to read the attorney general’s legal opinion on the Thomson prison sale

posted by Rich Miller
Friday, Dec 18, 09 @ 10:49 am

Comments

  1. These polls are not a surprise. Quinn has Blago baggage and Hynes does not. Quinn is a gadfly, and Hynes is not. Quinn has done almost nothing after a year in office, and doesn’t deserve the nomination. Of course, Hynes does better than Quinn against Republicans.

    But is anyone listening? Not so far. That White endorsement is a Hynes killer because White could beat either Hynes of Quinn if he wanted the nomination.

    As to the Republicans, it just doesn’t look good at all.

    Comment by VanillaMan Friday, Dec 18, 09 @ 11:09 am

  2. Solid video by Quinn’s campaign. That guy really needs a raise.

    Comment by Bring Back Boone's Friday, Dec 18, 09 @ 11:13 am

  3. The Hynes’ numbers confirm what I suspected, he’d be the stronger candidate in the general. On the other hand, since Ryan wasn’t included, I’m not sure this poll is terribly reliable.

    Rich, any idea why Ryan, who is leading in the Tribune poll, wasn’t included? Seems like either a major screw-up or Rasmussen knows something we don’t know…

    Comment by 47th Ward Friday, Dec 18, 09 @ 11:17 am

  4. I hesistated before watching the Jesse White video, but relented and decided to watch.

    Admittedly it was good, but can Jesse or anyone explain why Quinn fumbled so badly handling the budget knowing full well what was at stake? And, by at stake, I don’t mean his political career?

    I keep hearing his supporters suggest that Quinn is the person to “lead” out of the budget mess. Ok, but he had the opportunity earlier this year to do it and didn’t. Why? Why didn’t he?

    I don’t want to hear about how he was scared of Lisa Madigan because that was the excuse earlier this year when Quinn was messing up. He had a job to do and lisa madigan’s political career ambitions should have been inconsequential to Quinn. At that point and all year long, his focus should have been on the 12 million + people in Illinois, and their interest.

    Comment by Will County Woman Friday, Dec 18, 09 @ 11:26 am

  5. Jesse White didn’t have to endorse Quinn. He’s untouchable, no matter who’s the governor. Just old-school loyalty to an incumbent?

    Comment by wordslinger Friday, Dec 18, 09 @ 11:31 am

  6. Any claim that Hynes is polling better against the Rep. candidates doesn’t hold up to any kind of analysis.

    Hynes and Quinn are within 2 points of each other on individual support in each matchup (well within the 4.5% margin of error), and within 4 points of each other on total margin of victory, still within the margin of error.

    They are basically polling the same numbers against the GOP candidates.

    Comment by dave Friday, Dec 18, 09 @ 11:32 am

  7. On this one 47, I agree. I also think this prison thing is potentially hugely fertile ground for Hynes. The script for the tv ads pretty much write themselves. Don’t know if Hynes will have any money left come the end of the year.

    Rich, did you ask Rasmussen why they didn’t include the front runner in their poll?

    Comment by Chicago Cynic Friday, Dec 18, 09 @ 11:33 am

  8. ===Just old-school loyalty to an incumbent?===

    More like old-school retaliation for the 1998 primary.

    Comment by Rich Miller Friday, Dec 18, 09 @ 11:34 am

  9. Dave,

    No, they’re not. MOE is a fine way to discount a poll except when the results are so consistent. Hynes consistently does better than Quinn against the Rs. That’s just the fact and it’s not surprising. More people know Pat and he’s an easier target. Doesn’t mean he won’t win.

    Comment by Chicago Cynic Friday, Dec 18, 09 @ 11:36 am

  10. Adam Andrzejewski is the best Republican candidate -especially to beat the democrats because of his unique background and real impressive platform…

    Comment by Jerry Vachaparambil Friday, Dec 18, 09 @ 11:41 am

  11. With respect to the poll, I guess unless you subscribe to Rasmussen, you can’t see the results from name id.

    On the stump, Hynes keeps talking about how he was the “only one” to stand up to the budget insanity of the last ten years, but how did he stand up specifically?? Aside from getting in a brief fight with Emil Jones and Blago by not paying for member initiatives (which if I remember correctly, Hynes quickly folded on) and not paying for those flu vaccines, there is not one time when Hynes has ever gone out of his way to stop additional borrowing or to propose big picture budget strategies. I am just curious about when we are talking about big time budget fights aside from the last month, has Hynes ever specifically gone out of his way to make a big time ruckus and propose specific big-time ideas??? Otherwise, it is fair game to say he sat on the sidelines.

    Comment by Irish Eyes Friday, Dec 18, 09 @ 11:41 am

  12. Obviously - It proves what we’ve all said for months. Kirk Dillard is the GOP’s best hope!

    Comment by Smack Down Mc. Friday, Dec 18, 09 @ 11:43 am

  13. Jerry, those sorts of comments are excruciatingly boring and do way more harm to your candidate here than good. Dispense with bumper sticker slogans, please. Thanks.

    Comment by Rich Miller Friday, Dec 18, 09 @ 11:43 am

  14. I agree that Jesse White’s endorsement of Governor Quinn is a blow to Dan Hynes’ campaign. Hynes can only hope that the Governor “opens mouth and inserts foot” significantly between now and February 2 to stand any chance of capturing the nomination.

    Comment by GA Watcher Friday, Dec 18, 09 @ 11:47 am

  15. Hynes consistently does better than Quinn against the Rs.

    Sure… he consistently does better in one poll. And better means by 1 or 2 percentage points of just 500 voters, who are all asked the same questions. Of course it is going to be consistent. If someone answered Hynes of McKenna, they are probably going to answer Hynes over Brady.

    The margin of error is very relevant. Now, if we start seeing multiple polls show the same information, then the margin of error becomes slightly less relevant.

    Again - this poll shows that Quinn and Hynes are essentially polling the same numbers against the GOP candidates.

    Comment by dave Friday, Dec 18, 09 @ 11:58 am

  16. Irish Eyes,

    just playing the devil’s advocate here…do yout think it possible that Hynes was told to back off and down from opposing Blago too vocally/openly by more powerful forces within the democractic party? you could look back and argue that the democrats as whole didn’t reign Blago in as well as they could have (e.g., the supporting him for a second term).

    I get the strong impression that hynes was not a fan of blago and had to suppress a lot of his discontent with blago on fiscal matter, for the good of the (democratic) party.

    Comment by Will County Woman Friday, Dec 18, 09 @ 12:18 pm

  17. Completely worthless results, even before considering Ryan wasn’t included. All the Republicans poll within the margin of error of each other, and that fact alone shows McKenna doesn’t have much of a chance - he’s spent how much money and has better name ID and is still sitting with the rest of the pack?

    While I think he’d be an awful choice for Republicans to nominate this cycle, I suspect, because of the nature of this poll, Jim Ryan would have polled much closer to both Quinn and Hynes. Again, this is all early name ID. And Ryans numbers drop virtually every time there’s a new poll.

    The GOP race is wide open, and whoever wins will raise money a lot of donors are sitting on until the smoke clears. They’ll be on TV and it will be a race. Unless Ryan is dropping out, Rasmussen’s credibility has to take a huge shot by not including Ryan in this poll.

    Comment by Amuzing Myself Friday, Dec 18, 09 @ 12:24 pm

  18. is there much credibility toward how the trib did their poll?
    how did they sample their base?
    as a quinn fan, i am more concerned about rasmussen’s report than the trib’s…
    gov quinn, or even hynes, will beat ryan…

    Comment by quinn fan Friday, Dec 18, 09 @ 12:27 pm

  19. @ WCW

    No. Short answer is No. A few months after Blago was reelected he proclaimed that “Quinn was not a part of my administration.” Those two didn’t really speak for years.

    Comment by Irish Eyes Friday, Dec 18, 09 @ 12:48 pm

  20. I suspect that McKenna spent more of his big bucks to keep Ryan out of the poll. Since November there have been 3 polls that pretty much show the same numbers for the GOP Primary with Ryan having a very comfortable lead over the field. If I recall, one of the polls did November head to heads with Ryan beating Hynes by a few and Quinn beating Ryan by a few. Much better than the rest of the Republicans in the field.

    Comment by Suspect Friday, Dec 18, 09 @ 12:51 pm

  21. Rich,

    Doing ole danny boy’s bidding once again. I love your screaming, hyperbolic and incredibly misleading headline of “Hynes does better than Quinn vs. Republicans”. Nice try Rich, but here are the facts. The the head to head match-ups you cite from Rasmussen are within the margin of error, which means that Quinn is as likely to be ahead of the Republicans as Hynes. Second, everyone in the polling business knows that Rasmussen is a Republican outfit (used exclusively by FOX News)and is notorious for using the narrowest samples possible. That means that their polls typically over emphasize the participation of older, white voters. Maybe that is a good sample for the off-year elections and maybe not. The fact remains that all of your amatuer pundits here don’t have the slightest clue how to read that poll and you are doing everyone a great diservice with your slanted analysis. If anyone thinks that Danny Boy, who trails the Governor by nearly 30 points in current polls, is a stronger general election candidate than I want some of what they are smoking. Happy Holidays boys and girls.

    Comment by Laborguy Friday, Dec 18, 09 @ 1:16 pm

  22. Every poll up to this point shows Quinn doing better than Hynes (including Ryan’s own poll) so this is a little surprising.

    If I were the Quinn campaign I wouldn’t shy away from these numbers. They can spin these to donors and insiders that Dan’s attacks ads are hurting Quinn so we need to unite behind him because Dan has no chance of winning. All Dan can do for the next month is hurt Quinn, he can’t win, so everyone should get behind the Governor to minimize the damage Hynes’ war chest will inflict.

    It will be interesting to see how negative Quinn goes on Dan. Does he want to eviscerate him or just beat him? Dan still has plenty of vulnerabilities that Quinn can hit him on, Hynes has pretty much exhausted all his lines of attack. Quinn can really damage Hynes if wants.

    Comment by Little Lebowski Urban Achiever Friday, Dec 18, 09 @ 1:20 pm

  23. Irish Eyes,

    true. I understand that Quinn and Blago weren’t buddy-buddy, through Quinn did go out of his way to ingratiate himself to Blago during ‘06 election cycle, by praising blago. And, Quinn didn’t need to, which makes it all the more curious as to why he did it anyway.

    Comment by Will County Woman Friday, Dec 18, 09 @ 1:21 pm

  24. I believe in the accuracy of robo-polls (check out how well they did in New Jersey predicting the Corzine loss), but only when they have much higher samples than this one at 500–especially at a time of year when few are paying attention.

    Comment by Middle of the Road Friday, Dec 18, 09 @ 1:23 pm

  25. sorry, i forgot to add, Hynes didn’t praise blago.

    Comment by Will County Woman Friday, Dec 18, 09 @ 1:23 pm

  26. McKenna leads both among Independents, in Quinn’s case by 12 points, but is losing overall by 8-12 points? Either an extremely high number of undecided independents, or an oversampling of Democrats. In either case, the poll doesn’t say much except everyone has similar numbers among their base.

    Comment by Anon Friday, Dec 18, 09 @ 1:33 pm

  27. Hey 47th Ward and VanillaMan,

    If you want to know how to read a poll just drop me a line. I will walk you kids through it.

    Comment by Laborguy Friday, Dec 18, 09 @ 1:39 pm

  28. Ah, the bad old Laborguy is back. Sheesh. Couldn’t help yourself, could you?

    Comment by Rich Miller Friday, Dec 18, 09 @ 1:42 pm

  29. Hey Rich,

    Just trying to keep it real, Brother.
    How about printing some real polling analysis, not this inane drivel?

    Comment by Laborguy Friday, Dec 18, 09 @ 1:48 pm

  30. Rich,

    BTW, you didn’t attempt to counter any of the points I made regarding the Rasmussen poll and your misleading headline. Why is that?

    Comment by Laborguy Friday, Dec 18, 09 @ 1:50 pm

  31. Laborguy, when you accuse someone of shilling for a candidate, don’t expect a response to your alleged points.

    Comment by Rich Miller Friday, Dec 18, 09 @ 1:56 pm

  32. Rich,

    You have no sense of humor and everyone knows you are shilling for Hynes. That is alright though. You are just trying to draw an audience. I’m not saying you are WITH the guy or something. My guess is, there isn’t much to be gained, from a business perspective, in shilling for the Governor.

    Comment by Laborguy Friday, Dec 18, 09 @ 2:00 pm

  33. I have a good sense of humor. Just not about you. Shall we go through this again? Because this time I’m not gonna wait until after the campaign is over to deal with it.

    Comment by Rich Miller Friday, Dec 18, 09 @ 2:10 pm

  34. I dont’ know what you feel you need to “deal with” Rich but it sounds awfully ominous. Mea ulpa, mea culpa. mea culpa. How was that?

    Comment by Laborguy Friday, Dec 18, 09 @ 2:14 pm

  35. Are you gonna block me again becuz you don’t like what I’m saying? That isn’t very sporting of you Rich.

    Comment by Laborguy Friday, Dec 18, 09 @ 2:16 pm

  36. Rich,

    You should come up to Chicago more and hang out. I will take you out for a nice steak dinner and lovely cocktails. Wouldn’t that be nice? We would become the best of friends, I am sure.

    Comment by Laborguy Friday, Dec 18, 09 @ 2:22 pm

  37. The last time we were in a restaurant together we almost had a fist fight. So, I’ll pass.

    Comment by Rich Miller Friday, Dec 18, 09 @ 2:24 pm

  38. Well, Merry Christmas anyway Rich. At least I tried.

    Comment by Laborguy Friday, Dec 18, 09 @ 2:29 pm

  39. With regards to the Cook County Board Race Endorsement by Rep. Davis:
    Rep. Davis never said anything about Dorothy Brown being the best candidate for Cook County, nor her record, nor her platform. This “endorsement” really looses its luster when you see what Don Terry reported for the NYT:

    “Mr. Davis admitted, however, that had any of Ms. Brown’s opponents been leading in the polls, he would have endorsed them instead.”

    Comment by PPP Friday, Dec 18, 09 @ 3:02 pm

  40. ==Hynes has pretty much exhausted all his lines of attack.==

    He hasn’t even started yet, “labor” guy.

    Comment by Bill Friday, Dec 18, 09 @ 3:04 pm

  41. Quinn might win the primary but as Coach Dennis Green once said, I’m not ready to crown his behind…The Tribune poll had Scanlan with a 33% name ID. If there’s a conservative polling outfit out there…It’s more likely to be the trib… Dan Hynes has enough more than enough money to compete against an incumbent Governor who hasn’t the clue about Governing. Is it February already?

    Comment by Slim Shady Friday, Dec 18, 09 @ 3:36 pm

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