September 01, 2010 12:19 AM UTC

Rasmussen Gubernatorial Poll Shows Demoralized Partisans, Hick on Top

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• by: Colorado Pols

GOP-leaning pollster Rasmussen Reports’ poll of the Colorado gubernatorial race today:

The latest Rasmussen Reports statewide telephone survey of Likely Voters finds Democrat John Hickenlooper, the mayor of Denver, with 36% support. Republican Dan Maes captures 24% of the vote while Tom Tancredo trails with 14%. Support for both Hickenlooper and Maes is down seven percentage points from two weeks ago while Tancredo’s support is down four points.

Six percent (6%) of Colorado voters prefer some other candidate and twenty percent (20%) are undecided. The undecideds are up fifteen points from earlier in the month.  Twenty-four percent (24%) of Republicans are undecided along with 14% of Democrats and 21% of unaffiliated voters.

The prevalent feeling on this poll in most media is that “all three candidates” have “lost support,” and surficially that’s the case–Rasmussen’s poll two weeks ago had John Hickenlooper at 43%, Dan Maes at 31%, and Tom Tancredo at 18%, a consistent decline obviously more attributable to greater indecision among surveyed voters than it is any one candidate peeling support from another. Maes would really prefer to see those Tancredo supporters moving into his column instead of ‘undecided,’ but it’s reasonable to assume that few of those voters would ever support Hickenlooper. Hick, in turn, could be seeing signs of apathy from his own base in these poll results, as he arguably hasn’t done much to motivate core Democratic voters.

In both cases, you can spot dynamics at work pointing to undermotivated partisans: Hickenlooper’s base Democrats unenthusiastic about his centrist message, and Republicans with very little chance of a successful outcome regardless of who they choose–and who don’t know which way to turn.

But there is one big difference between the three candidates as polled here that you can’t miss or downplay. We’ve come back to it again and again, both in terms of gleaning useful information from early polls, and why Democrats aren’t worried about Hickenlooper in general: apathetic base or no.

Hickenlooper is viewed Very Favorably by 29% of voters in the state and Very Unfavorably by 18%.

For Maes, Very Favorables are 7% and Very Unfavorables are 17%.

Ten percent (10%) have a Very Favorable opinion of Tancredo, but 35% view him Very Unfavorably.

Hickenlooper’s durable likability is what most observers believe will carry him when few other factors are seemingly in his favor: despite furious attempts to link Hickenlooper to the slate of issues Republicans believe are lethal to Democrats, it’s just not sticking–and not merely because Hickenlooper is depriving them ammunition by running to the center. People resiliently like the guy, and as that affable image contrasts against the raging Tancredo and clueless Maes in the coming weeks, this race moves closer to what remains its basically inevitable conclusion.