Obama NC approval on the rise

Barack Obama's approval numbers have been on the rise nationally as of late, and the same trend has come to North Carolina. 48% of voters in the state approve of him to 49% who disapprove. That's the highest his approval rating has been since June.

Obama hit a low point in September at 43/53. He's seen improvement across the board since then but the really significant movement has come with independents.  Where they disapproved of him by a 2:1 margin five months ago at 31/62, now they're pretty much breaking even at 48/49. Obama's still weaker with independents in the state than he was 4 years ago but he's made a lot of progress.

Obama leads the entire Republican field in the state, although most of the margins are close. He's up 47-46 on Mitt Romney, 48-46 on Rick Santorum, 50-45 on Newt Gingrich, and 47-41 on Ron Paul.

This is the fourth in a line of swing state polls PPP's conducted in the last few weeks that challenge the premise that Romney has a significant electability edge on Santorum. An Ohio poll last week found Santorum doing a point better than Romney, and polls in Minnesota and Missouri found Romney only 2 and 3 points stronger against Obama. Average out the 4 polls and Romney does just 1.25 points better than Santorum, a pretty inconsequential difference.

Santorum is the most 'popular' of the Republican candidates with a 35/50 favorability rating. Romney's at 31/56, Gingrich at 30/58, and Paul at 24/60. This continues a recent trend of weak numbers for Romney in battleground states. In addition to the North Carolina numbers he's at 28/56 in Ohio, 30/54 in Missouri, and 29/56 in Minnesota. Those numbers will pretty definitely improve if he ends up with the nomination, but they're not a good starting point.

North Carolina makes another state where Paul is the strongest candidate with independents, leading Obama by 2 points with them even as the rest of the Republican field lags the President. Paul's favorability with independents (39/46) is actually much better than it is with Republicans (25/62).

This is our 16th monthly poll on the Presidential race in North Carolina and the story has really been the same every time- this should be one of the most closely fought swing states in the country this fall.

Full results here

Comments

[Obama 2012]

I love that Santorum is close to Romney in these numbers (and in others... including the crazy Rasmussen national poll that has Santorum beating Obama) because I think it will give right wing voters a false sense of confidence in Santorum.

The only reason Santorum is close in these polls is because mainstream voters don't know much about him yet. When they learn about him - they will not like him, at all.