Close Race in the Wisconsin recall

Democratic prospects for recalling Scott Walker are looking like even money right now, an improvement for the party since PPP's last poll in October when Walker led most of his potential opponents.

Walker continues to be unpopular with only 47% of voters approving of him to 52% who disapprove. Pretty much all Republicans approve of him and pretty much all Democrats disapprove, but what turns the scales against him is that he's at just 43/55 with independents.

Walker trails both of his most likely opponents in the recall election by narrow margins. Tom Barrett would lead 49-46 in a rematch of their 2010 contest, and Kathleen Falk has a 48-47 advantage. These numbers represent positive movement for both Barrett and Falk who trailed by 2 and 8 points respectively on PPP's last poll of the race.

Those are tenuous leads for the Democratic hopefuls. In the State Senate recall elections last summer we generally found that sentiment moved away from recalling the incumbents as the election came closer. And Wisconsin voters aren't exactly dying to remove Walker from office- 49% generally support a recall and 49% generally oppose one...it's going to take a very strong Democratic campaign to knock Walker out.

There is one potential Democratic candidate who would have a sizeable lead if he changed his mind about running in the recall election, and that's Russ Feingold. Feingold would start out with a 52-45 advantage over Walker, including a 57-39 lead with independents. His 2010 loss seems to have softened feelings toward Feingold in Wisconsin. He now has a 55% favorability rating, with only 36% of voters seeing him negatively. That's better than his numbers ever were last cycle.

We tested 5 other Democrats against Walker and found close races involving all of them. Ron Kind would lead by a point at 46-45. Doug LaFollette would trail by a point at 46-45. David Obey and Kathleen Vinehout would each have 2 point deficits at 47-45 and 46-44. And Jon Erpenbach would trail by 3 at 47-44.

We looked at a couple different variations of the Democratic primary. We didn't test Feingold in either because it seems pretty safe to say that if he decided to run he would coast to the nomination. If Tom Barrett ran he would be the strong front runner, pulling 45% to 18% for Kathleen Falk, 14% for Doug LaFollette, and 6% for Kathleen Vinehout. If he stayed out of the race Falk would be the leader among the most likely candidates, at 41% to 23% for LaFollette, and 13% for Vinehout.

Recalling Scott Walker is still not going to be easy for Democrats. Based on what we saw last summer I'd say that a tie in the polls probably ultimately means a win for the incumbent. But Barrett and Falk's chances are at least looking better than they did four months ago...and if Feingold could be coaxed to change his mind he'd be the clear favorite.

Full results here

Comments

[Jess3532]

Do you see a WI senate race that looks anything close to the one Rasmussen sees?

[RoughAcres/RL McKee]

RUN, RUSS, RUN!

[Vicki]

Yeah. Great news for our nation if we can get Walker out. It will be a big defeat for the Koch billionaires against middle class workers.

[Dave]

Ya get walker out, we want to look just like our neighbor to the south. We want to bankrupt our state and give a bunch of babies their way because they deserve it. Let us not forget all the union workers who would have lost their jobs if Walker had not done, what he did. But the education of those new union workers math doesn't work very well because it is a LIFO method when it comes to unions. That means for all you non-business minds, yes all you government employees that those at the bottom of the food chain would have lost your jobs. No, matter to you becuase you are losing money, and the man took our money! He lied check your fact he said what he was going to do your unions put it in their flyers and the Milwaukee paper published it long before Walker was elected. Lets not let the facts get in the way, I mean almost completley balancing a 3.6 billion budget deficit in 1 year, amazing!

But, wait till the numbers come out they are going to be much worse than Walker has been saying. If they are all I have to say is it is better to have an income at a reduced rate than no job at all. Somebody has to pay the bills, oh wait Illinois isn't anymore they are in default on pensions. Welcome home budget deficits and kicking the can down the road and eventual bankruptsy.