Public Policy Polling

Markey leads by 4 in Massachusetts special

Raleigh, N.C. – PPP's first poll of the general election in the Massachusetts Senate special finds a close race, with Ed Markey leading Gabriel Gomez by a 44-40 margin.

Gomez is starting out as a pretty popular candidate, with 41% of voters rating him favorably to 27% with an unfavorable opinion. Beyond having good numbers with Republicans he's at 42/24 with independents, and actually seen narrowly positively even by Democrats at 33/32. Voters meanwhile are more divided on Markey, with 44% holding a positive view of him to 41% with a negative one. He's at 31/50 with independents.

For a Republican to be competitive in Massachusetts they need to win independents by a hefty margin and get a fair amount of crossover support from Democrats, and right now Gomez is doing both of those things. He's up 47/31 with independents and winning over 21% of Democratic voters. Both those numbers suggest that some folks who supported Stephen Lynch in the primary are being a little reticent about supporting Markey in the general.

Markey starts general with 4 point lead

PPP's first poll of the general election in the Massachusetts Senate special finds a close race, with Ed Markey leading Gabriel Gomez by a 44-40 margin.

Gomez is starting out as a pretty popular candidate, with 41% of voters rating him favorably to 27% with an unfavorable opinion. Beyond having good numbers with Republicans he's at 42/24 with independents, and actually seen narrowly positively even by Democrats at 33/32. Voters meanwhile are more divided on Markey, with 44% holding a positive view of him to 41% with a negative one. He's at 31/50 with independents.

For a Republican to be competitive in Massachusetts they need to win independents by a hefty margin and get a fair amount of crossover support from Democrats, and right now Gomez is doing both of those things. He's up 47/31 with independents and winning over 21% of Democratic voters. Both those numbers suggest that some folks who supported Stephen Lynch in the primary are being a little reticent about supporting Markey in the general.

To put Gomez's 16 point lead with independents in context though, our final poll in the 2010 special election found Scott Brown winning them by a 64/32 margin. So he still has a long way to go to replicate the formula that let Brown pull off that upset.

Markey puts Brown on the ropes

Raleigh, N.C. – A Scott Brown/Ed Markey race to replace John Kerry in Massachusetts would start out as a toss up, PPP's newest poll of the state finds. Markey is a clear favorite over Stephen Lynch in a potential primary contest, and Brown would have an easier path to the Governor's office than a return to the Senate.

Brown starts out leading Markey by just 3 points in a head to head match up, 48/45. 69% of the voters currently undecided voted for Elizabeth Warren in November, while only 17% of them voted for Brown. If those folks ended up voting for the same party that they did in November, Markey would lead Brown by a point.

The primary for the special election looks like it will be a blowout. Markey starts out with a 52/19 lead over Lynch. Lynch actually has a net negative favorability rating with Democratic voters- only 27% see him positively to 28% with a negative opinion. Markey, on the other hand, is quite popular with the party base- 58% of Democrats have a favorable opinion of him to only 13% with an unfavorable one.

Brown/Markey would start out as toss up

A Scott Brown/Ed Markey race to replace John Kerry in Massachusetts would start out as a toss up, PPP's newest poll of the state finds. Markey is a clear favorite over Stephen Lynch in a potential primary contest, and Brown would have an easier path to the Governor's office than a return to the Senate.

Brown starts out leading Markey by just 3 points in a head to head match up, 48/45. 69% of the voters currently undecided voted for Elizabeth Warren in November, while only 17% of them voted for Brown. If those folks ended up voting for the same party that they did in November, Markey would lead Brown by a point. Brown may be starting out at 48%, but it's a very hard path to 50 for him given who the undecideds are.

The comparatively large number of undecided voters who lean Democratic is a function of Markey having 73% name recognition at this point compared to 93% for Brown. Markey starts out as the much stronger potential Democratic candidate- Lynch trails Brown by 9 points at 48/39.

The primary for the special election looks like it will be a blowout. Markey starts out with a 52/19 lead over Lynch. Lynch actually has a net negative favorability rating with Democratic voters- only 27% see him positively to 28% with a negative opinion. Markey, on the other hand, is quite popular with the party base- 58% of Democrats have a favorable opinion of him to only 13% with an unfavorable one.

The Senate race looks like about a 50/50 proposition for Brown at this point. Republican voters, by a 48/38 margin, would actually prefer that Brown run for Governor rather than the Senate. And our polling finds that Brown would start out as a pretty strong favorite for that office.