Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) holds a commanding lead over his tea party challenger, according to a new poll.
The NBC News-Marist poll released Monday found McConnell leading tea party challenger Matt Bevin 57 percent to 25 percent among likely Republican voters. That finding comes about a week before the Kentucky primary and follows recent polling which has shown McConnell with a wide lead over Bevin.
The poll also found that 51 percent of McConnell’s supporters say they “strongly” support his candidacy for re-election while 53 percent of Bevin’s backers say they strongly support him.
Bevin has argued that he’s a stronger candidate against likely Democratic nominee Alison Lundergan Grimes in the general election. But a matchup between Grimes and Bevin in the new NBC News-Marist poll found Grimes leading Bevin among Kentucky registered voters, 46 percent to 37 percent. By contrast, when matched against McConnell, Grimes trails the top Senate Republican 46 percent to 45 percent among registered Kentucky voters.
The NBC News-Marist poll for Kentucky was conducted between April 30 and May 6 among 2,353 registered voters. It had a margin of error of plus or minus 2.0 percentage points. Among the 408 likely Republican primary voters surveyed, the margin of error was plus or minus 4.9 percentage points.
46-45 against Grimes. An incumbent with less than 50%. She can take him.
Republicans like to talk about “throw the bums out”, and “the 47%”, and “congressional pork”.
But at the end of the day, what they really mean is “throw the bums out – except mine”, “he got us congressional pork we deserve”, and “gimme free stuff instead of giving the ghetto dwellers free stuff”.
By the time he gets to election day, Mitch will BE the Tea Party candidate, and we can take this “crushed tea” meme right to the polls.
Damn, this shocks the shit out of me. From the signage alone, it really looked to me like Bevin had picked up a lot of support in Republican districts. I’m very surprised McConnell is doing so well.
Absolutely. I honestly don’t think that the Turtle will make it. and that’s not just me whistling past the graveyard. I really don’t get the sense that the 25% who are supporting Bevin are necessarily going to come home to the Turtle. I think that his “soft” support among KY GOP voters in addition to Grimes turning out the Dem base can put her over the top.