The new national survey from Public Policy Polling (D) finds President Obama with leads of various margins over potential Republican challengers — with Mike Huckabee as the strongest one for now.
Obama is in a dead heat with Huckabee, with 46% to Huck’s 45%. Obama leads Sarah Palin by 50%-44%, has a stronger lead of 48%-35% over Tim Pawlenty — likely because of Pawlenty’s lower name recognition — and is ahead of Mitt Romney by 47%-42%. The margin of error is ±2.8%.
From the pollster’s analysis: “There is no evidence that Huckabee’s been hurt by the bad publicity stemming from the murders committed in Washington last month by an inmate whose sentence Huckabee had commuted. His favorability rating of 35/35 is basically unchanged from 36/37 a month ago.”
That could very well be true for now, with only high-information voters knowing about the case. But give Mitt Romney or Sarah Palin some money for attack ads in Iowa and New Hampshire, and they might be able to change that.
