At a time when Barack Obama’s national approval rating is varying wildly from pollster to pollster, the President is receiving an encouraging sign in another key swing state. The latest Public Policy Polling (D) survey of North Carolina shows Obama besting all four potential Republican challengers in hypothetical general election match-ups.
Among registered voters in the state, Obama tops the prohibitive GOP frontrunner Mitt Romney, 49 percent to 46 percent, as well as former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum, 49 percent to 44 percent. Romney leads among usual Republican primary voters, claiming 31 percent to Santorum’s 27 percent.
Long a Republican stronghold, North Carolina went blue in 2008 when Obama became the first Democratic presidential candidate to win the Tar Heel State since Jimmy Carter in 1976. The state will be highly coveted again this year, as it is widely thought to be crucial to the Obama’s re-election chances. The TPM Poll Average of North Carolina shows an extremely close race between Obama and Romney, although the president has been trending upward since January.
