The new survey of the PA-12 special election by Public Policy Polling (D) shows a dead heat in tomorrow’s election for the House seat formerly held by the late Democratic Rep. John Murtha, with Republican businessman Tim Burns having a bare one-point edge over Democratic candidate and former Murtha aide Mark Critz.
The numbers: Burns 48%, Critz 47%. The survey of likely voters has a ±3.4% margin of error. In the last PPP survey from a month ago, Burns had a lead of 44%-41%. The TPM Poll Average gives Burns a lead of 43.0%-42.4%.
The pollster’s analysis finds voters feeling restless and disapproving of both sides in Washington — but Republican voters appear to be a bit more energized and motivated than Dems:
PA-12 provides a clear example of how dimly voters are viewing politicians and parties across the board right now. Hurting Critz’s chances is that 55% of voters in the district disapprove of Barack Obama and 63% have an unfavorable opinion of Nancy Pelosi. But national Republicans don’t do much better in the district with 60% of voters expressing a negative opinion of Congressional Republicans and 63% saying the GOP ran the country poorly while George W. Bush was President.
If Burns does pull out the victory on Tuesday night it will be more because of a continuing gap in interest between Democratic and Republican voters in the off year election than anything else.
