Cainmentum?
Former Godfather’s Pizza CEO Herman Cain has had a TX Gov. Rick Perry-like rise in the polls over the last two weeks, when Perry flopped on the national stage in the FOX/Google debate and lost a key straw poll in the Sunshine State. Tuesday saw the release of an NBC News/Marist poll that showed previous frontrunner and former Mass. Gov. Mitt Romney leading the first in the nation Iowa caucuses yet again, after ceding the lead for a few months. Cain was directly behind Romney in that poll, seemingly having increased his support by taking Perry’s Tea Party support.
Now, a Public Policy Polling (D) survey shows Cain far ahead among Iowa GOP caucus-goers, while Perry has fallen to fourth.
The official numbers: Cain with 30 percent, Romney with 22, Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX) with 10, Perry with 9, Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN) and former House Speaker Newt Gingrich both at 8, and former Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum (R) coming in a 5 percent. Both former Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman and former New Mexico Gov. Gary Johnson get one percent.
But Cain’s lead, just like all leads this GOP primary season, came with a warning.
“Herman Cain not only has the lead in Iowa, he also has far more committed supporters
than Mitt Romney,” said Dean Debnam, President of Public Policy Polling in a release. “That doesn’t mean his support will be lasting though- just ask Michele Bachmann.”
Tea Party support has swung wildly in the the PPP poll, which now shows that nearly two fifths of Tea Party supporters are going for Cain, and he nearly ties Romney among non-supporters. There’s also a split between “very conservative” voters, 40 percent of which go for Cain, and “somewhat conservative” voters, a third of which go for Romney.
But as PPP pollster Tom Jensen made known, being in second is a good position for Romney. The former MA Gov. wasn’t initially going to contest the state, instead building a lead in New Hampshire and on to Nevada and South Carolina — the conventional wisdom being a strong showing in Iowa and a win in the Granite State could propel him to the nomination. “How happy would Mitt have been if you told him 6 months ago that in October he’d be 12 pts clear of everyone other than Cain in Iowa?” Jensen tweeted.
The PPP poll of Iowa 311 automated telephone interviews with likely GOP caucus-goers conducted from October 7th to the 10th. It has a sampling error of 5.6 percent.
