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Bush doubles lead over Gore |
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June 23, 2000
WASHINGTON (AP) - George W. Bush has built a double-digit lead over Al Gore in a new bipartisan poll, getting more credit as the presidential candidate who would keep America prosperous and showing strength among groups Gore needs to win.
Bush, the Republican governor of Texas, had 52 percent support among likely voters in the Voter.com-Battleground poll released Thursday, while Gore had 40 percent. Bush had a 6-point lead in May.
Bush also led, 49 percent to 41 percent, in an NBC-Wall Street Journal poll released Wednesday. Gore strategists noted that the Voter.com-Battleground poll was completed before the launch of his "progress and prosperity" tour of key states to tout the economic record of the Clinton-Gore years.
The NBC-Wall Street Journal poll also was done last week, a few days into the tour. At Gore campaign headquarters in Nashville, Tennessee, advisers said they were unworried, and highlighted the past three days of generally positive news coverage of Gore's retirement savings plan and denunciation of huge oil company profits at a time of soaring gas prices.
"Al Gore has the right message," said communications director Mark Fabiani. "He's an experienced, determined candidate and the campaign is ready for the election in the fall." Gore pollster Harrison Hickman regularly conducts his own private surveys and campaign officials privately voiced confidence that the message of Gore's "prosperity tour" is getting out and moving voters in numbers that will show up in subsequent public polls.
But the Battleground poll, conducted by Democrat Celinda Lake and Republican Ed Goeas, highlighted a continuing area of concern for the vice president: He is not performing well enough with key voter groups he needs to win in November.
Gore and Bush were about even among women, a group Gore very much needs to win the presidency. Bush had a 23-point lead among men, twice the lead he had in May. Both were even among union members, another constituency Gore needs to win. Bush led among voters who were Democrats when they supported Ronald Reagan in the 1980s.
And Bush was getting the support of more than nine of 10 Republicans, while Gore was getting the support of just under eight in 10 Democrats.
"Who are these Democrats who aren't supporting Gore?" said Vanderbilt University presidential scholar Erwin Hargrove, who surmised that "a lot of them are probably blue-collar workers."
"A Democrat cannot win the presidency unless he can win the support of these ordinary working people," Hargrove said. He recalled the Democratic nominee in 1956, Adlai Stevenson, who never connected with working-class voters and lost by a big margin to incumbent President Eisenhower.
When asked which candidate gave them more confidence they could keep the country prosperous, the likely voters Bush was favored by 12 points. They also said he shared their values, and would do a better job of holding the line on taxes and dealing with the gun issue. Gore and Bush were about even on handling education and Social Security, while Gore had the edge on health care.
When asked about presidential qualities, Bush was favored on the characteristics of strength, trustworthiness and vision. Gore had a lead on experience.
The Voter.com-Battleground poll of 1,000 likely voters was taken June 11-13 and had an error margin of plus or minus 3 percentage points. The NBC-Wall Street Journal poll of 1,740 registered voters was taken June 14-16 and had an error margin of plus or minus 2.5 percentage points.
The two surveys are the latest giving Bush the advantage, though Gore's campaign says it is too early to worry about polls because the public isn't yet focused on the election.
"The political junkies have concluded that polls this early are meaningless," said Stephen Hess, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, a Washington think tank. "But if I were a candidate, I'd sure rather be ahead than behind."
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