FDU PublicMind - October 2, 2003 Release

Bush Beatable?

President George Bush is still popular enough to beat all presidential rivals but there may be electoral storm clouds on his horizon. According to the most recent Fairleigh Dickinson University poll, 44% of NJ voters give the President a job rating of excellent or good as compared to 62% six months ago. A majority of Garden State voters now say the country is "off on the wrong track" where 6 months ago, a similar majority said the country was moving in the right direction.

Al Gore and Hillary Clinton are the only Democrats who do well in an election match up with the President, but neither is running. Democrats declared as candidates for the 2004 Presidential election have difficulty getting any more than 25% of the vote so far. This includes General Wesley Clarke who entered the race recently as well as the supposed front-runner Howard Dean. Joe Lieberman, Gore's running mate in 2000, polled best among declared candidates with 31%. "Democratic candidates can't take advantage of Bush's decline in popularity until they are better known and their positions better understood," said Dr. Bruce Larson, professor of political science at Fairleigh Dickinson University and a survey analyst. "And that can't happen until the field narrows and voters can focus on them more clearly."

Still, the President's support in hypothetical races with various Democrats does not exceed 41%. This is roughly the same percentage the President received in New Jersey in the Presidential election of 2000.

The President's fortunes in the Garden State are associated with the public's perception of US military efforts in Iraq. Whereas 6 months ago four of five New Jersey voters said the war in Iraq went better than they expected, now only about a third say the military effort is going better than expected: almost half (47%) say it has gone worse. A majority still believe the US did the right thing in going to war in Iraq. But the percentage who think the war was a mistake has risen to 38% from 23% six months ago. "The President's support earlier in the year was bi-partisan," added Larson. "The president's political fortunes over the coming year will depend to some extent on the public's perceptions of the U.S. effort in Iraq. Especially if the economy remains sluggish, the public will have little patience for an expensive and protracted struggle in Iraq."

Indeed, a plurality of voters say they are following the economy more closely than the war in Iraq. And half of the voters say the economy is more important in deciding their vote for President than foreign policy or the war in Iraq.

The PublicMind poll of 810 registered voters was conducted from September 24 through September 30 and has a margin of error of +/- 3.5 percentage points.

Poll Analysis

Contacts:

Bruce Larson 973.443.8727

Peter Woolley 973.670.3239

Radio actuality line: (201) 692-2846.

For more information, please call (201) 692-7032.