Friday, July 16, 2010

Looking at a Tancredo Candidacy

Tom Tancredo is now getting mentioned as a possible replacement for Scott McInnis as the Republican Gubernatorial nominee in Colorado. How would he fare? A poll we did in January 2009 gives a pretty good indication.

On that survey we tested both Tancredo and McInnis against Michael Bennet for the Senate. McInnis trailed Bennet by 6, while Tancredo trailed McInnis by 9. So John Hickenlooper would probably be about 3 points better off against Tancredo than McInnis. Given that our last poll was a tie that would likely push Hickenlooper into a small advantage.

It's possible that Tancredo would not wear well as a statewide candidate, but it's hard to make the argument that you can with some of the other more extreme GOP hopefuls across the country that voters didn't know them initially and that the better they get to know them the less they'll like them, i.e. Rand Paul. That survey last year found 84% name recognition for Tancredo in Colorado, with 40% of voters seeing him favorably and 44% unfavorably.

Certainly Hickenlooper would be better off running against Tancredo than McInnis before the plagiarism allegations, but I wouldn't just assume it's over in such a scenario.

Full results from that January 2009 poll here.

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