GOP Unified

The biggest story of the primary season this year was the deep divisions within the Republican Party. When it comes to the general election though the party's voters are showing a pretty remarkable degree of unity around their candidates.

Since switching to polling likely voters in mid-August PPP has polled 21 Senate and Gubernatorial races where each party's nominee had already been set. In 16 of those contests the Democratic candidate is polling in single digits with GOP voters. With just a few exceptions Republicans have put aside their ideological differences in the primary to fight the greater evil of the Democrats.

The exceptions to the rule are Joe Manchin (14% of GOP vote), Bill White (12%), Ethan Berkowitz (11%), Jack Conway (11%), and Dan Onorato (10%). Manchin, White, Berkowitz, and Onorato are all among the most personally popular Democratic candidates in the country this year but the contours of their races are so difficult that they may all lose anyway. Conway is probably benefiting from some segment of Republican voters, albeit a pretty small one, thinking Rand Paul is too extreme.

The even better news for the Republicans is that in a lot of the races where the party really has to be unified to win it is to a pretty remarkable degree. In the deep blue states of Illinois and Maine we find Senate candidate Alexi Giannoulias and Gubernatorial candidate Libby Mitchell getting only 2% and 3% of the GOP vote respectively. In the purplish states of North Carolina, Missouri, and Ohio Senate candidates Elaine Marshall and Robin Carnahan and Gubernatorial candidate Ted Strickland were getting 1%, 4%, and 5% of the GOP vote.

Independents going strongly toward the GOP and the Democratic enthusiasm gap are the two biggest reasons this is shaping up to be a great year for Republicans. But GOP unity isn't too far behind.

Here's the percentage of Democratic support from Republicans in the races we've polled post-primary since August:

Race	% of GOP Support for Democrat
West Virginia Senate	14
Texas Governor	12
Alaska Governor	11
Kentucky Senate	11
Pennsylvania Governor	10
California Senate	9
Pennsylvania Senate	9
Wisconsin Senate	9
Wisconsin Governor	9
Michigan Governor	8
California Governor	8
New Mexico Governor	7
Illinois Governor	7
Ohio Senate	7
Louisiana Senate	7
Ohio Governor	5
Alaska Senate	5
Missouri Senate	4
Maine Governor	3
Illinois Senate	2
North Carolina Senate	1