Rough Month for Rudy, Still On Top
by Ryan Sager
Thu, 12 Apr 2007 at 12:29 AM
updated Thu, 12 Apr 2007 at 12:32 AM
March was undoubtedly a rough month for Rudy Giuliani (and April's not shaping up so great, either). But, the fact is he's still doing extremely well in the polls.
Much was made of Mr. Giuliani's drop to 31% in the Gallup poll at the end of March, from 44% in the same poll at the beginning of March. However, in the first Gallup poll taken in April, Mr. Giuliani's back up to a quite-robust 38%. John McCain is still on his way down (to a low of 16% in the Gallup poll). And Mitt Romney is still a flat line nationally (6%).
At the same time, Mr. Giuliani continues to do very well in the state-by-state polls...
In Iowa, Rudy has regularly led the pack. The latest Strategic Vision poll (March 30-April1) has him at 25%, Mr. McCain at 20%, and Mr. Romney at 8% (behind Fred Thompson).
In New Hampshire, a CNN/WMUR poll (March 27-April 3) has Mr. Giuliani and Mr. McCain tied at 29%, with Mr. Romney in third, at 17%.
In South Carolina, Mr. Giuliani holds a very slim lead in the latest Fox News/Opinion Dynamics poll (April 1-3) at 26%, to Mr. McCain's 25% and Mr. Romney's 14%.
A boatload of bad press about his wife, bad news about Bernie Kerik, a generally higher level of scrutiny now that the press has accepted Mr. Giuliani as the frontrunner ... none of this has been enough to seriously damage him yet.
I continue to think Mr. Giuliani's campaign apparatus is weak — but I also think he got a late start in putting it together, and it's likely to improve with time. If I were in the Giuliani camp, I'd be glad to be seeing a lot of this negative stuff happening now as opposed to this fall. By all means, I'd argue, let's get 10 or so more Judith Giuliani New York Post covers. Get it out of the way now. Be stronger in the home stretch.
Everything's early yet, but despite some chinks in the armor, Rudy stands strong.
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