Poll shows DFLers ahead of Emmer in Minnesota…
Poll shows DFLers ahead of Emmer in Minnesota governor's race
By Bill Salisbury | bsalisbury@pioneerpress.com | Pioneer Press
PUBLISHED: June 7, 2010 at 11:01 p.m. | UPDATED: November 12, 2015 at 8:32 a.m.
All three leading Democratic-Farmer-Labor candidates for governor hold firm leads over Republican endorsee Tom Emmer, a new statewide poll shows.
The poll also showed Gov. Tim Pawlenty's popularity has sunk to a new low.
In addition, it suggested Minnesotans are gloomy about the state of their state. A lopsided majority thinks the North Star state is headed in the wrong direction.
Decision Resources Ltd., of Minneapolis, conducted the survey of 800 Minnesota adults May 28-June 2. The margin of error is plus or minus 3.5 percentage points.
Among the three main DFL gubernatorial candidates, former U.S. Sen. Mark Dayton has the biggest lead over Emmer, 40 percent to 28 percent.
House Speaker Margaret Anderson Kelliher, the DFL-endorsed candidate, led the GOP candidate, 38 percent to 28 percent.
Former House DFL Minority Leader Matt Entenza also topped Emmer, 34 percent to 27 percent.
Tom Horner, the Independence Party's endorsed candidate for governor, finished third in all three trial heats, receiving 17 percent to 19 percent of the vote.
Asked what the poll results mean, Decision Resources President Bill Morris said, "The bounce that Emmer enjoyed after the Republican convention is gone."
Immediately after the GOP convention in early May, a Survey USA poll for KSTP-TV showed Emmer leading all three DFL candidates. A Minnesota Public Radio/ Humphrey Institute poll conducted in mid-May placed the Republican legislator from Delano in very tight races with his DFL rivals.
While Pawlenty has been expanding his national profile for a possible campaign for president in 2012, Morris said the Republican governor got his lowest approval rating ever from his constituents.
Only 37 percent of Minnesotans have a favorable impression of Pawlenty, while 62 percent view him unfavorably, the poll found. By contrast, President Barack Obama's ratings were 58 percent positive and 42 percent negative.
Even controversial House Speaker Nancy Pelosi fared better than Pawlenty. While she tied his 37 percent favorable rating, she received a much lower unfavorable number of 46 percent.
Minnesotans apparently think their state is in worse condition than the nation. Fifty-nine percent said Minnesota is "off on the wrong track," while 48 percent said that of the country.
A whopping 92 percent agreed that "state government spends too much time arguing and not enough time solving problems." By 53 percent to 42 percent, a majority said they are starting to believe "the problem is not with one political party, but it is with all incumbents."
Based on those responses, Morris said, "People are fed up with partisan gridlock, and they're looking for alternatives."
In another sign of voter cynicism, the poll found three out of four respondents think elected officials are more likely to listen to their favorite lobbyists and special interest groups than their constituents.
Legislators now receive a fixed daily payment, called a per diem, to cover expenses while the Legislature is in session. The poll found 85 percent of respondents favored replacing per diems with a system requiring lawmakers to report their actual expenses for reimbursement.
Four in five support immediate public disclosure of any contribution from a special-interest group or lobbyist.
Two-thirds favor a law requiring elected officials to resign from their current position before becoming a candidate for a new office.
To help balance the state budget, respondents by a 3-to-1 ratio favored allowing "racinos" to operate slot machines at Canterbury Park and Running Aces horse racing tracks.
Sixty-three percent favored a two-year freeze in wages and benefits for all state employees.
But four in five opposed cutting state payments to nursing homes for their senior residents, and three in four were against cutting state aid to K-12 public schools.
By nearly 2-to-1, respondents said Education Minnesota, the state teachers' union, was more interested in "protecting their members' salaries" than the quality of education.
The poll suggested Minnesotans are evenly split on the traditional hot-button social issues:
21 percent said they would absolutely vote for a candidate who opposes all abortions, except to save the life of the mother, while 22 percent would absolutely vote against such a candidate.
21 percent said they would vote for a candidate who supports a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage, civil unions and domestic partnerships. Nineteen percent would absolutely vote against that candidate.
17 percent would absolutely vote for a candidate who opposes further restrictions on gun ownership, while 16 percent would absolutely vote against such a candidate.
The "tea party" has yet to catch fire in Minnesota, the poll showed. Twenty percent of respondents supported the anti-big-government movement, while 74 percent did not.
But 39 percent considered themselves conservatives, 36 percent said they were moderates and 23 percent identified themselves as liberals.
The political party breakdown was 39 percent Democratic, 32 percent Republican, 2 percent Independence Party and 24 percent independents.
In releasing the poll results to the Pioneer Press, DRL President Morris revealed that Himle-Horner, Inc., the public relations firm that Horner co-founded, is a DRL client and that he personally supports Horner for governor. But he said neither Himle-Horner nor the Horner campaign paid for any part of the poll, and he said nothing in the poll questions or methodology was intended to benefit Horner.
Bill Salisbury can be reached at 651-228-5538.
Bill Salisbury | Capitol bureau reporter
Bill Salisbury has been a newspaper reporter since 1971. He started covering the Minnesota Capitol for the Rochester Post-Bulletin in 1975, joined the Pioneer Press as a general assignment reporter in 1977 and was assigned to the Capitol bureau in 1978. He was the paper's Washington correspondent from 1994 through 1999, when he returned to the Capitol bureau. Although he retired in January 2015, he continues to work at the Capitol part time.
bsalisbury@pioneerpress.com
Follow Bill Salisbury	@bsalisbury