Richard Burr Maintains Tight Lead Over Cunningham & Marshall (Polls)

Richard Burr Leads Both Potential N.C. Democratic Rivals in U.S. Senate Race


First-Term Republican U.S. Sen. Richard Burr is running ahead of N.C. Secretary of State Elaine Marshall and former N.C. State Sen. Cal Cunningham in North Carolina's Senate race as the attention the two Democrats received during the first round of their primary fight has begun to fade, according to a Public Policy Polling survey conducted June 4-5.

Marshall had beat Cunningham, who is the choice of National Democratic leaders to be the party's candidate, but did not get the necessary 40 percent of the vote to avoid a June 22 runoff.

Richard Burr leads Marshall by 46 percent to 39 percent with 16 percent undecided and runs ahead of Cunningham 46 percent to 35 percent with 19 percent undecided. The margin of error is 3.9 points.

A Rasmussen Reports poll, conducted June 3, gives Burr a somewhat bigger advantage.

In that poll, Burr leads Marshall 50 percent to 36 percent with 6 percent preferring another candidate and 8 percent undecided, and he runs ahead of Cunningham 47 percent to 35 percent with 7 percent preferring someone else and 10 percent undecided. The margin of error is 3 points.

A week after the May 4 primary, when campaign ads were still fresh in voters' minds, the percentage of those in PPP's poll who did not know enough about the Democratic candidates to express an opinion about them was 41 percent for Marshall and 52 percent for Cunningham. In the PPP's poll, those numbers are back up to 62 percent for Marshall and 74 percent for Cunningham.

The last PPP poll, conducted May 8-10, showed Marshall and Cunningham tied. Since then, the third Democrat in the race, fundraiser and party activist Ken Lewis, endorsed Marshall. (Lewis had polled 16 percent in the primary compared to 36 percent for Marshall and 27 percent for Cunningham).

Burr's advantage appears to owe more to the weakness of the Democrats than his own popularity. Thirty-seven percent disapprove of his job performance compared to 38 percent who approve, with 28 percent undecided.

Asked to rate his performance on a scale of 1 to 9, with 9 being the highest, 43of voters percent graded him between 1 and 4, 34 percent rated him between 6 and 9, and 23 percent gave him a 5.




Richard Burr Extends Lead Over Cunningham & Marshall


Republican U.S. Sen. Richard Burr continues to hold a double-digit lead over his potential Democratic rivals, according to a new state-wide survey.

A new Rasmussen Reports survey shows Burr defeating Democrat Elaine Marshall by a 50-36 percent margin and defeating Democrat Cal Cunningham by a 47-35 percent margin, Rob Christensen reports.

Richard Burr has extended his lead from a month ago. Rasmussen found last month that Burr had a 48-40 lead over Marshall and a 50-37 percent lead over Cunningham.

The survey of 500 likely voters was conducted on June 3. The margin of error was 4.5 percentage points.

The survey also found that 59 percent of North Carolina voters favor repeal of the new health care law, while 34 percent would keep it.

The poll found that 56 percent favor state adoption of a tough immigration law like Arizona's.


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Sources: Facebook, McClatchy Newspapers, Politics Daily, Public Policy Polling, Rasmussen Reports, Google Maps