Gingrich And Romney Now Tied In Three National Polls

Steven Taylor noted yesterday that Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich were tied in the latest CNN/ORC poll, and I noted in an update to James Joyner’s post this morning that there’s also a tie in the latest ABC News/Washington Post poll. Now, we’ve got a third national poll showing the two people at the top of the GOP race tied:

Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich are tied at the top of the Republican pack to win their party’s presidential nomination, each with 20 percent of GOP primary voters’ support, according to the latest CBS News Poll.

Ron Paul takes the third spot with 10 percent, while the remaining candidates enter the holiday period languishing in the single digits.

Of those surveyed, an overwhelming 79 percent said it was still to early to declare their minds made up on whom to support.

Others Republican primary voters – 17 percent according to the poll – remain completely undecided as to which candidate they will support, and another 19 percent said they’d like to have more options.

The poll shows that Gingrich and Romney receive their support from different factions of the Republican primary electorate.

Gingrich leads among self-identified conservatives and Republican primary voters who support the Tea Party movement, while Romney has the advantage with non-Tea Party supporters and moderates – but less than a third of Republican primary voters call themselves moderates.

At the very least this means that the negative campaigning is likely to continue right through the end of the year, because by all measures it’s been working. Of course, it’s worth noting that national polling doesn’t mean as much as state polling at this point, but it does give us an idea of where the momentum is, and right now Newt Gingrich has downward momentum while Mitt Romey is moving up:

Right now, things are not moving in a direction favorable to Gingrich to say the least.

FILED UNDER: 2012 Election, Public Opinion Polls, US Politics, , , , , , , , ,
Doug Mataconis
About Doug Mataconis
Doug Mataconis held a B.A. in Political Science from Rutgers University and J.D. from George Mason University School of Law. He joined the staff of OTB in May 2010 and contributed a staggering 16,483 posts before his retirement in January 2020. He passed far too young in July 2021.

Comments

  1. Fiona says:

    And lets hope Newt’s numbers keep spiraling downward. Much as nominating him might be a gift to Obama, the thought of him having even a remote chance of winning the presidency is as frightening as the prospect of a Palin presidency.

  2. michael reynolds says:

    What’s happening now is that Romney is being permanently damaged by the GOP’s refusal to accept him. He’s become the product no one buys — like Korean cars used to be — even if they’re a perfectly acceptable product.

    The fact that so many people have looked him over, kicked his tires and walked away shaking their heads becomes a thing unto itself, a sort of peer pressure, groupthink thing. People will be predisposed to doubt Romney. And the beautiful thing is that he has no warmth, no ability to connect emotionally. All he’s got is electability and an assertion of competence.

    But when the house has been shown to 50 prospective buyers after being on the market for six months new prospects tend to dismiss it out of hand. After all, if all those other people found something wrong, well, there must be something to it. Which hurts his claim to electability. And a downward spiral ensues.

  3. PJ says:

    You wrote about a Romney rise in another comment, are these polls that are the sign of it?

    20% in the CBS poll with a margin of error of 6%. (Gingrich has 20%)
    If earlier polls by CBS has had the same margin of error, Romney’s rises and falls are within the margin of error since September.

    28% in the CNN poll with a margin of error of 4.5%. (Gingrich has 28%)
    If earlier polls by CNN has had the same margin of error, Romney’s rises and falls are within the margin of error since September.

    30% in the ABC/WaPo poll with a margin of error of 6%. (Gingrich has 30%)
    If earlier polls by ABC/WaPo has had the same margin of error, Romney’s rises and falls are within the margin of error since July.

    What isn’t within the margin of error is the rises and falls of all the Not-Romneys.

  4. I am referring to the trends revealed in the poll averages.

  5. PJ says:

    @Doug Mataconis:

    I am referring to the trends revealed in the poll averages.

    2) Compare any new poll against previous polls by the same pollster to get a notion of trends.

    That didn’t take long.

    I’m not saying that this is the case here, but a rise in a polling average could be due to the fact that polls in the average have results that, while within the margin of error, are higher than the true number. Or the previous polls that the average was based on had result that was lower than the true number.
    Or the pollster being used for the current result, may on average give a higher results than the pollsters for the previous result.

    Also, the results in the average for Romney have been within 22.5% +/- 2 points since June.
    Compare that to the rise and fall of Perry, Cain, and Gingrich.

  6. PJ says:

    I am referring to the trends revealed in the poll averages.

    should have been quoted.