Obama Leading In Three New Swing State Polls

Repeating a pattern we’ve seen this week, a new round of swing state polls from NBC News and Marist College shows the President with strong leads in three more swing states:

President Barack Obama leads Mitt Romney in Colorado, Iowa and Wisconsin, reaching the key 50 percent support threshold in all three battlegrounds, according to the latest NBC News/Wall Street Journal/Marist polls of these states.

In both Colorado and Wisconsin, Obama is ahead by 5 points among likely voters (including those leaning toward a candidate), 50 percent to 45 percent.

And in Iowa, the president’s edge over Romney is 8 points, 50 percent to 42 percent.

Among a wider sample of registered voters, Obama’s lead is even larger – 6 points in Colorado, 8 in Wisconsin and 11 in Iowa.

Perhaps of bigger concern for the Romney campaign, though, is the fact that the last two weeks have clearly taken on toll on their candidate’s likability:

A plurality of likely voters view Romney in a negative light in all three states. In Colorado, it’s 43 percent favorable to 50 percent unfavorable; in Iowa, it’s 42 percent to 50 percent; and in Wisconsin, it’s 43 percent to 46 percent.

By contrast, out of last week’s polls in Florida, Ohio and Virginia, just one of them – Ohio – found Romney’s favorable/unfavorable rating under water.

Meanwhile, Obama’s favorable/unfavorable scores in Colorado (51 percent to 45 percent), Iowa (53 percent to 42 percent), and Wisconsin (51 percent to 44 percent) are all above water.

And, again, we see that the President has essentially caught up to Romney on the economy:

According to these polls, Obama and Romney are essentially battling to a tie on the question of which candidate would do a better job in handling the economy. In Wisconsin, 46 percent of likely voters pick Romney, while 45 percent select Obama.

But in Colorado, the president gets 48 percent, and the GOP nominee gets 46 percent. And in Iowa, Obama is up by four points, 47 percent to 43 percent.

Yet when it comes to which candidate would do a better job on foreign policy, the president enjoys a double-digit advantage in all three states.

Most significant, of course, is the fact that the President is at or above 50% in all three polls, although the numbers are slightly different when you look at the polling averages. In Wisconsin, the RCP Average has Obama at 51.2% and Romney at 44.2, giving the President a +7.0 advantage at the moment. Additionally, looking at the chart you see that the movement recently has been Obama up and Romney down to the point that RealClearPolitics now lists Wisconsin as a “Leans Obama” state. It’s much closer in Iowa, where the average shows the President at 47.0% and Romney at 44.7%, giving the President a slim +2.3 advantage. It should also be known that Rasmussen has released a poll of Iowa that shows Romney leading the President by 3 points. In Colorado, meanwhile, the President leads 48.0% to 46.0%, giving the President a +2.0 advantage. Here too is should be noted that a new Rasmussen poll of the state shows Romney leading by two points.

All in all, it’s been a very good week for the President in the polls, and a pretty depressing one for the Romney camp. He’s got substantial leads in several swing state polls (indeed, there isn’t a single swing state where Romney is leading right now according to the RCP average), he’s leading in the national polls, and he’s building on his Electoral College advantage. Today we sit 46 days from Election Day and 12 days from the first debate. If Mitt Romney is going to start turning this thing around, he’s going to have to start doing it soon, or its going to be too late.

 

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. Me Me Me says:

    Where are Mitt’s medical records?

  2. mattb says:

    On the less good news for Romney and Ryan, Rasmussen is now also showing Obama with the lead in Wisconson: 49/46

    BTW, if you plug the current electoral map from Rasmussen (and only Rasmussen) into the RCP electoral college tool, you end up with the following results:
    Obama/Biden – 313
    Romney/Ryan – 225

    Here’s the RCP map based on Rasmussen’s latest Electoral College Map.

    Looking forward to hearing about oversampling in Rasmussen.

  3. EddieInCA says:

    This is great news for McCain/Palin. It means they’re going to win the 2008 election!!!

  4. Liberty60 says:

    @EddieInCA: Or as others have noted, it IS good news for McCain/Palin, since this will assuredly remove their names from the roster of “Most inept Campaign Evah”.