A new Public Policy Polling survey in Maryland finds a significant increase in support for same-sex marriage among African American voters following President Obama’s historic announcement two weeks ago.
The referendum to keep the state’s new law legalizing same-sex marriage now appears likely to pass by a healthy margin, 57% to 37%, a 12 point shift from a similar survey in early March.
Donald Trump tells Newsmax that he is seriously considering launching his own super PAC.
His goal would be to produce ads against President Obama that show how Washington is permitting outsiders to “absolutely suck the blood out of this country.”
Said Trump: “If I did one I would show how bad we’re doing as a country, how disrespected we are as a country. I would show people from OPEC, 11 people sitting around a beautiful gold-encrusted table talking about how they are going to continue to rip off the United States.”
“I’m so boring that I didn’t even know I was boring.”
— Sen. Rob Portman (R-OH), quoted by the Washington Post.
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New NBC Marist polls find President Obama with a narrow advantage over Mitt Romney in three of the most pivotal presidential battleground states — Florida, Ohio and Virginia.
Florida: Obama 48%, Romney 44%
Ohio: Obama 48%, Romney 42%
Virginia: Obama 48%, Romney 44%
A new Reason-Rupe poll in Wisconsin finds Gov. Scott Walker (R) eight points ahead of challenger Tom Barrett (D) in the recall race, 50% to 42%.
A new St. Norbert College poll finds Walker leading by five points, 50% to 45%.
A new We Ask America poll shows Walker leading by 12 points, 54% to 42%.
A new Suffolk University poll in Massachusetts finds Sen. Scott Brown (R) with a slight lead over challenger Elizabeth Warren (D), 48% to 47%.
Said pollster David Paleologos: “Brown has fallen short of the coveted 50% mark for an incumbent, while Elizabeth Warren has converted some undecided voters since February. This leaves both campaigns no choice but to spend tens of millions of dollars in an all-out war to woo the five percent of voters who will decide this election.”
Also interesting: 72% were aware of the recent controversy concerning Warren’s heritage. Of those, 49% said Warren was telling the truth about being part Native American; 28% said she was not telling the truth; and 23% weren’t sure.
Rep. Denny Rehberg (R-MT), who is running for U.S. Senate in Montana, has become the poster child for boating safety, but not in a good way, the Huffington Post reports.
“Rehberg was one of several people injured in a 2009 boating wreck when the speedboat he was riding in… slammed into the rocky shore of a lake… The startling photo of the wreck, with the boat entirely out of the water, made most local papers. And now, it’s the feature photo of a boating safety campaign in Montana.”
A new Public Policy Polling survey in Arizona finds Mitt Romney has now opened back up a seven point lead over President Obama, 50% to 43%.
During the GOP primaries, similar surveys suggested the state might be winnable for Democrats.
The New Republic profiles Bob White, a “longtime-pal-cum-alter-ego” to Mitt Romney.
“White, who is trim with graying brown hair, was one of Romney’s original hires when launching the private-equity firm back in the 1980s. He has been at Romney’s side in every major endeavor he’s undertaken since, from the Olympics to the campaign trail. Over the course of Romney’s career, White has served as debate prepper, personnel vetter, designated gut-checker, in-house historian, and diplomatic envoy. It was White who found Romney a campaign manager for his run for governor, White who headed his transition to the Massachusetts statehouse, White who has chaired his campaigns for president.”
Gallup finds that Americans are about equally likely to have a favorable (42%) as an
unfavorable (45%) view of Joe Biden, which has been the case for most of
his tenure as vice president.
Sasha Issenberg notes that political campaigns used to guess which ads were most effective, but the Obama re-election campaign is trying to prove it using random tests.
“To those familiar with the campaign’s operations, such irregular efforts at paid communication are indicators of an experimental revolution underway at Obama’s Chicago headquarters. They reflect a commitment to using randomized trials… designed to track the impact of campaign messages as voters process them in the real world, instead of relying solely on artificial environments like focus groups and surveys.”
Mitt Romney told Mark Halperin that if he’s elected president “we’d get the unemployment rate down to 6%, and perhaps a little lower.”
However, just a few weeks ago, as NBC News reported, Romney said that anything “over 4% is not cause for celebration.”
ThinkProgress: “Though 6 percent unemployment is significantly lower than the current 8.1 percent rate, the feat isn’t all that remarkable. In fact, it is exactly where multiple government agencies project unemployment will be at the end of that time frame. The Congressional Budget Office predicts that unemployment will average 6.3 percent in 2016; the Office of Management and Budget, meanwhile, projects unemployment will hit 6.1 percent and ultimately fall below 6 percent the same year.”
Arizona Secretary of State Ken Bennett (R), who questioned whether President Obama should be allowed on the state’s presidential ballot because of citizenship questions, says his office received verification from Hawaiian officials confirming the copy of the Certificate of Live Birth for Obama matches the original record in their files.
Said Bennett: “At the request of numerous constituents, I merely asked Hawaiian officials to verify the information contained within President Obama’s original birth certificate. They have complied with the request and I consider the matter closed.”
“Do not buy into the BS that you hear.”
— White House press secretary Jay Carney, quoted by The Hill, saying it was “a sign of sloth and laziness” that reporters bought into the GOP idea that federal spending increased dramatically under President Obama.
Wonk Wire: The spending spree that never happened.
A new national NBC News/Wall Street Journal/Telemundo poll finds President Obama holds a 34-point lead over Mitt Romney among registered Latino voters, 61% to 27%.
In 2008, according to the exit polls, Obama defeated McCain among this key voting bloc, 67% to 31%.
Coming on DVD next month: Washington: Behind Closed Doors, the miniseries based on John Ehrlichman’s post-Watergate novel The Company.
Steven Rattner, the former Obama administration official who criticized the president’s attacks on Mitt Romney’s tenure at Bain Capital, clarifies his position in the New York Times:
“On Monday, Mr. Obama struck the right balance, emphasizing that he wasn’t attacking private equity but was questioning Mitt Romney’s Bain Capital credentials to be the job creator in chief. That’s fair, particularly because Mr. Romney himself has been foolishly reweaving history to claim, as recently as last week, that he helped create 100,000 jobs during his time at Bain. In fact, Bain Capital — like other private equity firms — was founded and managed for profit: ideally, huge amounts of gain earned legally and legitimately. Any job creation was a welcome but secondary byproduct.”
“Adding jobs was never Mitt Romney’s private sector agenda, and it’s appropriate to question his ability to do so.”
First Read: “One of the downsides to Republicans and the Romney campaign citing the
Cory Bookers, Steve Rattners, etc. when it comes to Bain Capital is
this: These folks are supporting Obama, not Romney.”
A new Gallup poll finds 41% of Americans identify themselves as “pro-choice,” a record low, while 50% now call themselves “pro-life,” one point shy of the record high.
Taegan Goddard is the founder of Political Wire, one of the earliest and most influential political web sites. He also runs Political Job Hunt, Electoral Vote Map and the Political Dictionary.
Goddard spent more than a decade as managing director and chief operating officer of a prominent investment firm in New York City. Previously, he was a policy adviser to a U.S. Senator and Governor.
Goddard is also co-author of You Won - Now What? (Scribner, 1998), a political management book hailed by prominent journalists and politicians from both parties. In addition, Goddard's essays on politics and public policy have appeared in dozens of newspapers across the country.
Goddard earned degrees from Vassar College and Harvard University. He lives in New York with his wife and three sons.
Goddard is the owner of Goddard Media LLC.
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