While neo-Confederate Corey “Trump Mini-Me” Stewart spends his days (and nights) campaigning by himself (since no other Virginia Republicans want to be seen with him), ranting and raving about “criminal illegal aliens,” Confederate statues, “Antifa thugs,” how much he looooves Donald Trump and the like, Tim Kaine stays focused on doing his job, working on important matters for Virginians, campaigning around the state with a united Democratic ticket, etc. In short, the contrast couldn’t be starker between the demagogic, nasty, vicious, fear-mongering campaign of Corey Stewart and the positive, unifying, serious, forward-thinking campaign of Tim Kaine.
Virginians appear to have recognized the difference and are reacting accordingly, giving Tim Kaine big leads over Corey Stewart in poll (54%-36% in a June Quinnipiac University poll) after poll (49%-26% in an early August VCU poll). Now, Roanoke College is out with a brand-new poll, with yet another big lead for Tim Kaine. Here are the key findings:
- Only 32% of Virginia likely voters approve of the way Donald Trump is handling his job as “President,” while 53% disapprove. So sure, Corey, tie yourself as closely as possible to Trump, let’s see how that works out for ya.
- By a nearly 2:1 margin (58%-30%), Virginia likely voters think that things are going in the right direction here in the Commonwealth. Also, Virginia likely voters approve of Ralph Northam’s performance as governor by a 3:1 (54%-18%) margin.
- For U.S. Senate, it’s a 17-point lead (51%-34%) for Tim Kaine over crazy Corey.
- Kaine has a 50%/33% (+17 points) favorable/unfavorable score, with Corey Stewart Stewart at 23%-23%.
- Top issues? The economy/jobs (25%) as usual, followed by health care (11%), education (6%), immigration (6%), honesty/character/corruption (6%), “stopping Donald Trump/elect Democrats” (5%), race relations (4%), taxes (3%), economic inequality/poverty (3%), and the pipelines/climate change/environment (2%). Believe it or not, gun control is only at 1%, as is abortion. Seems kinda strange, but that’s what the poll says…
- On guns, by a narrow 48%-44% margin, Virginia likely voters say it’s more important to “control guns” than to “protect owners.”
- For Congress, by an 11-point margin (46%-35%), Virginia likely voters prefer that Democrats control Congress.
By the way, note that Roanoke College is a “C”-rated pollster, according to 538. This pollster’s track record includes: on 11/3/17, they had a poll that found “Northam and Gillespie deadlocked; Lieutenant Governor and Attorney General races also tied” (uhhhhh…nope, not even CLOSE!); on 11/4/16, they said “Final RC Poll before election shows Clinton with 7 point lead over Trump in Va.” (not bad); on 10/30/13, they said that Terry McAuliffe was leading Ken Cuccinelli by a whopping 15 points (a few days later, McAuliffe beat Cuccinelli by just 2.5 points – so not even close on this one); and on 10/30/12, they had Romney leading Obama by 5 points (a few days later, Obama beat Romney by 4 points – so again, not even close). Personally, I’d just recommend that everyone focus on winning this election by as big a margin as possible and not focus too much on the polls…even if they show Democrats up big time, as in this Roanoke College poll.
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