Recent polling from Magellan Strategies indicates that both Governor Mitt Romney and Meg Whitman , former CEO of eBay.com, are in early pole position for their relative offices, or potential office I should say in the case of Governor Romney. California has a closed primary, meaning only registered Republicans can vote in the primary. As such the Magellan poll only included those who are registered GOP.
California is rich with GOP delegates with approx. 170 that get to vote in the RNC convention. Of those McCain received 158 delegates in the 2008 primary, while Romney earned 12, with 42% of the vote and 35%, respectively.
The results for Magellan’s early 2012 Presidential preference poll:
31% Romney
18% Palin
13% Huckabee
12% Gingrich
08% Paul
03% Other
03% Pawlenty
12% Undecided
That is a very healthy margin for Romney, and there could very well be similar results in February 2012, bringing a vast majority of those 170 delegates into Romney’s camp. Interesting enough the results included cross-tabs which showed the results among social conservatives to be very similar to those of the state-wide poll: 30% Romney ; 20% Palin ; 17% Huckabee. This disputes claims that Romney can’t do well among SoCons, and being a strong SoCon myself I find great satisfaction in that.
Now for the 2010 GOP Gubernatorial nominee poll results:
63% Meg Whitman !!!
12% Steve Poizner
04% Other
21% Undecided
Much could happen before the June 8 primary elections, but I think Whitman is almost a definite winner with nearly 2/3 of the entire vote. Meg Whitman as Governor would be an extraordinary benefit to the State of California with her extensive economic expertise as a business leader, but I can’t overlook the fact that it will also be a huge boon to Romney with Whitman in the Governorship.
Good Luck Whitman 2010 and Go Mitt 2012!!
~Nate Gunderson
Results of the full survey found here. HT GOP12.com
I prefer closed primaries. I don’t like the idea of outsiders choosing our nominee. Party members don’t deserve the nominees that outsiders thrust upon them in an open primary. I lived in a state that had an open system and the democrat incumbent was running so not much of a contest on the democrat side of the ballot. So many democrats decided to skip their primary and vote in ours. Nearly all of them voted for the weakest republican that they virtually guaranteed victory for their democrat incumbent. What would be the reason for a minority party to open up their nomination process to the opposition? I honestly wonder, what were party leaders thinking?
So California gets it right. A closed primary. As we know Mitt did very well and if he had gotten just a few percentage points it could have been a very different result. I live in California and know that the voters were supportive even if the local talk shows were not. KSFO had virtually nothing good to say. But away from the squawk, he starts from a position of strength and I think, should he run, and he better run, the California delegates are his to lose.
Hilarious that Pawlenty tied for last place with “other.” New SurveyUSA poll shows that 62% of Minnesotans do not think he should run for president. 54% of Minnesotans disapprove of him as Governor.