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MADISON - With three weeks to go until voters head to the polls, Francesca Hong is again leading the Democratic primary field for governor in a new statewide survey that also shows Hong either trails or ties Republican candidate for governor Tom Tiffany in head-to-head matchups.
In a new poll from the Marquette University Law School, Hong received 26% of primary voters' support, while former Lt. Gov. Mandela Barnes received 15%. When the second choices of those who supported Lt. Gov. Sara Rodriguez, who quit the race after the poll was conducted, were allocated among other Democrats, Hong's support grew to 27% and Barnes' moved to 18%.
But when looking at the Democratic field against Tiffany, Tiffany leads Hong 43%-40% among registered voters and ties with Hong at 44% among likely voters. Barnes leads Tiffany with both sets of voters.
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"What this does show you is, as we like to do in Wisconsin, fairly tight race," Marquette University Law School poll director Charles Franklin said July 22. "A little bit of variation from candidate to candidate, but not a huge amount."
Among Democratic primary voters, the poll also showed 45% had not yet chosen a candidate.
The poll comes just days after the primary field imploded when Rodriguez dropped out after revealing her campaign was actually broke at the same time it was projecting momentum and had received the endorsement of Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley based on that alleged strength.
Crowley got back into the race in a stunning week of chaos.
The poll gives the public a limited view of the true electoral landscape as Marquette University Law School pollsters were in the field July 8-16, or as Crowley left the field and Rodriguez's campaign imploded but concluded their work before Rodriguez left the race and Crowley got back in.
Evers cabinet official Joel Brennan received 5% and state Sen. Kelda Roys received 2% of voters' support without Rodriguez in the race.
It's the fourth Marquette University Law School poll of Democratic primary voters that Hong has led.
"When we first asked back in October, [Hong] was in first place with I believe 6%. Then in February she was in first place with 11%. In March it was 14%. And now at 26%. So she has been the leading candidate in all of these, but with those enormous percentages of undecided, not a huge share," Franklin said.
"On the other hand, consistency counts for something, and we see that consistency in her performance over this entire time."
The poll asked voters about their opinion of democratic socialism, asking half specifically about the organization Democratic Socialists of America and half about the ideology in general. Combining the two questions, 49% of registered voters expressed an unfavorable opinion of democratic socialism, while 25% had a favorable view and 26% didn’t have an opinion.
The poll surveyed 838 registered voters with a margin of error of +/- 4.5 percentage points. The margin of error within the Democratic sample was +/- 6.1 percentage points.
Franklin said pollsters were going back into the field and would release a new poll on the Democratic field on July 29.
Molly Beck and Jessie Opoien can be reached at [email protected] and [email protected].
(This story was updated to add new information.)
This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Hong leads Dems but faces tighter Tiffany matchup in Marquette poll
