In the first post-primary poll, Attorney General Jim Doyle has a slight lead over Republican Gov. Scott McCallum, but 37 percent of those polled said they had not yet decided for whom they would vote.
Badger Poll showed Doyle has support from 43 percent of the registered voters questioned, leading incumbent McCallum, who had support from 35 percent.
Libertarian candidate Ed Thompson trailed in third with 6 percent in the poll, and Green Party candidate Jim Young had 1 percent. The remaining 15 percent were undecided, didn’t have a response or said they would choose another candidate on the Nov. 5 ballot.
When those polled were given the option of waiting to weigh in on a particular candidate, 48 percent of those surveyed said they hadn’t made up their minds yet, while 26 percent said they were voting for Doyle and 20 percent said they were voting for McCallum.
Doyle’s campaign quickly hailed the results, while McCallum’s questioned the validity of the survey. Pollsters said the survey is proof most voters can still be swayed.
“The size of the lead is small enough; it could easily change,” said Donald Ferree of the University of Wisconsin Survey Center in Madison, in an interview with the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.
McCallum campaign manager Darrin Schmitz told the Journal Sentinel that during the primary, all three Democratic contenders — including defeated U.S. Rep. Tom Barrett of Milwaukee and Dane County Executive Kathleen Falk — ran ads that were critical of McCallum.
“That suggests McCallum can pick up enough of the undecided [votes] and swing the election his way,” Schmitz said. “We have just begun to convey to the voters of Wisconsin Jim Doyle’s tax-and-spend record.”
Doyle spokesman Bill Christofferson said the poll results are good news and pointed out that there were also negative ads about Doyle running while the poll was being taken.
“The good news is that the voters of Wisconsin have seen through the McCallum lies and unprecedented barrage of negative commercials,” Christofferson said. “The poll was completed when four negative commercials had aired against Doyle, and our campaign has aired against Doyle, and our campaign had not even started post-primary television advertising.”
The poll showed Doyle with a major lead among women, 50 percent of whom said they would vote for him and 31 percent of whom said they would vote for McCallum. Men were about evenly split, with 39 percent for McCallum to 36 percent for Doyle.
According to the survey, 35 percent of respondents said they believe McCallum is doing an excellent or good job as governor, while 58 percent rated him as either fair or poor.
