Pennsylvania Democrats in sweet spot heading into mid-term elections, new Morning Call/Muhlenberg Co

[modrepub]

Democrats running in Pennsylvania this year have strong support, with voters in a new Morning Call/Muhlenberg College poll saying they’re likely to re-elect Gov. Tom Wolf and U.S. Sen Bob Casey and vote for a Democrat to represent them in Congress.

That poises the party to gain congressional seats because of an unusually large number of Republican retirements among the 18-member U.S. House delegation and new congressional boundaries favoring Democrats.

While Pennsylvania voters were key to President Donald Trump’s victory, they gave him a poor rating in the poll, with 55 percent disapproving of his job performance and 39 percent approving.

“The takeaway is that the Republican brand is not good right now, and it starts at the top with a president who has approval ratings around 40 percent,” said Chris Borick, a political scientist and director of the Muhlenberg College Institute of Public Polling, which conducted the poll of 414 voters between April 4 and 12.

The best news for Republicans? “The election isn’t right now,” Borick said, suggesting that the president’s standing could improve and become less of a drag for the GOP.

If it doesn’t, the 9-point difference in voters’ preference for which party they will send to Congress — with 47 percent saying a Democrat and 38 percent saying a Republican — could translate into major losses for Republicans in Pennsylvania. That would aid Democrats nationally as they try to regain control of the U.S. House.

Link: http://www.mcall.com/news/nationworld/pennsylvania/capitol-ideas/mc-nws-morning-call-muhlenberg-pennsylvania-poll-governor-senate-20180411-story.html



Polls don't mean much in my book...

[beachbum bob]

1. polls don't mean much this far out except to indicate what the trend is, combined with past

performances. I would dare to say, I rather be a democrat in PA seeking elected office than a republican. We are seeing similar trends in other states. Here in Illinois not only do have a very unpopular republican Gov seeking re-election, who's disapproval are even lower than trumps. All indications are we can see 2-4 GOP house seats flipped. Many House republicans are in similar situations in "blues states" where if the democratic turn out is high and enthusiasm is huge, a blue tidal wave will take them out.

again, its a while to Nov 2018 but be realistic, trump won't be changing his behavior at all and he is an anchor around the sinking GOP's neck.

If the economy goes sour and a pretty good chance that could (is) happening as we see gas prices rising, tariff wars being waged and employers still holding back sharing their "tax cuts" with their employees, the approval/disapproval of trump can drop further along with the GOP while not even factoring in the corruption of trump and his administration and the investigations happening.

[romana]

2. Interesting dig

Interesting dig that the author slips in that redistricting favors Democrats. I thought it was meant to be rather fair across the state to make up for the GOP gerrymandering. They should have left out the "favors Democrats" part of the sentence, and just gone with redistricting.

[FakeNoose]

3. Let's play "what if" for a moment...

What if the Pennsylvania Congressional District map had not been redrawn this year, and what if the Supreme Court hadn't found in our favor that the PA-GOP was wasting time and jerking off? We'd be stuck with the same map we've had since 2012 that vastly favors the Republican Party.

In that case would any of these pundits be talking about how the CD map "favors Republicans" ? I doubt it very much, because that's exactly what we had and nobody mentioned it for 6 years. Now it's even-steven and they're talking about how it "favors the Democrats". Like bloody hell it does!

[DeminPennswoods]

4. I'm hoping if there is a blue wave, it takes out some of the state

house republicans and senators, too.

Gov Wolf has done what he said he'd do for the most part despite having to work with a GOP-controlled legislature. He's as unpretentious as it gets, too.

Sen Casey is the same way.