Civitas Poll: McCrory Still Leads as More Voters Make Up Minds

May 29, 2012
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT: Jim Tynen (919) 834-2099
James.Tynen@NCCivitas.org

Raleigh, N.C. – The newest Civitas Poll of likely North Carolina voters shows Republican gubernatorial candidate Pat McCrory maintaining a 10-percentage point lead. Voters prefer McCrory, a former mayor of Charlotte, by 48 percent to 38 percent to the Democratic standard-bearer, Lt. Gov. Walter Dalton.

The head-to-head numbers are also reflected in voters’ view of the candidates, with 48 percent of voters viewing McCrory favorably and 20 percent viewing him unfavorably. Dalton had a lower favorability rating, 33 percent, with about the same amount of voters, 21 percent, viewing him unfavorably.

Dalton’s support in a head-to-head contest with McCrory has risen 8 percentage points since a February Civitas Poll. “The party faithful tend to rally behind a candidate, as we see in Dalton after the May primary election,” Civitas President Francis De Luca said. “So a surge in support was to be expected.

“Note, however, that the amount of undecided voters has declined from 20 percent to 12 percent since February. Dalton will need to pick up a large proportion of the shrinking pool of undecided voters to beat McCrory,” he concluded.

The Civitas Poll is the only regular live-caller poll of critical issues facing North Carolina.  For more information on Civitas polling, see http://www.nccivitas.org/category/poll/.

Full text of questions:

Now I am going to read you a list of people active in politics.  After I read each name, please tell me if you have a favorable or unfavorable opinion of that person.  If you never heard of them, just tell me and we’ll go on to the next one…

Pat McCrory

Total fav	Total unfav	Very fav	Smwt fav	Smwt unfav	Very unfav	Hrd of/no opin	Never hrd of
48%	20%	24%	24%	7%	13%	17%	15%

Walter Dalton

Total fav	Total unfav	Very fav	Smwt fav	Smwt unfav	Very unfav	Hrd of/no opin	Never hrd of
33%	21%	11%	22%	13%	8%	21%	25%

If the election for Governor were held today and you had to make a choice, for whom would you vote if the candidates were: Pat McCrory, the Republican, or Walter Dalton, the Democrat?

2/12               3/12             5/12    

49%                48%               48%     Total McCrory
30%                32%               38%     Total Dalton

37%                 36%                 36%     Definitely McCrory
10%                 10%                 9%       Probably McCrory
2%                   2%                   3%       Lean McCrory
20%                 18%                 12%     Undecided
2%                   2%                   2%       Lean Dalton
7%                   9%                   9%       Probably Dalton
20%                 21%                 26%     Definitely Dalton
2%                   2%                   1%       Refused

For the full results and crosstabs, click here.

This poll of 600 registered 2012 general election voters in North Carolina was conducted May 19-20, 2012 by National Research, Inc. of Holmdel, NJ.  All respondents were part of a fully representative sample of registered 2012 general election voters in North Carolina.  For purposes of this study, voters interviewed had to have voted in at least one of the past three general elections (2006, 2008, 2010) or be newly registered to vote since November 2, 2010.

The confidence interval associated with a sample of this size is such that: 95 percent of the time, results from 600 interviews (registered voters) will be within +-4% of the “True Values.” True Values refer to the results obtained if it were possible to interview every person in North Carolina who had voted in at least one of the past three general elections or is newly registered since November 2, 2010.

More information on the Civitas Institute is available at www.nccivitas.org, or contact Jim Tynen at (919) 834-2099.