Obama leads McCain in new poll directed by UW-Madison political scientists

In the inaugural UW–Madison Department of Political Science/WisPolitics.com survey taken immediately after Hillary Clinton suspended her campaign, Barack Obama leads John McCain by a 13-percentage point margin in the Badger state.

The survey of 506 randomly selected probable voters was conducted by phone from June 8-10 and was directed by UW–Madison political scientists Charles Franklin and Ken Goldstein. It has a margin of error of plus or minus 4.5 percentage points.

Fifty percent of respondents said that if the election were held today they would vote for Obama, to 37 percent for McCain. Ten percent were undecided, and 3 percent refused to answer.

Consistent with evidence from other national surveys, the study paints a picture of a hostile political environment in the swing state of Wisconsin for Republicans in 2008.

Eight in 10 Wisconsin voters think the country is going in the wrong direction; President George W. Bush has a favorability rating of only 30 percent; 66 percent believe that the war in Iraq was not worth fighting; and the top two issue concerns are the economy and getting U.S. soldiers out of Iraq.

Wisconsin was a key battleground in the presidential contests of 2000 and 2004 and saw extraordinarily tight contests in both years. Al Gore beat Bush by 5,708 votes (0.2 percent) in 2000, and John Kerry defeated Bush by 11,384 votes in 2004 (0.38 percent).

"In both 2000 and 2004, party attachments in the state were virtually identical with equal numbers of voters identifying with the Democrats and the GOP," says Goldstein. "One of the striking results in this poll and consistent with other survey work I have done in the state, the Democrats now enjoy a major advantage in party identification."

In the study, 38 percent of probable voters identified with the Democrats and 24 percent with Republicans.

Obama has strong favorable ratings, with 64 percent of Wisconsin probable voters saying they have a favorable opinion and 32 percent having an unfavorable opinion.

McCain also has relatively strong favorables, at 53 percent to 44 percent. Obama is seen as the candidate to bring about change (70 percent to McCain’s 42 percent) while McCain is seen as the experienced candidate (84 percent to Obama’s 43 percent). Still, as the evidence shows, McCain faces a stiff headwind in Wisconsin.

Party polarization is a striking feature of Wisconsin opinion at this time, with 87 percent of Democrats and 89 percent of Republicans saying they would vote for their party’s nominee if the election were held today.

"For all the talk about a new politics, the electorate is sharply split," says Franklin. Among independents, Obama holds a nine-point lead, 46 percent to 37 percent for McCain with 17 percent undecided.

Despite widespread speculation about lingering divisions within both parties, there is little evidence of it in the poll.

Democrats with favorable views of Clinton were as favorable toward Obama and as likely to vote for him, as were those less supportive of Clinton. And 55 percent of those surveyed said Obama choosing Clinton as a running mate would "have no effect on (the) likelihood of voting for Barack Obama." Among undecided voters, the results were also a wash with equal proportions of undecided voters saying a Clinton pick for vice president would help, hurt or make no difference.

On the Republican side, there was no evidence of a split in support for McCain among the more conservative Republican voters, despite criticism from some conservative commentators.

"The party bases have come together despite sometimes divisive primaries," concludes Franklin.

This is the first in a series of at least three UW–Madison Department of Political Science/WisPolitics.com polls this general election season.

"WisPolitics.com is a believer in emphasizing good polling, and we’re confident professors Goldstein and Franklin will provide top-notch survey work to help us better understand the dynamics of this historic election,” says Jeff Mayers, president of WisPolitics.com.

WisPolitics.com, based in Madison and launched in 2000, is an independent, nonpartisan online news service that runs wispolitics.com, wisbusiness.com, wisopinion.com and iowapolitics.com.