A new Siena poll shows New York Governor Kathy Hochul has a 17 point lead in her bid to win her first full term this upcoming November. The poll puts Hochul at a net 11 point positive approval rating amongst 655 likely New York voters, four points higher than President Biden recieved.
The results are the latest indictator that Republican efforts to flip the state may be fleeting. The Cook Political Report considers the race safe for Democrats, along with California, Illinois, and Rhode Island.
The results also show a Zeldin campaign struggling to resonate with voters. While Zeldin had spoken previously with Democrats planning to vote with him, and recieved the endorsement of the last Republican governor of New York, George Pataki, the poll shows that Hochul could get 17% of registered Republicans and 16% of identified conservatives.
In a press conference in Queens, Zeldin called into question the validity of the Siena poll.
“The race is currently at a four to six point race,” Zeldin said. “Ask Siena why their poll is so far off.”
The campaign later sent a press release reporting that McLaughlin and Associates found Zeldin was “only 5.8 points” away from Hochul. FiveThirtyEight has given polls that show Zeldin close to Hochul lower scores than those that show Hochul at a significant advantage.
The New York Times reported that Republicans in New York generally need 30% of NYC votes to pull an upset. However, the Siena poll showed that Republicans running for the top three positions statewide, or for Chuck Schumer’s US Senate seat, were at or below 20% NYC votes.
Previously, an Emerson poll on the NY Governor’s race showed that Zeldin had 16% of the Democratic vote, and Hochul was 15 points ahead of Zeldin in the overall race. The Siena poll shows Zeldin with 12% of the Democratic vote, and 2% of the identified liberal vote.
The poll also showed that while likely voters felt optimistic about their family’s prospects by 44 points, they were pessimistic about the direction of the country and New York State, by 28 points and 6 points respectively.
The Siena poll asked voters what their top two issues were going to the ballot box and found that voters consistently rank the economy, threats to democracy, and crime as issues that would affect their vote.
According to the US Bureau of Labor Statisitics, inflation in the New York-Newark-Jersey City area increased by six percent since last August. Inflation for food products went up by nine percent, four percent for housing, and 14 percent for transportation.
21% of likely New York voters felt that Donald Trump was the legitimate winner of the 2020 election, almost two years later. Immediately after the contentious 2000 election, Gallup reported that only 18% of the country saw George W. Bush as an illegitimate president, in a race Al Gore conceded after the Supreme Court decision Bush v. Gore.
Zeldin was one of four New York Republican members of Congress to vote against certifying the 2020 results on January 6th, 2021.
29% of voters, including 45% of Republicans, feel that the 2022 election won’t be conducted fairly, and 23% of voters said they wouldn’t be able to accept the results of the election. When asked, Zeldin said that election security is an issue everyone should care about.
“I believe that this is something that we should care about whether it’s the day before an election or the day after election,” Zeldin said
Overall crime in NYC saw a 26% increase in August, according to a press release from the New York Police Department, though shootings came down by about 30%.
Hochul told law enforcement officials that she planned to invest $50 million in policing equipment and pre-trial services in a summit in Albany this morning.
“You’ll never hear the words from me or my administration defund the police,” Hochul said. “In fact, we are doing the opposite.”
Categories: Politics Uncategorized
This is Ufon Umanah, 
Leave a comment