POLITICO poll: Shutdown backlash boosts McAuliffe

Democrat Terry McAuliffe has opened up a significant lead over Republican Ken Cuccinelli in the Virginia governor’s race amid broad public disapproval of the federal government shutdown, according to a POLITICO poll of the 2013 gubernatorial election.

McAuliffe, the former national Democratic Party chairman, is now 9 points ahead of Cuccinelli, the current state attorney general, in a race that also includes Libertarian nominee Robert Sarvis. In the survey, McAuliffe drew support from 44 percent of Virginians versus 35 percent for Cuccinelli and 12 percent for Sarvis.


Four weeks from Election Day, McAuliffe also leads Cuccinelli in a one-on-one contest, 52 percent to 42 percent.

The POLITICO poll, conducted by Democratic firm Public Policy Polling and Republican firm Harper Polling using automated survey methodology, is the first snapshot of the Virginia race to take into account the impact of the closure of the federal government. The survey tested 1,150 likely voters Oct. 5- 6 with a margin of error of plus or minus 2.9 percentage points.

( WATCH: Virginia governor race poll analysis)

For much of the year, the Virginia race has been an exercise in mutual annihilation between two unpopular candidates, a dynamic that held up in this poll: Nearly half of likely Virginia voters — 49 percent — have an unfavorable opinion of McAuliffe while 39 percent said they have a favorable opinion.

Mirroring a trend in other recent public polls, Cuccinelli’s favorability numbers are worse: Only 34 percent of voters viewed him favorably, and a 56 percent majority viewed him unfavorably.

Sarvis is largely unknown, and his support could fade from the 12 percent mark before Election Day. Only 43 percent of respondents had an opinion of the third-party candidate with slightly more viewing him unfavorably, at 23 percent, than favorably, 20 percent.

( PHOTOS: Ken Cuccinelli’s career)

The major curve ball in the Virginia race, however, is the government shutdown, which is now entering its second week and could be expected to have an outsize impact in a state with such a large population of both civilian and military government employees. McAuliffe has led Cuccinelli in the mid-single digits in both public and private polling; his margin is wider in the POLITICO poll, and the shutdown is the most obvious explanation for that.

Both McAuliffe and Cuccinelli have spoken out against the shutdown. The Democrat has run ads tying Cuccinelli to Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, the so-called defund Obamacare champion, while Cuccinelli has accused McAuliffe of risking a shutdown in Richmond with his give-no-quarter support for Medicaid expansion under the Affordable Care Act.

They have good reason to run in that direction: A full 62 percent of poll respondents said they oppose the government “shutting down over funding for the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare.” Thirty-one percent said they support the shutdown.

( Also on POLITICO: Virginia governor race 2013: Shutdown roils contest)

Of the Virginia voters who oppose the shutdown, nearly two-thirds — 64 percent — support McAuliffe while 16 percent support Cuccinelli, and 12 percent back Sarvis. Shutdown supporters prefer Cuccinelli over McAuliffe, 73 percent to 10 percent with 11 percent for Sarvis.

National Republicans take the greater share of blame from Virginians for the lights-out moment in Washington: Fifty percent of respondents said they blame Republicans in Congress most for the shutdown while 35 percent said they primarily blame President Barack Obama and Senate Democrats. Fifteen percent of likely voters in the poll said they blame both sides equally.

Democratic and Republican voters largely pin the blame on the other party, but independent voters blame congressional Republicans over Obama and Senate Democrats, 48 percent to 33 percent.

( Also on POLITICO: Shutdown puts Virginia’s GOP in a vise)

Cruz, who boosted Cuccinelli at a conservative event in Richmond last weekend, is an unpopular figure in Virginia. He was viewed unfavorably by 45 percent of poll respondents while 26 percent had a favorable opinion of the Texas Republican.

The Cuccinelli campaign, which has regularly criticized PPP during the 2013 race, said in a statement that it flatly discounts the results of the poll and asserted that the race is closing. “We reject the findings within this poll. One of the polling outfits that conducted this survey has been exposed by a number of neutral news outlets for withholding poll numbers that were unhelpful to its Democratic friends,” spokesman Richard Cullen said. “Ken is the only serious candidate in this race who will fight for Virginia and has a plan to create 58,000 new jobs.”

McAuliffe press secretary Josh Schwerin cited Cuccinelli’s event with Cruz over the weekend to argue that the race is moving in the Democrats’ direction: “The more voters learn, the more they side with Terry’s bipartisan focus on jobs and against Cuccinelli’s divisive focus on tea party priorities.”

( PHOTOS: 25 unforgettable Obamacare quotes)

For national Republicans already anxious about the shutdown, the poll underscores the extent to which the clash between Obama and House Republicans has hobbled the GOP’s ability to communicate with voters about anything else, including the Affordable Care Act, which prompted the Republicans’ “defund” push to begin with.

In recent weeks, Cuccinelli has blasted Obamacare in speeches and TV ads, and Virginians seem to share at least some of his skepticism about the national health care law. Asked how they would rate the implementation of the ACA based on what they have heard so far, 60 percent of respondents gave a rating of “fair” (18 percent) or “poor” (42 percent) while only 36 percent said either “good” (25 percent) or “excellent” (11 percent).

And Obama’s personal job approval in the state is tepid at just 45 percent positive and 49 percent negative.

Republican pollster Brock McCleary, head of Harper Polling, said the shutdown appears to have deprived Cuccinelli of the opportunity to make hay of the glitch-ridden debut of the ACA’s state exchanges last week.

“Already playing from behind, Cuccinelli is getting no help from the shutdown fight in Washington. Sixty-three percent of independents oppose the shutdown over Obamacare,” McCleary said. “Absent a shutdown, the Cuccinelli campaign could be making a play to capitalize on voters’ largely negative reviews concerning the implementation of Obamacare.”

PPP’s Tom Jensen agreed that the shutdown is rippling in the race.

“We’ve already found backlash against many House Republicans since the shutdown, and these results suggest anger over it could impact other GOP candidates, as well,” said Jensen, who shrugged off the jab at PPP from the Cuccinelli camp. “Our numbers are consistent with two things: one, every public poll showing Cuccinelli trailing for months, and two, things worsening for Republicans in general as voters revolt against them over the shutdown.”

If Virginians expressed negative views of both the GOP’s shutdown strategy and the early wave of news about the ACA’s implementation, they were less fired up about two other subjects: the debate over the federal debt ceiling and new EPA regulations governing the construction of coal power plants.

Asked if the government should have to cut spending in order to raise the debt limit “even if it risks a default,” 28 percent of voters said they agreed with such a policy, and 44 percent said they opposed it.

On the new EPA rules — described as “regulations on coal-fired power plants aimed at curtailing climate change” — 45 percent expressed support for the regulations and 33 percent expressed opposition.

The balance of all those issue debates may look grim for Virginia Republicans, but at least one prominent member of the GOP was still on solid footing in the poll.

Outgoing Gov. Bob McDonnell earned positive job approval marks from 44 percent of respondents. Forty percent said they disapproved of the GOP governor, and 16 percent said they were unsure of their opinion. Those right-side-up approval numbers are striking given that McDonnell has spent months battling an investigation into his involvement in the Star Scientific gift-giving scandal.

The pool of likely voters in the POLITICO survey included 34 percent Democrats, 31 percent Republicans and 36 percent independents. The sample was 52 percent female and 48 percent male, and 77 percent white, 13 percent African-American and 5 percent Hispanic.

That snapshot of the electorate is somewhere between the whiter, more conservative that showed up in the 2009 governor’s race, which McDonnell won in a landslide, and the more diverse and liberal electorate that turned out for the 2012 presidential election last year.