Craig Gilbert and Bill Glauber | Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Just under half the Wisconsin electorate (48%) thinks the state is heading in the right direction.

Just under half (48%) approves of the job GOP Gov. Scott Walker is doing.

And just under half (44%) backs Walker for re-election against Democratic challenger Tony Evers.

WisconsinEye

Those numbers all come from a new statewide poll of 500 likely voters by Suffolk University, conducted for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.

Are they good enough to get Walker re-elected? Only the Nov. 6 election will tell.

Walker trails Evers 44% to 46% in the new Suffolk poll, a difference well within the margin of error.

The latest survey is consistent with the findings of other pollsters on the two-term governor in at least two respects.

First, the Republican Walker is in greater danger of losing his job right now than the other big-name incumbent on the Wisconsin ballot this fall, Democratic U.S. Sen. Tammy Baldwin.

Baldwin leads her GOP opponent Leah Vukmir 50% to 42% in the Suffolk poll. In five different surveys by four different pollsters since June, Baldwin has been better positioned than Walker to win re-election, a pattern that underscores how challenging this mid-term election cycle is for the GOP.

{{props.notification}} {{props.tag}} {{props.expression}} {{props.linkSubscribe.text}} {{#modules.acquisition.inline}}{{/modules.acquisition.inline}} ... Our reporting. Your stories. Get unlimited digital access to exclusive content. Subscribe Now

Baldwin also has a more positive image than Walker in the Suffolk survey.

“She looks solid to me, across demographic (groups),” said Suffolk pollster David Paleologos, who polls for USA Today. Baldwin is trailing Vukmir by single digits among men in the survey but winning women 58% to 35%.

Both Walker and Baldwin have nearly universal support in their own party and almost no support in the opposing party. While Baldwin is winning independents in her race for Senate, however, Walker is losing independents in his race for governor, which explains why she is in better shape in the summertime polls.

WisconsinEye

"I did vote for Walker once, when he first got elected. I would no longer do that,” said Robert Pavlak, 62, of Neenah, a self-described independent and retired heavy equipment worker who was interviewed for the survey.

“I think Foxconn is a bad deal for Wisconsin,” he said of the huge factory project the state attracted to Racine County. “The payback for 25 years before we start seeing anything … It won't help us up here where all these paper companies have gone."

At the same time, despite his vulnerabilities, Walker’s standing is consistently stronger in Wisconsin than that of the leader of his party, GOP President Donald Trump. Walker’s job ratings are better than Trump’s in every recent Wisconsin poll. In the new Suffolk survey, 48% approve of Walker’s performance and 47% disapprove. In the case of Trump, 41% of Wisconsin voters approve and 53% disapprove – very close to Trump’s numbers among American adults in the national Gallup Poll (41% approve, 54% disapprove).

“There is a disparity between Trump’s (2016) vote and what people are saying” today about him in the state, said Paleologos, referring to Trump’s narrow election victory in Wisconsin nearly two years ago.

Thomas Frenn, 70, a lawyer from Wauwatosa, is a Republican who disapproves of Trump—he called him “very perilous with the truth” -- but backs Walker and Vukmir.

Frenn said Walker has "tried to lower taxes" and made it "easier for the local government to negotiate with the unions through Act 10." He cited the state’s low unemployment rate and called Foxconn a good idea.

“We need more manufacturing jobs in this state, especially in the southeast area," he said.

On Trump, voters were offered a choice in the poll of three statements about the president’s effect on their vote this fall: 46% said they wanted their vote to “change the direction President Trump is leading the nation;” 34% said they wanted their vote to “support the direction Trump is leading the nation;” and 18% said their vote “doesn’t have much to do with Trump and his policies.”

The poll was conducted from Aug. 18 through 24. The president’s former campaign manager, Paul Manafort, was convicted of tax fraud while the poll was in the field on Aug. 21, the same day Trump’s former personal attorney Michael Cohen pleaded guilty to breaking campaign laws. But Paleologos said there was not a significant shift in Trump’s numbers after those developments.

Other highlights from the Suffolk survey:

The top issue in the governor’s race is the economy (chosen by 26%), followed by education (18%), health care (16%), taxes (7%), corruption (7%), gun control (6%), roads and bridges (5%), and Foxconn (4%). Of these, the economy would seem to be an asset to Walker: 54% of voters in the survey rated the economy good or excellent, while 33% rated it fair and only 11% rated it poor. But the next two issues, education and health care, are ones that Democrats are hitting hard in the belief they are vulnerabilities for Walker. Overall, 48% of voters said Wisconsin is heading in the right direction, 41% said it was on the wrong track, and 11% were undecided. On Walker’s first-term move to sharply limit collective bargaining for public employees, 41% said they agreed with that move and 51% said they did not.

The top issue in the U.S. Senate race is health care (chosen by 26%), followed by the economy (24%), immigration (11%), corruption (7%), gun control (7%), foreign affairs (4%), and trade (3%). (As with the issues in the governor’s race, voters in the poll were choosing from a defined list of options). On the issue of trade, President Trump’s tariffs were not popular with Wisconsin voters. Asked about recent tariffs on China, 39% supported them and 47% did not. The recent tariffs on the European Union, Canada and Mexico were especially unpopular: only 31% supported them while 57% did not.

The challengers in the races for governor and U.S. Senate aren’t nearly as well known as the incumbents, not surprisingly. But of the two, Evers, the Democratic state school superintendent running against Walker, had a more positive image than Vukmir, the Republican state legislator running against Baldwin. In the case of Evers, 43% had a favorable image, 27% an unfavorable image, 22% were undecided and 8% hadn’t heard of him. In the case of Vukmir, 30% had a favorable image, 33% had an unfavorable image, 25% were undecided and 11% had not heard of her. Baldwin was viewed favorably by 50% and unfavorably by 41%. Walker was viewed favorably by 47% and unfavorably by 48% -- the sort of 50/50 divide that has characterized Walker’s polling numbers throughout this two-year election cycle.

“Scott Walker is not afraid to make the hard choice, meaning to keep things in budget, keep taxes lower. That's the way it is. He's for cutting waste, versus, ‘we'll raise taxes to cover that,’" said Raul Hart, 61, a construction worker from Burlington. He said the economy was going well, and "everything is good, the last 10 years.”

A very different view of Walker came from Kathi Rabe, 63, of Fond du Lac, a recently retired licensing specialist with the Wisconsin Department of Children and Families.

“My eyes really opened up in 2011 when the Act 10 went through," she said. "Prior to that, my husband and I were both strong Republicans. And (then) I saw what the Republicans did, how they took away our union, how they busted our union, how the state employees really became villainized by everybody in the state."

Interest among voters in the governor’s race (55% were “extremely interested") was measurably stronger than interest in the Senate race (43% were “extremely interested").

Walker, who has won three straight elections for governor, has been either deadlocked or behind Evers in public polling since last month. The race was a virtual toss-up in the new Suffolk poll and a poll released last week by Marquette Law School, while Walker trailed Evers by double digits in a July survey by Marist/NBC and by seven points in a July survey by Emerson College.

The Marquette poll last week pointed to a closer Senate race than reflected in the Suffolk survey. Among likely voters, Baldwin led Vukmir 49% to 47%. But among the larger universe of registered voters, Marquette showed a gap similar to the one in the Suffolk poll, with Baldwin up 51% to 43%.