NJ Poll Finds Corzine Still Behind Christie

Last week, I related how I was polled by Quinnipiac University Poll on New Jersey politics and the economy. The Star Ledger reports today that the results are in, and they claim that Democrat Gov. Jon Corzine has narrowed the gap between him and GOPer Chris Christie.

The poll found Corzine getting negative reviews from a record number of New Jerseyans, with 54 percent disapproving of the incumbent governor's job performance vs. 37 percent who approve. That's the worst showing for a New Jersey governor in 13 years of polling.

Clay Richards of the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute said the faltering economy has left Corzine vulnerable to a re-election challenge.

"The economy is killing Corzine's approval rating in New Jersey so much that he is vulnerable not only to a strong challenger such as Chris Christie but a lesser-known Republican such as Steve Lonegan," Richards said.

The poll of 2,222 New Jersey registered voters was taken April 14-20 and has a sampling error margin of plus or minus 2.1 percentage points.

I'm not so sure I'd characterize it as a narrowing as the headline suggests. I think the 1 point shift is within the margin of error, and the pollsters seem to concur (a sampling error of +/- 2.1%).

Corzine is still behind, and in a head-to-head with Steve Lonegan, Corzine is tied at 41%.

In fact, the numbers suggest more bad news for Corzine as a record number of people disapprove of Corzine's job performance. Whether Christie is the best alternative for New Jersey remains to be seen, but people are clearly tired of Corzine and do not feel he should be reelected.

The full poll results are here. Democrats back Corzine 71-13, while GOPers back Christie 90-3 and 50-31 among independents.

More people think that Corzine shouldn't be reelected in this polling sample than in the last round in March.

Curiously, the most interesting part of this polling is the question on whether New Jerseyeans think that President Obama is doing a good job and whether people think that the economy is getting better.

The April 22 result shows 67%/24% approval/disapproval for President Obama, compared with 61%/28% for March 11 and 65%/16% for February 5. Part of this may be that Obama was out of the country at the Summit of the Americas for part of this sampling, and he received better press coverage owing to the foreign policy coverage rather than focusing on domestic issues.

Then again, it may be due to the fact that many more people think that the economy is improving nationally; 27% think it's improving compared with 5% in the March poll. The same effect is seen in New Jersey's economy, although far fewer people think that the economy is better. New Jerseyeans think that the situation is stabilizing - it isn't getting worse, as 61% thought in March. Now, only 42% think it is getting worse. For New Jersey, it would appear that the situation is stabilizing, which is good news for business and industry.

UPDATE:
The Record finds a completely opposite result of the Star Ledger, reporting that Corzine's disapproval ratings grow to record levels. That's a slightly more accurate picture of Corzine's ratings than the Star Ledger's nonsense.