If the Democratic presidential primary were held today, 35 percent of Rhode Islanders would vote for Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., 16 percent would vote for Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill. and 7 percent would vote for former Senator John Edwards, according to a new public opinion survey released Monday, and conducted by Darrell West, professor of political science at the Taubman Center for Public Policy.
The survey, which was conducted by telephone on Sept. 8 and 9, polled a random selection of 571 registered voters in Rhode Island, West told the Herald. The poll had an overall margin of error of plus or minus 4 percentage points, according to a press release.
The last such survey was conducted by the Taubman Center in January of this year and indicated that 33 percent of Rhode Islanders would vote in a primary for Clinton, 15 percent for Obama and 8 percent for Edwards. In the January survey, 36 percent of respondents said they did not know who they would vote for, compared to 35 percent in last week's survey.
Rhode Island's Democratic presidential primary will be held on March 4, 2008 - significantly later than the "Super-Duper Tuesday" primary date on Feb. 5, 2008, when 20 states will cast primary votes. At the moment, residents of 33 states and Washington, D.C., will cast their primary votes before Rhode Island residents.
West told The Herald he was not surprised that Clinton did so well in the survey.
"Senator Clinton is very popular in Rhode Island," he said, attributing her popularity to the fact that she has been endorsed by several state-elected officials and that she has visited Rhode Island "a number of times."
Craig Auster '08, a member of the Brown-based group Students for Hillary, said he was similarly unsurprised by the poll's results.
"She has a strong base of support (in Rhode Island)," he said. Like West, Auster also attributed Clinton's early success to the endorsements she has received from elected officials in the state, including Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, D-R.I., Rep. Jim Langevin, D-R.I., and Providence Mayor David Cicilline '83.
But Max Chaiken '09, coordinator for the Brown chapter of Students for Obama, said West's data might not be representative of true Rhode Island voting patterns.
"Most students registered (to vote) in Rhode Island don't have land (telephone) lines," he said. "A lot of students who are entering Rhode Island as freshmen might not be registered yet."
Chaiken said Clinton's endorsements were important, but that there is "still a lot of time left, and still a lot of ways for Senator Obama to turn it around." Students for Obama is officially affiliated with the Obama campaign.
In addition to survey questions about the presidential primary race, Rhode Islanders were polled on their approval of several elected officials and their opinions on specific issues.
West said the biggest surprise of the survey was the drop in job approval for Gov. Donald Carcieri '65 - in January, 59 percent of those polled said he was doing an "excellent" or "good" job, while in the recent poll, only 44 percent gave the same answers. West called this "a huge drop in a short period of time."
"The state budget is out of control, the economy is softening," West said. Rhode Islanders are "disenchanted with the future of the state," he added. Only 31 percent polled believe that the state is headed in the right direction, while 57 percent believe it is headed in the wrong direction.
In January, 50 percent believed the state was on the right track, and 34 percent on the wrong track.
Cicilline's job approval rating stands at 64 percent, slightly down from 67 percent in January. West said he believes the mayor's job approval rating has remained high because of continued economic development in Providence and the fact that "nobody in the city government has gone to jail."
One of the issue questions on the survey, inspired by recent public debate over whether a convicted felon should be on the radio, asked respondents if they felt that former Mayor Vincent "Buddy" Cianci's new radio talk show, which debuts next week, was a good idea.
The majority of respondents, 57 percent, felt that Cianci's radio show was a good idea, and just 23 percent thought it was a bad idea.
"People think it's a good thing," West said. "They feel he has paid his debt to society, and they want to hear what he has to say."
