MN-Sen: Franken Jumps to a Lead Over Coleman

from MyDD

by Jonathan Singer, Sat Feb 02

This is really big news. It always is when a challenger jumps ahead of an incumbent Senator in head-to-head polling.

Senator Norm Coleman's bid for re-election faces some challenges even as he remains a formidable candidate, according to a Minnesota Public Radio News and Humphrey Institute poll conducted between January 18 and January 27, 2008.

Tenuous job rating: Minnesotans are divided on Coleman's job performance. His rating is poised at 50 percent, a symbolically significant tipping point for an incumbent seeking reelection. By contrast, Minnesota's first year Senator - Democrat Amy Klobuchar - is enjoying a remarkably strong approval rating of 66 percent. Twice as many Minnesotans strongly approve of her performance compared to Senator Coleman's (30% vs.16%).

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Franken Offers Toughest Test for Coleman: Senator Norm Coleman is locked in a close contest with potential Democratic Party challenger Al Franken among Minnesotans. Franken holds a slight edge (43.2% versus 40% for Coleman), which is at the margin of error. But Senator Coleman leads among other potential Democrats - he holds a narrow edge over Mike Ciresi (43% versus 38%) and double-digit margins over Jack Nelson-Pallmeyer (47% versus 29%) and Jim Cohen (46% versus 31%).

I wouldn't say it's a death knell for an incumbent to be sitting at 40 percent in a named head-to-head match up against a leading challenger or failing to come near to 50 percent even against largely unknown challengers. That said, the type of incumbents we've seen in the past at 40 percent against their rivals this early in a cycle have had names like Rick Santorum, Ernie Fletcher and the like. So at this point, it's hard not to rank this race as one of the top-5 or at most top-6 most competitive in the nation in 2008.