Perry Threatens To Cut Into Romney's Base
By Ronald Brownstein
National Journal
August 24, 2011 | 3:55 PM
A closer look at Wednesday's striking Gallup poll showing Texas Gov. Rick Perry rocketing to the top of the 2012 Republican presidential field captures the threat his campaign could pose to Mitt Romney, the former Massachusetts governor who had previously been considered the front-runner.
The Gallup results show Perry displaying broad reach across the party, with appeal that, for now at least, transcends lines of income and education. Those results underscore Perry's potential, as a staunch social conservative with a strong economic story in Texas, to build a primary coalition that bridges the divide between upscale, managerial Republicans and the party's more populist and evangelical blue-collar wing.
Overall, the survey, conducted from August 17-21, showed Perry leading the field with 29 percent among Republicans and Republican-leaning independents. Romney trailed with 17 percent, followed by Ron Paul with 13 percent and Michele Bachmann at 10 percent.
According to figures provided to National Journal by Gallup, Perry leads Romney not only among Republican voters without a college education -- a group always expected to be responsive to Perry's anti-government and culturally-conservative arguments-but also among GOP voters with at least a four year college degree. That group had been Romney's strongest in earlier polling, offsetting his difficulty among working-class Republicans. In 2008, the GOP primary electorate split almost exactly in half between voters with and without a college degree.
(More here.)
National Journal
August 24, 2011 | 3:55 PM
A closer look at Wednesday's striking Gallup poll showing Texas Gov. Rick Perry rocketing to the top of the 2012 Republican presidential field captures the threat his campaign could pose to Mitt Romney, the former Massachusetts governor who had previously been considered the front-runner.
The Gallup results show Perry displaying broad reach across the party, with appeal that, for now at least, transcends lines of income and education. Those results underscore Perry's potential, as a staunch social conservative with a strong economic story in Texas, to build a primary coalition that bridges the divide between upscale, managerial Republicans and the party's more populist and evangelical blue-collar wing.
Overall, the survey, conducted from August 17-21, showed Perry leading the field with 29 percent among Republicans and Republican-leaning independents. Romney trailed with 17 percent, followed by Ron Paul with 13 percent and Michele Bachmann at 10 percent.
According to figures provided to National Journal by Gallup, Perry leads Romney not only among Republican voters without a college education -- a group always expected to be responsive to Perry's anti-government and culturally-conservative arguments-but also among GOP voters with at least a four year college degree. That group had been Romney's strongest in earlier polling, offsetting his difficulty among working-class Republicans. In 2008, the GOP primary electorate split almost exactly in half between voters with and without a college degree.
(More here.)
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