In two of the three most crucial swing states, former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich and former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney are polling close to President Barack Obama in head-to-head races. But Republican primary voters in those states seem more inclined to elevate Gingrich to the position of running against the president.
Quinnipiac University conducted its swing state poll in Florida, Ohio and Pennsylvania, noting that “no one has won the White House since 1960 without carrying at least two of” those states. Obama is underwater in his approval rating in all three.
In Florida, Romney narrowly leads Obama 45 percent to 42 percent, and Obama leads Gingrich by an even smaller margin, 46 percent to 44 percent. In Ohio, Obama is virtually tied with Gingrich and Romney: each runs with 43 percent to his 42 percent. In Pennsylvania, Obama fares slightly better, narrowly leading Romney 46 percent to 43 percent, and beating Romney 48 percent to 40 percent.
Those numbers could be troubling for Romney, who has cast himself as the most electable candidate in the field and the one best able to take on Obama. But in those three states, more registered Republican voters say they want Gingrich to be their nominee against Obama.
Gingrich leads Romney 35 percent to 22 percent in Florida, 36 percent to 18 percent in Ohio, and 31 percent to 17 percent in Pennsylvania. Quinnipiac’s polling, it should be noted, still has former pizza mogul Herman Cain on the ballot even though he dropped out of the presidential race last week.
Still, voters appear to actually like Romney better than Gingrich. The former Massachusetts governor has a narrowly positive net favorability rating in all three states, with his highest popularity number in Florida. Gingrich, on the other hand, has net negative favorability in all three states. The former speaker, though, has higher name-recognition there than Romney.
Also troubling for Romney may be the fact that Republicans in these states see Gingrich as the candidate who would do a better job of handling the economy, though Romney has positioned himself as first and foremost a businessman with deep national economic credentials.
Republican voters also believe Gingrich would handle foreign policy and immigration issues better than Romney, and that he is the candidate who most has “the knowledge and experience necessary to be a good president,” and the strongest leader in the field.
However, Republicans see Romney as the candidate that most has a strong moral character, suggesting that his campaign’s implicit attacks on Gingrich’s past marital infidelities could make a difference in primary races. Voters also see Romney as the most likeable.
Asked about electability, voters in Florida and Pennsylvania are torn between whether Romney or Gingrich could successfully take on the president. In Ohio, Gingrich is the strong favorite, leading Romney 39 percent to 30 percent. Voters, however, are more concerned about a candidate’s views than their ability to beat Obama, with at least two-thirds of voters in each state saying that a candidate’s views are the more important quality.
With the first primary contest of the season taking place in less than a month, some have said Gingrich has peaked at the right time. But as Peter Brown, assistant director of the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute pointed out, “It is worth remembering also that four years ago at this time, former New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani was the Republican leader.”