A new CNN poll appears to give Gov. Mitt Romney an implausible 8-point advantage over President Barack Obama in 15 swing states. If accurate, the poll would show Romney on track to a blowout victory in November.
But the result is likely a mirror image of the mid-June Bloomberg poll that gave Obama an equally implausible 13-point lead nationwide over Romney. Bloomberg’s poll showed the president leading his GOP rival’s favorability number by a 53-40 margin.
Numerous other polling firms show the two candidates are within a few points of each other. Rasmussen Reports, for example, showed Romney at 46 percent on July 2, only two points ahead of Obama. Gallup reported July 2 that Obama leads Romney 48 percent to 43 percent.
CNN’s poll of registered voters showed Obama slightly ahead nationally, 49 percent to 46 percent. But that slight advantage was swamped by an eight-point deficit among voters living in 15 swing states, including Ohio, Florida and Virginia.
ORC International conducted the poll of 1,390 registered voters during the weekend prior to July 2.
“In those 15 ‘battleground states,’ the poll indicates that Romney currently has a 51%-43% advantage over the president among registered voters, if the election were held today,” CNN reported.
Aside from his apparently devastating deficit in the battleground states, CNN’s poll offers plenty of good news for Obama.
His supporters are more enthusiastic than Romney’s, by a 59 percent to 51 percent advantage. RELATED: (Southwest Airlines offers Fox News, MSNBC on flights, but not CNN)
Fifty-one percent of voters polled said Obama’s health care policies would be preferable to Romney’s. Only 44 percent said Romney’s health care policies would be better.
The CNN/ORC poll has little predictive value, however, partly because roughly 20 percent of respondents said they may switch their allegiance between the two candidates before election day.