Jay Inslee’s tenure as governor is on shaky ground – that is the conclusion reached by Moore Information, a public research firm which works for challenger Bill Bryant. According to a poll released Tuesday, Inslee leads Republican Bryant by a narrow 43% – 36% margin.
Another 3% of respondents indicated they wouldn’t vote, while 18% indicated they were undecided, from a scientific sample of 500 registered voters last week.
Considering, Inslee’s name ID — and the fact that he is an incumbent — sitting at 43% is a problem. Inslee enjoys 89% awareness and his image is 41% favorable/29% unfavorable. Meanwhile, just 35% of voters are aware of Bryant and his image is 10% favorable/5% unfavorable. Via Moore Information’s report:
“Bryant leads among Republicans (80-8%) and Inslee leads by a similar margin among Democrats (80-4%). Independents are divided; 36% Bryant and 37% Inslee. Bryant trails Inslee in Western Washington (32-47%), but Bryant leads East of the Cascades (49-31%).”
Only 38% of voters said they thought Inslee deserves reelection. That includes some 20% of hard-core liberals who said they would vote for him regardless of his opponent. Another 47% prefer a new person as Governor and 15% have no opinion.
Additionally, a whopping 58% of voters indicated they agreed with the statement, “After 32 years of one party controlling the Governor’s office, a change in leadership and electing a new governor from another political party would be healthy for Washington state.” Just 34% disagreed, while 9% had no opinion.
According to Moore Information, voters’ general dislike of Inslee may have a lot to do with his political philosophy. A plurality of 40% of voters view Inslee as a Liberal, 30% describe him as Moderate, and 6% as Conservative — as a side note, we’d like to know who it is that describes Inslee as a Conservative (was Socialist Kshama Sawant polled?). The last 25% had no opinion on his politics.
Inslee’s philosophy appears to be out-of-step with Washingtonians. By contrast, poll results indicate just 25% of voters describe themselves as Liberal, 35% as Moderate, and 31% as Conservative. The remaining 9% said they did not know.
The poll results grants credence to the suspicions among political observers that Inslee is struggling to motivate voters to support his re-election bid. Certainly, Inslee has an enthusiasm problem — the reality is that he has no record to stand on, no accomplishments to tout as proof of success.
We are certainly no strangers to the desperate lengths Inslee has gone to try to come up with any compelling reason for somebody to support his campaign. Given the results of Moore Information’s survey, we expect much more desperation in the near future.
