But Poll Finds Many May Change Minds : Negative Rating of 42% Poses Problem for Bush

Vice President George Bush is experiencing extreme difficulty in putting together the Republican coalition that elected Ronald Reagan in 1980 and 1984 and is viewed unfavorably by 42% of the electorate, almost as high a negative rating as found for the Democrats’ controversial Jesse Jackson, according to an in-depth Gallup poll conducted for Times Mirror Co.

The survey, conducted in mid-May, shows Massachusetts Gov. Michael S. Dukakis leading Bush by substantial margins in the East, Midwest and West and virtually tied with him in the South, Bush’s power base.

Dukakis had a 53% to 40% lead in the trial heat. Although a more recent Gallup survey to be released Wednesday will show that Dukakis’ lead has shrunk by more than half, Bush’s negatives remain high.

The volatility reflects the fact that two-thirds of those surveyed in the poll for Times Mirror indicated that they might change their minds before the almost certain Bush-Dukakis race in November.

“There could be many ups and downs in the polls in this campaign,” said Andrew Kohut, president of the Gallup Organization. Dukakis’ support in the trial heats with Bush, he said, was largely soft and based to a great extent on voters’ antipathy for Bush.

More ominous for Bush than his defeat by Dukakis in the trial heat conducted for Times Mirror was his extraordinarily high negative rating--only 4 percentage points lower than Jackson’s 46%.

Analysts say Bush will have difficulty overcoming his unfavorable image both because he is a known quantity to many voters and because negative views of candidates are generally more ingrained than positive opinions. No presidential candidate has had such high unfavorable ratings and gone on to be elected President.

The poll ratings show “the voters know George Bush and have serious questions about his candidacy,” said Leslie Dach, communications director of the Dukakis campaign.

Dukakis, by contrast, has emerged as a popular national figure with relatively few enemies. In the Gallup survey for Times Mirror, he had an unfavorble rating of 22% and a favorable rating of 66%, compared to Bush’s 51%.

Symbol of Administration

Gallup analysts cautioned that surveys currently reflect opinions about the Reagan Administration more than perceptions of the two candidates. And that favors Dukakis because Bush is viewed as a symbol of an Administration that has increasingly fallen out of favor with the public.

Kohut called the Iran-Contra scandal “the very heart of George Bush’s problem.” A major reason that the Reagan coalition is not coming together for Bush, he said, “is that not Reagan, not Bush and not the Republican Party has ever really recovered from the Iran-Contra scandal.”

The Gallup survey for Times Mirror indicates that the vice president faces serious problems virtually across the board in trying to re-create the Republican coalition that won in 1980 and 1984.

Dukakis’ margin in the trial heat resulted largely from his overwhelming support among women, who favored him by 56% to 36%. Among men, he led by only 49% to 45%.

Leads Among Older Voters

The governor led Bush substantially among all voters 30 and older and was slightly ahead among those under 30.

More than that, the poll showed that Dukakis had attracted most of the Democrats who defected to Reagan in the last two elections.

Kohut, who directed the poll in consultation with Norman J. Ornstein, a political analyst with the American Enterprise Institute in Washington, said the survey demonstrated that the public wanted change.

“The public doesn’t know what change it wants, but it wants a fresh approach,” he said. At this point, he said, Dukakis is seen as an agent of change while Bush represents the status quo.

‘A Blank Slate’

Ornstein stressed that the poll did not indicate who would win the election. “For most Americans,” he said, “Michael Dukakis is a blank slate. In the next couple of months, there will be a lot written on the slate, and not just by Dukakis but also by the media and by George Bush and the Republicans.”

The poll, which was released Monday at the National Press Club, is the third in a series of in-depth surveys commissioned by Times Mirror, which publishes the Los Angeles Times and owns other newspapers, magazines and broadcasting stations.

The survey, conducted from May 13 to May 22, included hourlong, face-to-face interviews with 3,021 adults. The margin of error for questions involving the entire group in the survey is plus or minus 2 percentage points.

Gallup assessed the strength of the two candidates in four ways: by measuring their support in a head-to-head trial heat, by examining the general disposition of the public to vote for a Republican or Democratic candidate, by looking at each candidate’s overall favorable rating and by assessing the personal image of each man.

Stronger in All Areas

Dukakis measured up as a stronger candidate in all areas, but especially with regard to personal favorableness and image.

Dukakis’ decided advantage in overall favorableness ratings apparently was not based on an informed evaluation of him. The poll showed he had only a vague, mildly positive image.

At the same time, however, voters attribute some strong negatives and relatively few positives to Bush.

“It will be harder for Bush to change his image because he is more of a known quantity,” Kohut said, “but relatively unlikely that Dukakis’ image will remain what it is today because it is so loosely based.”

One bright spot for Bush is that support for Republican presidential candidates has been consistently increasing among young independent Republicans. In the Times Mirror survey’s categorization of 11 kinds of voters, young independent Republicans are called “Upbeats.”

That accounts for the fact that Bush has relatively more support among voters under 30 than among older voters. Dukakis’ lead among the younger voters was only 50% to 46%.

‘Disaffected’ Support

Bush’s problem in putting together the Reagan coalition is reflected in the support Dukakis won among another category of voters--the “Disaffecteds,” middle-aged, middle-class, Midwestern and Southern voters who distrust government and other national institutions. In 1984, Reagan won more than 80% of the “Disaffected” vote, but the poll showed Bush winning only 47% to Dukakis’ 43%.

Reagan lost much of that group’s support in late 1986 in the wake of the Iran-Contra scandal, as an earlier Times Mirror survey showed, and neither Reagan nor the Republican Party has recovered it. Between November and December, 1986, the President’s overall public approval dropped from 66% to less than 50%, and it remains in that range, according to the new poll.

Dukakis, who so far appears to be unifying the Democrats despite fears that Jackson’s candidacy would divide them, received much more Democratic support in the poll than analysts had expected.

About Even Among Whites

Among whites, Bush ran almost evenly with Dukakis, but he lagged by huge margins among blacks and Latinos, even though the 15% support the vice president received from blacks was about twice what Reagan polled in 1984.

While Bush led among white Protestants by 49% to 44% and among white Evangelicals by 53% to 40%, Dukakis led among Catholics by 58% to 35%.

Dukakis was favored by about 20 percentage points among those earning less than $40,000 a year. Bush was narrowly favored by 50% to 46% among those making between $40,000 and $50,000 and by 52% to 45% among those making more than $50,000.

The view that the Democratic Party could best implement necessary change was broadly held, according to the poll, and was particularly strong among low- and moderate-income groups. The Democrats’ lead over the GOP in this area increased from 37% to 28% a year ago to 43% to 27% in the recent poll.

Few ‘Very Favorable’

Every Democratic constituency in the Times Mirror voter categories had a favorable impression of Dukakis, although relatively few expressed “very favorable” opinions of him.

Among those with the most favorable views of Dukakis were New Dealers, the largest Democratic constituency--older Democrats whose politics are pro-union and pro-government but socially conservative. One-quarter of them viewed Dukakis “very favorably.” While 30% of New Dealers defected to Reagan in 1984, only 13% favored Bush.

Compared to Walter F. Mondale in his 1984 race against Reagan, Dukakis attracted significantly greater support from all Democratic constituencies except one. God and Country Democrats, an older, economically disadvantaged group holding strong religious and patriotic sentiments, supported Mondale by 69% but Dukakis by only 63%.

The other Democratic constituencies are the Partisan Poor, a heavily female category that feels strong financial pressure and sees the Democratic Party as the champion of social and economic justice, and the ‘60s Democrats, another predominantly female, well-educated group first drawn to politics by the peace, civil rights and environmental protection movements.

Dukakis drew 86% support among ‘60s Democrats and 85% among the Partisan Poor, compared to Mondale’s 75% of ‘60s Democrats and 81% of the Partisan Poor.

Seculars, Followers

Another voter category, the Seculars, a Democratic-leaning group that thinks like Democrats on issues but questions the party’s ability to select good candidates or manage the federal government well, supported Dukakis by 72%. And the governor won 55% of Followers, a pliable constituency that generally follows the candidate perceived as the leader of the moment.

Bush received more than 80% support from core Republican constituencies--Enterprisers, a free-market, anti-government group, and Moralists, champions of the conservative “social agenda.” And he was favored by three-fourths of the Republican-leaning Upbeats, the category of young voters that includes many who were first drawn to politics by Reagan’s optimistic, patriotic themes.

But Bush’s backing from both the Enterprisers and Moralists fell far short of the nearly 100% support Reagan received at the polls in 1984.

Less Democratic Support

The Gallup survey also showed Bush receiving about a quarter of the vote of Seculars, Followers and God and Country Democrats, compared to Reagan’s 1984 vote of about half of Followers and one-third of Seculars and God and Country Democrats.

Regardless of the reason behind the support patterns, Gallup analysts say it was clear they reflected longstanding opinions about the 1988 election.

A year ago, when former Sen. Gary Hart of Colorado was a leading national Democratic candidate, support for him against Bush equaled Dukakis’ current showing. A Gallup survey conducted in April and May of 1987 showed Bush trailing Hart by 9 percentage points, and the patterns of support by voter categories closely paralleled those in the most recent poll.

What has changed over the last year, Gallup analysts pointed out, is that on the Republican side the young Upbeats are much more supportive, while on the Democratic side there is generally more unity among the core Democratic groups.