Gore, Bush in Dead Heat Among California Voters

Running roughshod over their competitors, Democrat Al Gore and Republican George W. Bush are locked in a dead heat among California voters as the state gears up for its potentially pivotal role in the 2000 presidential contest, a new Los Angeles Times poll shows.

Bush, the second-term Texas governor, outpolled Vice President Gore 49% to 44% in a hypothetical general election matchup, but his lead is within the margin of error.

Both men would easily triumph, at this stage, in their parties’ primaries. Bush has a commanding 50%-13% lead over the second-place Republican, Elizabeth Hanford Dole, while other GOP contenders are mired in single digits.

Gore holds a more than 2-1 advantage over his sole Democratic competitor, former U.S. Sen. Bill Bradley of New Jersey, at 56% to 26%.

“Bush is clearly and dramatically the front-runner here for the GOP primary, and Gore too is the presumptive nominee,” said Times Poll Director Susan Pinkus.

“The other candidates are in trouble--many of them have been spending weeks, months, years campaigning and yet they cannot gain momentum,” she said.

The survey of Californians was undertaken as the race for the presidency heated up in earnest. Last weekend, Bush abandoned the cover of his “exploratory” campaign and ventured full tilt into Iowa and New Hampshire for the first time. Gore will formally announce his presidential candidacy today.

For both front-runners, the poll provided good news--and some cautionary notes. For Gore, even a statistical tie is sweet succor after a spring in which he has consistently trailed both Bush and Dole--he is also now tied with her in a theoretical matchup--across the nation. In a January national survey, the Los Angeles Times Poll found Bush trumping Gore 57% to 39%.

Bush, although far less known than the vice president, shows strength as well, particularly given the state’s recent habit of dismissing most GOP suitors in big races. He is running far better among Latinos than did 1996 GOP nominee Bob Dole--husband of Elizabeth--and has a 10-point advantage over the last nominee among women, the state’s largest voter bloc--both elements that have attracted an early momentum his way.

Under Pinkus’ direction, the Times Poll surveyed 1,602 Californians, including 1,179 registered voters, by telephone June 10-14. The margin of sampling error is 3 points in either direction, with larger margins for subgroups. Unless otherwise noted, the results reflect the views of registered voters.

California’s judgments could be more than just a rhetorical exercise next year. Eternally an afterthought in the primary season, the state has at least the potential to matter since it has moved its contest forward to March 7, one of a gaggle of big states to hold elections close on the heels of Iowa and New Hampshire. California controls 54 electoral votes, one-fifth of those needed to win the presidency.

But if the underdogs on either side are hoping for an upset, there is little in the poll to boost them.

Gore, for his part, is demonstrating the dicey nature of trying to take over from the boss. Significant among the vice president’s liabilities is his association with the polarizing, impeachment-tarred president. More than one in five voters said they are less likely to vote for Gore because of his alliance with Clinton, while only 4% are more likely to vote for him.

Yet with the benefit of incumbency, Gore is also catching a wave of contentment with the economy and a continuing affection by most Californians for Clinton, who has always proved more popular here than in other states. Indeed, Clinton scored a respectable 57% job approval rating in the poll, significantly higher than registered in other recent polls around the nation.

“Clinton is not demonized here,” said Pinkus, analyzing Gore’s standing. “Clinton is still popular here. Gore has been out here a number of times, and he’s been handing out money. . . . It’s not bad for him considering the other polls.”

In a contest between Bush and Gore, the candidates split women voters and Bush controls male voters, 52% to 43%. Self-described moderates are split as well, but the increasingly influential cadre of independent voters went to Bush, 46% to 32%.

Among Latinos, Gore carried 54% to Bush’s 37%--a critical improvement over recent showings by Republicans. In 1996, former Sen. Bob Dole carried only 18% of Latinos in California.

Bush also attracted Democrats better than Gore did Republicans. Twenty-one percent of Democrats favored Bush over Gore, while only 11% of Republicans abandoned Bush for Gore.

The Texas governor’s support suggests that he could reverse the trend that has cost most top-of-the-ticket Republicans their hides in California. Since 1986, former Gov. Pete Wilson is the only GOP candidate to have won a top state or presidential race in the state; not coincidentally, he and Bush share the same self-awarded moniker of “compassionate conservative.”

Wilson’s formula was to trounce his Democratic opponent among men, peel off moderates, independents and conservative Democrats, and fight to a draw, or better, among women. But ultimately he offended most Latinos and women with his opposition to affirmative action and strategies that seemed to play on racial turf.

“Bush’s anthem of compassionate conservatism plays well,” said Pinkus. “The perception is that Bush is a friend of Latinos and not a Wilson Republican.”

Bush does even better among Latinos when Gore--part of an administration that has been highly popular in that community--is taken out of the picture. In a matchup against Bradley, Bush took 45% of Latinos and Democrat Bradley 41%.

Yet Bush’s liability--or, potentially, a source of even more support--is his relative anonymity here. Although he won against Gore among independents, about one in five could not decide between the two.

Uncertainty is also reflected when Californians were asked whether Bush has the leadership skills to be president. Forty-five percent said yes, 30% said no, and a whopping 25% said they do not know. (Gore has little room to gloat, however, since a slim majority of Californians, 53%, declared that he does not have adequate leadership skills. About one-third said he does.)

A quarter of voters said they do not know enough about Bush, the son of former President George Bush, to declare whether they like him or not. On the flip side, however, those who do have an opinion favor him by a 55%-19% margin. He had a favorable rating even among Democrats, although three in 10 said they did not know enough about him.

Gore partisans have signaled that they will try to sway voters with a fierce fight over Bush’s conservative positions, at least some of which are at odds with the views of Californians. He opposes abortion rights, for example, which California has consistently defended. He also has approved easier access to guns than the state appears to condone. In the poll, Californians overwhelmingly backed stiffer gun control laws--atop state measures already more restrictive than Texas’.

“Bush is basically a clean slate,” said poll chief Pinkus. “To some extent, his support is wishful thinking on the part of Republicans.”

Bush’s hand is strengthened by the fact that for Californians, at least at this early date, he has no real competition among Republicans.

He leads Elizabeth Dole, his closest challenger for the nomination, by more than a 3-1 margin, which puts her well behind her national standing when she began her campaign in early spring. In The Times’ national poll in January, Bush led Dole by a narrower 39% to 25%.

In this month’s Times poll, Dole could not lay claim to the interest groups she has sought to attract. Among Republicans, women--to whom she has tailored her campaign--favored Bush 44% to 15%. Men were even more emphatically for the Texas governor, 57% to 10%.

To her credit, at least Dole is in double digits. The rest of the field is not, including magazine publisher Steve Forbes at 7%, former Vice President Dan Quayle at 6%, media commentator Pat Buchanan at 5%, Sen. John McCain of Arizona and conservative activist Gary Bauer at 2%, Sen. Bob Smith of New Hampshire, Rep. John Kasich of Ohio and conservative activist Alan Keyes at 1%, and former Tennessee Gov. Lamar Alexander at less than 1%.

Like Bush, Gore holds a strong lead among his party’s voters. Bradley, who is in the midst of a nine-day swing across California, mustered only a quarter of Democratic voters. Women--a particular Gore target of late--went for the vice president by a 62%-21% margin. A plurality of men--49%--went to Gore as well, with 32% for Bradley.

Another illustration of Bradley’s relative weakness to Gore comes in the head-to-head matchups.

Gore is statistically tied with both Bush (49% to Gore’s 44%) and Dole (44% to Gore’s 46%). Bradley, however, trails Bush, 40% to 48%, and is in a statistical dead heat with Dole, 44% to her 42%.

The poll makes clear that although he will not be on the ticket, Clinton still looms over the presidential contest here. But not, perhaps, in the way he might intend. More than five times as many voters said they would be less likely to vote for Gore because of his connection to Clinton than said they would be more likely to vote for Gore because of it, 23% to 4%.

And the contortions of the recent past also show up when voters are asked which qualities they want in a president: Honesty won going away, with 42% of registered voters saying they would demand that trait--a clear rebuke to Clinton.

The second ranking attribute was “leadership,” at 28%, followed by empathy at 17% and shared views on issues, at 14%.

Bush trounced Gore among those desiring honesty--61% to 31%--although Gore led among those citing leadership, 49% to 44%. Illustrating that the stain is not limited to Democrats who served in the Clinton administration, Bush also beat Bradley among those citing honesty as most important, 58% to 29%.

If there is any consolation for all the major candidates, it is that at present California has a positive view of them--although that may change as the campaign gets more brutish.

Pulled down by Republicans, two-thirds of whom had an unfavorable view of him, Gore was seen favorably by 53% of registered voters and disliked by 38%.

His Democratic challenger Bradley has a far better ratio of favorability to unfavorability, 33% to 6%, but fully 53% of Californians said they do not know enough about him to form a judgment. That sentiment was shared by half of Democrats as well.

The two major Republican candidates have virtually identical favorability ratings, 55% to 19% for Bush and 55% to 18% for Dole. For each, about a quarter of the voters said they do not know enough about the candidates to make a determination.

How the Poll Was Conducted

The Times Poll contacted 1,602 adults statewide, including 1,179 registered voters, by telephone June 10 through Monday. Of the registered voters, 540 are registered Democrats and 391 are registered Republicans. Telephone numbers were chosen from a list of all exchanges in the state. Random-digit dialing techniques were used so that listed and unlisted numbers could be contacted. The entire sample was weighted slightly to conform with census figures for sex, race, age, education, region and voter registration. The margin of sampling error for the entire sample and for registered voters is plus or minus 3 percentage points; for Democrats it is 4 points and for Republicans it is 5 points. For certain subgroups the error margin may be somewhat higher. Poll results can also be affected by other factors such as question wording and the order in which questions are presented. The survey was conducted in English and Spanish.

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Early Choice

If the presidential election were held today, California voters in a hypothetical matchup would vote for:

George W. Bush: 49%

Al Gore: 44%

Don’t Know: 7%

Source: Times Poll

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California’s Choice of Candidates

In a hypothetical matchup for the Democratic primary, Vice President Al Gore clearly beats former New Jersey Sen. Bill Bradley by two to one. In the Republican primary, Texas Gov. George W. Bush substantially outdistances all his GOP opponents. Honesty is the quality voters seek most in a presidential candidate.