Yesterday I mentioned New York mayoral candidate Christine Quinn’s “trifecta” of big daily newspaper endorsements. But if the new Quinnipiac poll of the race is correct, she needs a lot more help than that.
Q-Pac has Bill de Blasio forging into a big lead over the Democratic field, with 36% as compared to Quinn with 21% and William Thompson with 20% (Anthony Weiner has finally dropped into the single digits with 8%). Not only is de Blasio getting close to the 40% that would win the nomination without a runoff; Quinn is getting trounced by de Blasio in a hypothetical runoff by a large 59/30 margin (for that matter, Thompson would beat her in an unlikely runoff by a 57/33 margin). Moreover, her voters are significantly less enthusiastic, and more likely to say they might change their votes, than those of either of her major rivals.
Q-Pac has been showing more de Blasio strength than other polls for a while, and it’s also possible the survey, taken from August 22-27, missed some endorsement-driven “switches” to Quinn and/or some loss of votes by de Blasio attributable to Thompson’s emotional attacks on him aimed at African-Americans. But with under two weeks left before primary day, it’s not looking good for a win by the long-time front-runner Quinn.
