President Bush has surged to a substantial lead in the race against Democratic challenger John Kerry, who trails by 11 points in a new poll of Ohio voters released yesterday.
The Ohio Poll, conducted by the University of Cincinnati, shows that 54 percent of Ohio's likely voters support Bush and 43 percent support Kerry; independent candidate Ralph Nader has 2 percent support. And just 1 percent of Ohio voters say they are still undecided, according to the poll, which has a 4.6 percent margin of error.
The poll reflects other recent results that show Bush riding a wave of support following his convention three weeks ago. Kerry also has been hurt by a wave of attacks from Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney and independent groups that seek to paint him as weak on defense and indecisive in his positions.
The results mark a dramatic shift from the last time the poll was conducted in August, between the Democratic and Republican conventions. In that poll, Kerry held a slight lead over Bush garnering 48 percent support among likely voters, compared to Bush's 46 percent support.
Even Democrats are crediting Bush with a successful convention that has given the president a substantial bounce in recent weeks, but the Kerry campaign is still confident that they can take the state.
Bush certainly did a nice job with his convention
but I think that this race is much closer than what that poll suggests said Brendon Cull, a Kerry spokesman in Ohio.
Cull said the campaign recognizes the work to be done, but he said Kerry's forces will retain a strong presence in the state through election day.
The latest poll also shows a significant shift in the favorability ratings of the two candidates. In August, 49 percent of respondents had a favorable opinion of Bush and 48 percent had an unfavorable opinion. Now that split is 55 percent favorable and 43 percent unfavorable.
The opposite is true for Kerry. In August 45 percent had a favorable opinion of him versus 40 percent who had an unfavorable opinion. Now half of those surveyed had an unfavorable opinion of Kerry, and 43 percent view him favorably.
The shift in ratings for Kerry show the effectiveness of the Bush campaign in painting the Massachusetts senator as an indecisive flip-flopper out of touch with regular voters.
Voters see John Kerry as a flip-flopper because they've taken an inventory of his statements and they've seen that time and time again John Kerry takes two sides on every issue said Kevin Madden, a Bush campaign spokesman.
Ohio's 20 electoral votes might prove the decisive factor in this year's election, and both campaigns are battling fiercely to determine whether this will be a red state or a blue state come Nov. 2. Cheney and his opponent John Edwards both stumped for votes in the state this week, and Kerry will visit Columbus tomorrow.
Madden said the Bush campaign will not scale back its operation in Ohio based on the president's new lead.
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Nick Juliano
