New Hampshire Republican Primary Poll Kelly Ayotte in a 37-30 lead

Ayotte Holding Onto Lead

Raleigh, N.C. – Kelly Ayotte’s had a quite a dramatic fall from PPP’s last poll of the New Hampshire Republican primary for Senate, when she led Ovide Lamontagne by 39 points. But Lamontagne may have run out of time to catch up. Ayotte leads with 37% to 30% for Lamontagne, 13% for Bill Binnie, and 12% for Jim Bender.

If Ayotte survives where many GOP establishment candidates have failed in Senate primaries this year it will be because she managed to be the Tea Party candidate herself. With the third of Republican primary voters who describe themselves as members of that movement she leads Lamontagne 38-37, a contrast to the wallopings folks like Trey Grayson, Sue Lowden, Lisa Murkowski, and likely Mike Castle have received with that group.

Ayotte builds on her running even with the Tea Party folks with a 39-17 lead over Lamontagne with moderate voters. Binnie actually finishes second with that group at 19%.

Although Binnie is best case scenario going to finish a distant third his numbers in this poll say a lot about where the Republican Party is headed. Generally viewed as the moderate candidate in the race, 55% of GOP primary voters have an unfavorable opinion of him to only 26% who see him favorably. That is telling when it comes to the ability of centrists to make their way in Republican primaries this year.

Lamontagne actually has the best net favorability of the candidates at +40 (56/16), followed by Ayotte at +29 (56/27), and Bender at +23 (42/19).

“It looks like Kelly Ayotte will hang on but the momentum has certainly been in Ovide Lamontagne’s direction so an upset is not out of the question,” said Dean Debnam, President of Public Policy Polling. “Our general election polling finds little difference between how Ayotte and Lamontagne do against Paul Hodes so it may not matter from an electability standpoint.”

PPP surveyed 1,134 likely Republican primary voters on September 11th and 12th. The margin of error is +/-2.9%. Other factors, such as refusal to be interviewed and weighting, may introduce additional error that is more difficult to quantify.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE September 12, 2010 INTERVIEWS: DEAN DEBNAM 888-621-6988 / 919-880-4888 (serious media inquiries only please, other questions can be directed to Tom Jensen) QUESTIONS ABOUT THE POLL: TOM JENSEN 919-744-6312

TEXT CREDIT: Public Policy Polling 3020 Highwoods Blvd. Raleigh, NC 27604 Phone: 888 621-6988 Web: www.publicpolicypolling.com Email: information@publicpolicypolling.com

FULL POLL RESULTS IN PDF FORMAT Kelly Ayotte in a 37-30 lead