New Poll Says CT’s Dannel Malloy is “One of the Most Unpopular Governors In The Country”

Connecticut’s Dannel P. Malloy “continues to be one of the most unpopular governors in the country,” according to the latest poll by Public Policy Polling.

The poll said that Malloy would lose in the Nov. 2014 gubernatorial election to a hypothetical Republican.

The poll director said Thursday that 33 percent of Connecticut voters approve of Malloy, while 51 percent disapprove.

“Out of more than 40 sitting governors we’ve polled on across the country, the only ones with worse numbers in our most recent polls are Bev Perdue of North Carolina, Neil Abercrombie of Hawaii, Pat Quinn of Illinois, and Tom Corbett of Pennsylvania,” said Tom Jensen, director of the PPP poll.

“Malloy only barely gets over 50 percent approval even with Democrats, at 52/33,” Jensen said in a statement. “Independents disapprove of him by a more than 2:1 margin, 25/53, and with Republicans, he’s at 15/73. Malloy would trail a hypothetical GOP opponent for reelection right now by a 46/39 margin. Certainly he has plenty of time to turn it around before November 2014, but for now he’s not in a great position.”

Malloy’s chief strategist, Roy Occhiogrosso, responded in the same way that he has in various recent polls.

“We generally don’t comment on polls, because what’s there to say?” he said. “Polls come and go, numbers go up and down. The governor always tries to do what he think is in the best interests of the people of Connecticut, irrespective of the political consequences.”

In other results in the poll, U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal “continues to be Connecticut’s most popular major politician,” he said.

Overall, 49 percent of those polled approve of the way Blumenthal is doing his job, while 36 percent disapprove. Jensen described them as “numbers pretty comparable to where he was when we last polled the state in September and found him at 52/34.”

Regarding U.S. Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman, his approval numbers “have seen a fair amount of improvement as he heads for the door,” Jensen said.

Voters are relatively split as 41 percent approve and 43 percent disapprove.

“Those still aren’t good numbers but they compare quite favorably to the first poll we did after his retirement announcement, in March of 2011, when we found only 29 percent of voters approving of him to 58 percent who disapproved,” Jensen said. “Lieberman continues to be very unpopular with Democrats. Only 26 percent approve of him, while 55 percent give him poor marks. But his numbers have seen significant recovery with Republicans (56/26) and independents (46/41). ”

Outside of politics, the person with the highest approval rating – when compared to the politicians – is University of Connecticut women’s basketball coach Geno Auriemma.

“Auriemma has a much better image in the state and has numbers any of the state’s major politicians would take in a second,” Jensen said, noting Auriemma’s favorable rating of 57 percent and unfavorable at 10 percent.

Further details are available at http://www.publicpolicypolling.com/main/2012/08/connecticut-miscellany.html