Pawlenty Polling Roundup

The last time I posted something about Tim Pawlenty, it was to look at the disconnect between how he was polling and how he was being talked up by the media. That was back in March.

Not much had really changed since then, the pundits were still treating him like a front runner and the polls still disagreed. But in the past week or so he has officially announced his candidacy for the GOP nomination for President and for the first time he's posted some decent polling numbers. Since I haven't covered any of these polls yet, I'm going to throw them all into one big Pawlenty polls post.

Are you ready for the T-Pawmentum?

PPP (6/2, GOP primary voters, 5/10 in parenthesis):

Mitt Romney: 16 (18)
Sarah Palin: 16 (12)
Tim Pawlenty: 13 (5)
Herman Cain: 12
Michele Bachmann: 9 (7)
Ron Paul: 9 (8)
Newt Gingrich: 9 (13)
Jon Huntsman: 4
Someone else/Undecided: 12 (11)
(MoE: ±4.1%)

This is the best showing for Tim Pawlenty in a national poll so far, going from only 5% on May 10th into the low double digits in three weeks. This rise in his support coincides with his official campaign announcement and subsequent media blitz, so it could be a temporary spike, or it could be upward momentum, we'll have to wait and see.

For what it's worth, the same trend is manifesting itself in Minnesota.

PPP (6/3, MN GOP primary voters, 12/10 in parenthesis, 10/30 in brackets):

Tim Pawlenty: 33 (24) [19]
Michele Bachmann: 14
Sarah Palin: 11 (17) [18]
Mitt Romney: 11 (13) [11]
Herman Cain: 10
Ron Paul: 9 (9)
Newt Gingrich: 4 (11) [11]
Jon Huntsman: 2
Someone else/Undecided: 6 (6) [18]
(MoE: ±5.1%)

Pawlenty's support among Minnesota Republicans continues its steady growth. What seems to be happening is that as candidates have dropped out; Huckabee, Daniels, etc, people who were supporting those candidates are gravitating to the known commodity.

But watch out for Herman Cain! 45% of respondents didn't have an opinion about him, meaning he's not well known, but he's polling at the same level as household names like Sarah Palin and Mitt Romney.

The problem for Pawlenty is that Minnesota is not likely to mean a whole lot in the quest for the nomination. Iowa and/or New Hampshire will have to be the spring board to the nomination for Pawlenty, and in Iowa, the T-Pawmentum hasn't caught on yet.

PPP (6/1, IA GOP primary voters, 5/10 (Q19) in parenthesis):

Mitt Romney: 21 (25)
Sarah Palin: 15 (15)
Herman Cain: 15
Newt Gingrich: 12 (15)
Michele Bachmann: 11 (10)
Tim Pawlenty: 10 (9)
Ron Paul: 8 (15)
Jon Huntsman: 0
Someone else/Undecided: 8 (11)
(MoE: ±4.5%)

Tim Pawlenty has to do well in Iowa for his campaign to really have any viability. I don't think he has to win necessarily, but he can't afford to do much worse than third and even that would have to be considered a disappointment.

It's not just Iowa though, Pawlenty can't really afford to not do well in any northern states, especially Midwestern ones, because he's polling terribly in the south (perhaps a reason for this).

PPP (6/7, SC GOP primary voters, 2/1 in parenthesis):

Mitt Romney: 27 (20)
Sarah Palin: 18 (18)
Newt Gingrich: 12 (13)
Herman Cain: 12
Michele Bachmann: 9
Ron Paul: 8 (7)
Tim Pawlenty: 4 (4)
Jon Huntsman: 2
Someone else/Undecided: 8 (8)
(MoE: ±3.1%)

Tom Jensen:

As voters are getting to know Pawlenty and Huntsman better they're liking them less. Pawlenty's favorables in the state are up by 5 points since we last polled the state but his negatives are up by 18 and he's stuck at 4% support for the nomination.

That's not a new trend, it's the same trend that's been going on since March:

[Pawlenty's] name recognition has improved from 36% to 48% in the last 15 months. The bad news for him is that his favorability has just gone from 12% to 15% while his unfavorabilty has gone from 24% to 33%.