Maggie Hassan (D)
Public Policy Polling (PDF). 5/10-13. New Hampshire voters. MoE ±2.9% (4.5% for Democratic primary sample, 4.2% for Republican primary sample) (6/30-7/5/2011 in parentheses):
Maggie Hassan (D): 39 (35)
Ovide Lamontagne (R): 40 (41)
Undecided: 21 (24)
Maggie Hassan (D): 37
Kevin Smith (R): 31
Undecided: 32
Jackie Cilley (D): 38
Ovide Lamontagne (R): 38
Undecided: 24
Jackie Cilley (D): 37
Kevin Smith (R): 32
Undecided: 31
Maggie Hassan (D): 23
Jackie Cilley (D): 20
Undecided: 57
Ovide Lamontagne (R): 53
Kevin Smith (R): 13
Undecided: 34
New Hampshire is entering a new era in state politics: one that doesn't involve Governor John Lynch. The very popular Democratic incumbent (with 60/28 approvals in this poll) is retiring after four terms (although New Hampshire is one of only two states in the country that uses two-year gubernatorial terms, four terms is still highly unusual). That leaves an open seat in a hotly-contested swing state that had some of the nation's sharpest pendulum swings in 2008 and 2010 and where the pendulum now seems poised to stop right in the middle. Public Policy Polling's first NH-Gov poll since Lynch's retirement announcement last year (though you'll notice there is one trendline that's salvageable from the time they polled the race shortly before Lynch's retirement) finds the race about as dead a heat as you'll see, very similar to last month's poll by
Univ. of New Hampshire.
The reality of this race, though, is that nobody knows the candidates yet. Ovide Lamontagne, who narrowly lost the 2010 GOP Senate primary, is best-known thanks to that campaign. Even he's at only 29/33 favorables, but he's a massive celebrity compared with ex-State Sen. Maggie Hassan (15/16), ex-state Sen. Jackie Cilley (11/16), and ex-State Rep. (and not the film director) Kevin Smith (8/17). So, really, all we're seeing now is the size of the two party's solid bases. And New Hampshire, swing state that it is, seems to have bases of very similar sizes. We'll need to check back in a few months to see how they've grown their shares, but for now, the Democrats are starting in a good-looking spot, seeing as how more Democrats and indies are undecided than are Republicans.
Lamontagne -- who was the Tea Party alternative to Kelly Ayotte in 2010 but who since then seems to have donned the establishment mantle -- does seem to have an electability edge over Smith, though, worth about five points to the Dems. Smith is more of a social conservative, something that tends not to play well in New Hampshire, where the right-wingers tend to be more libertarian-flavored. (Case in point, only 13% of the poll's respondents say there should be no legal recognition for same-sex couples. 54% support marriage, while another 31% say civil unions.) Unfortunately for the Dem candidates, Lamontagne has a sizable edge in the GOP primary.