A new poll says that a promotion from the House to Senate is no done deal for Tom Cotton (R).
Well, well ... it seems like only yesterday (because, of course,
it was) that Republicans were crowing, and Democrats were despairing, about the state of play in Arkansas. A poll from the reliable crew at PPP had both Democratic incumbent Sen. Mark Pryor and Democratic gubernatorial hopeful Mike Ross trailing by 5-6 point margins. Republicans were trotting out their "even the lib'ruls at PPP" bullcrap, while Democrats worried that PPP's new numbers might be an indicator that Arkansas was even more perilous for Democrats than originally thought.
Then, when the news arrived that Suffolk (as part of their new partnership with USA Today) was going to be releasing an Arkansas poll just one day after PPP, Democrats braced for a second dose of potentially bad news.
Yeah, not so much.
Suffolk threw the community of political junkies a bit of a curveball, with their new poll being the first nonpartisan poll in a month to show a lead for Mark Pryor over Republican challenger Tom Cotton. Suffolk's new poll, released on Wednesday, showed Pryor with a 45-43 lead over Cotton (two independent candidates split 5 percent of the vote).
Equally surprising, the open seat battle to replace outgoing Democratic Gov. Mike Beebe is closer than it has been in some time, according to the pollster. The new Suffolk poll, as has been the case elsewhere, had Republican Asa Hutchinson edging Democrat Mike Ross, but by a quite modest 43-41 margin (here, as in the Senate poll, third party candidates split 5 percent of the vote). Downballot, the Suffolk poll also gave Democrats modest edges in several races, including a surprising seven-point lead for Democrat John Burkhalter in his battle with former GOP Rep. Tim Griffin.
The survey was conducted from September 20-23, and polled 500 likely voters in the state. It is part of an ongoing series of swing state polls for USA Today.