Election 2010: Delaware Senate: Delaware Senate: Castle 56%, Coons 27%

Rasmussen Reports

Tuesday, January 26, 2010

A first look at Delaware’s U.S. Senate race following Beau Biden’s decision not to run shows why Democrats were hoping Biden would enter the race.

A new Rasmussen Reports telephone survey of likely Delaware voters shows longtime GOP congressman Mike Castle leading New Castle County Executive Chris Coons 56% to 27%. Five percent (5%) prefer some other candidate, and 13% are undecided.

The survey was taken Monday night following the announcement by Biden, the state’s Democratic attorney general, that he will not run for the Senate. In October, Castle led Biden 47% to 42% in a hypothetical match-up for the seat Biden’s father, now the vice president, held for 36 years.

The younger Biden’s decision, coming just after the upset GOP Senate win in Massachusetts, still took Democrats by surprise, particularly in a state that has trended blue in recent years. Coons’ name is the only one that has surfaced so far as a possible replacement, although he has yet to formally announce his candidacy. Ted Kaufman, appointed by the governor to the elder Biden’s seat following the November 2008 election, reiterated yesterday that he has no intention of seeking a full Senate term.

Castle, who is an announced candidate, holds virtually identical two-to-one leads over Coons among both male and female voters.

While 86% of Republicans support Castle, just 49%of Delaware Democrats back Coons. Thirty-one percent (31%) of Democrats favor the moderate GOP candidate. Sixty-one percent (61%) of the state’s unaffiliated voters choose Castle at this point.

Twenty-nine percent (29%) of Delaware voters have a very favorable opinion of Castle, while just seven percent (7%) view him very unfavorably. Only nine percent (9%) have no opinion of the Republican hopeful who has served as governor and lieutenant governor and been the state’s only congressman since 1993.

Coons is viewed very favorably by 10% and very unfavorably by nine percent (9%). But 23% don’t know enough about Coons to venture even a soft favorable or unfavorable opinion of him.

At this point in a campaign, Rasmussen Reports considers the number of people with a strong opinion more significant than the total favorable/unfavorable numbers.

Just five percent (5%) of voters in the state rate the economy as good or excellent. Fifty percent (50%) say it’s poor. Thirty-one percent (31%) believe the economy is getting better, but 39% say it’s getting worse.

Fifty-seven percent (57%) of Delaware voters say cutting taxes is a better way to create jobs than increasing government spending. Just 14% say increasing spending is better.

Only 33% think it’s likely that Congress will able to agree this year on a smaller, bipartisan health care plan, with 10% who say it’s very likely. Sixty percent (60%) say chances of such a plan are not very or not at all likely. This is roughly comparable to views among all voters nationwide.

Following the Christmas Day terrorist attempt to blow up a U.S. airliner, 68% in Delaware say another terrorist attack in the United States in the next year is at least somewhat likely. Delaware voters are narrowly divided over whether America is safer today than it was before September 11, 2001: 42% say yes, 39% say no.

Thirty-seven percent (37%) say the government’s response to the Christmas Day incident has been good or excellent, but 34% say it’s been poor.

Seventy-two percent (72%) favor the use of full-body scanners at airports.

Barack Obama carried 62% of the vote in Delaware in the November 2008 election, but just 50% of the state’s voters now approve of the president’s job performance, down four points from October. Forty-nine percent (49%) disapprove. Approval of the president’s performance has also declined nationally in the Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll.

Fifty-seven percent (57%) approve of the job Democratic Governor Jack Markell is doing, with 15% who strongly approve. Thirty-six percent (36%) disapprove, including 12% who strongly disapprove. These numbers are basically unchanged from October.

Democratic Senate incumbents who currently trail their challengers include Harry Reid in Nevada, Michael Bennet in Colorado, Blanche Lincoln in Arkansas and Arlen Specter in Pennsylvania. Barbara Boxer from California finds herself in a more competitive race than usual.

Republicans lead open-seat Senate races in Florida, Kentucky, Missouri, New Hampshire, North Dakota and Ohio. Democrats lead in Connecticut, and the race is close in Illinois. A commentary by political analyst Larry Sabato, suggests that if the election were held today, “the (59-seat) Democratic majority in the Senate would be reduced to just 52 seats.”

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