Donald Trump,  Mike Huckabee,  Mitch Daniels,  Mitt Romney,  Newt Gingrich,  Polling,  President 2012,  Sarah Palin

President 2012 Poll Watch: Obama Gets a Bounce – Obama – 47% Vs. Romney – 42%

According to the latest PPP Poll.

The killing of Osama bin Laden has given Barack Obama a bounce in his approval ratings. But it doesn’t appear to have boosted his chances for reelection.

PPP this month finds Obama with a 49% approval rating to 43% of voters who disapprove. That’s a seven point improvement on the margin since last month’s national survey when slightly more voters (48%) gave him poor marks for his work than good ones (47%). Obama’s greatest improvement has come with Republicans (from 8% approval to 14%). He’s up with independents (from 44% to 49%) and with Democrats (from 81% to 83%) by smaller amounts.

More voters may like Obama for the moment, but there aren’t more planning to support him next year. Last month Obama led the Huckabee/Romney/Palin/Gingrich quartet by an average of 10.75 points. This month Obama leads those same four candidate by an average of…10.75 points. There’s been no improvement in his reelect numbers whatsoever since the bin Laden death and if there hasn’t been in the week after the killing it doesn’t seem likely there will be 18 months after the killing either. What Obama’s approval bounce appears to be is an increase in the percentage of people who say they like him, but still won’t vote for him. They appreciate him taking out bin Laden but that’s not going to outweigh everything he’s done that they don’t like over the course of the last 27 months.

Approval Vs. Disapproval:

  • Mike Huckabee – 33% Vs. 41%
  • Sarah Palin – 33% Vs. 60%
  • Newt Gingrich – 29% Vs. 53%
  • Mitt Romney – 32% Vs. 41%
  • Donald Trump – 24% Vs. 65%
  • Mitch Daniels – 14% Vs. 33% Vs. 53% (not sure)

Again, voters are not amored with the Republican Presidetial candidates and the one new face, Mitch Daniels is not really known.

We also tested Mitch Daniels on this poll and he trails 48-34 but what might be most interesting is his favorability numbers with Republicans. Only 23% express a favorable opinion of him to 25% with an unfavorable one. I think a fair amount of that ‘unfavorable’ rating can be explained by voters who rate just about any politician they’ve never heard of negatively- which I think is about 10% of the population- but those are not impressive numbers by any stretch of the imagination. Beltway journalists are clearly a lot more enamored with Daniels than actual GOP voters are.

General Election Head to Head:

  • Obama – 49% Vs. Huckabee – 42%
  • Obama – 54% Vs. Palin – 37%
  • Obama – 52% Vs. Gingrich – 38%
  • Obama – 47% Vs. Romney – 42%

Again, this is a national poll and the election contest is in key battleground sates. But, it is surprising that Obama did not receive more of a bounce with the killing of Osama Bin Laden. This event will fade with time.

What the GOP nominess should hope is that their favorability improves.

The entire poll is here.

PPP surveyed 814 American voters from May 5th to 8th. The margin of error for the survey is +/-3.4%.  This poll was not paid for or authorized by any campaign or political 

organization.  PPP surveys are conducted through automated telephone interviews.  PPP  is a Democratic polling company, but polling expert Nate Silver of the New York Times

found that its surveys in 2010 actually exhibited a slight bias toward Republican candidates.