Hillary Clinton has always had an electability problem. In the current campaign cycle, she has presented herself to a national audience for the first time as candidate rather than wife. Recent headlines suggest that she is working at making herself more likable. So far, though, it appears that many voters are able to resist Hillary’s appeal:
Forty percent of Americans say they would vote to keep Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton from winning the presidency, more than twice the total for their No. 2 “anti-” pick, former New York Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani.
In a new Fox 5-The Washington Times-Rasmussen Reports survey, 64 percent of Republicans, 42 percent of third-party or independent voters, and 17 percent of Democrats said the candidate they most want to keep from the White House is Mrs. Clinton.
The eye-opener there is that 42% of independents, and even some Democrats, are dead set against Mrs. Clinton.
It would be interesting to study the poll’s internals, which I haven’t yet had the opportunity to do. This bit of demographic data, however, is striking. It shows the percentage of respondents who most want to block Hillary, broken down by race:
Hillary needs to do much better among African-Americans than that. Worse, it appears that she has a serious problem with Hispanic voters, who presumably make up a large majority of the “other” category.
There’s a long way to go before November, but Hillary’s unpopularity with many Americans has persisted for a long time and will not easily be overcome. Indeed, one could speculate that as voters hear more of Hillary in the coming months, their negative perceptions are more likely to be reinforced than allayed.
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