Poll: MacArthur Up By 13-Points

By Matt Rooney | The Save Jersey Blog

Steve Lonegan (left) and Tom MacArthur (right) with Michael Aron during a televised debate.
Steve Lonegan (left) and Tom MacArthur (right) with Michael Aron during a televised debate.

Time may be running out for Steve Lonegan to reverse the momentum and regain the upper hand in CD3, Save Jerseyans. That’s not a “RINO” observation. I’m just looking at the numbers.

Data: a new poll out Wednesday morning from the American Action Network found Lonegan’s rival Tom MacArthur leading by 13-points (43% to 30%) among likely GOP primary voters.

You can click here to read the full report. Surveyors found MacArthur leading Lonegan across the board including among those who consider themselves “very conservative.”

The difference-maker? Lonegan’s likability…

“By contrast, Lonegan has seen his image ratings erode by a net -16 points over the past three weeks. His favorable rating has dropped by -10 points (42% May) and his unfavorable rating has increased by +6 points (31% May), and he has been reduced to a very weak 1.4 to 1 favorable to unfavorable ratio.”

Pollsters didn’t draw any conclusions as to whether MacArthur’s money or Lonegan’s campaign is primarily to blame for the likability gap. They did discover that “[a]mong those who have seen, read, or heard about MacArthur and his campaign, his net intake is +23, with fifty-two percent (52%) of primary voters indicating they would be more likely to vote for MacArthur based on the things that they have seen, read, or heard.”

Results from only one other public poll have been released to date; that one from Patrick Murray’s Monmouth University Polling Institute found MacArthur up by 11. An internal MacArthur campaign poll from earlier in May found its candidate up 9.

 

Matt Rooney
About Matt Rooney 8403 Articles
MATT ROONEY is SaveJersey.com's founder and editor-in-chief, a practicing New Jersey attorney, and the host of 'The Matt Rooney Show' on 1210 WPHT every Sunday evening from 7-10PM EST.

17 Comments

  1. Lonegan’s saving grace could be an enthusiasm gap: MacArthur’s base is more moderate and less politically active than Lonegan’s. If the weather is really bad on Tuesday, things could swing.
    But I very much doubt that it’ll be enough.

  2. “In a way, this Republican primary resembles what’s going on in the rest of the country, an establishment Republican being challenged by a Tea Party Republican, except in this case the establishment candidate is new and the Tea Partier very familiar.” – Michael Aron, Chief Political Correspondent, NJTV News

  3. I give Steve Lonegan a lot of credit for consistently standing up for conservative causes even when he was not running for office. He made it possible for many of us regular folks to travel with him to Washington to voice our objections to Obamacare and up to New York to rally against Cap & Trade. I saw him testify against RGGI in Trenton and join with State Senators Allen and Doherty at a rally in Burlington City with regard to same. Some of my friends have shared various other experiences with Steve leading the charge on behalf of NJ taxpayers. He has been there for us, and I will continue to be there for him.

    Nobody was more annoyed than I in 2012 when so many people I knew said they refused to vote for “the lesser of two evils” and threw their votes away rather than voting for Romney, but now I know the feeling and would not be able to bring myself to vote for McArthur in November.

  4. And in totally unsurprising news, liberal Tom MacArthur received the endorsement of the most liberal newspaper in Pennsylvania!

    The newspaper praised liberal MacArthur’s willingness to “compromise” and applauded the fact that MacArthur “acknowledges that government has a role to play in health care,” (Obamacare). (Philadelphia Inquirer, 5/27/2014)

    The newspaper believes that compromise by conservatives is a good thing. The piece went on to criticize Steve Lonegan for his “uncompromising conservatism” and “government-is-the-problem ideology.”

  5. Not all Tea Party groups are backing Lonegan. The Independence Hall Tea Party PAC, the oldest and largest in the tri-state region, is proudly backing Tom MacArthur

  6. The Inquirer is using reverse psychology. The Inquirer Editorial Board endorsed MacArthur because they want conservatives, who despise the them, to vote for Lonegan.

    In reality, they’d prefer Lonegan win the nomination.

    This is the same reason why the liberal Harry Reid group, Patriot Majority USA (note the Tea Party sounding name) is spending tens of thousands of $$$ to trick conservatives and Tea Partiers into voting for Lonegan.

    Both the Inquirer Board and Patriot Majority know that Lonegan is the weaker candidate. The Dems stand a chance of winning if Lonegan is the nominee.

    If MacArthur wins the June 3 primary, the DCCC will give up on CD 3.

  7. I find it absolutely astonishing that someone with no defined platform who didn’t lift a finger when politicians in both parties borrowed billions of dollars without our approval, who remained silent on the Obamacare issue, and who did absolutely nothing when our previous Governor tried to shove “asset monetization” down our throats, is leading over a candidate who stands for something and has fought for us on all of these issues. If this poll is correct, liberal Tom MacArthur may once again succeed in keeping a fiscal conservative from getting elected just as he did in the Township of Randolph. Well, count me as one on a long list of voters who will be staying home, going third party, or reluctantly casting a vote for Aimee Norcross (I won’t go that far) if this empty suit succeeds in buying the nomination.

  8. Lonegan has the support of Ron Paul, Sarah Palin, Steve Forbes, and Mark Levin. MacArthur has the support of … a who’s who of tax-hiking pseudo-Republican legislators who always do what their puppet masters George Gilmore & Bill Layton tell them to do. Lonegan being our candidate means that there will be greater national interest, and it follows that we will receive far more out-of-state donations than we would if MacArthur received the nomination. Candidates like Lonegan engage the electorate and inspire people to get out and vote because he will make a difference in Washington. On the other hand, MacArthur is a status quo candidate who will vote far too often for the Obama agenda (just as the current Congressman Jon Runyan has done) and not do anything without first getting the approval of liberal Republican John Boehner (again, just like Runyan). The choice to me seems to be pretty simple and obvious. Anyone who thinks otherwise is clearly either following the money or isn’t truly engaged.

  9. An organization with a history of backing liberal candidates, which exists more to undermine the Tea Party than anything else.

  10. So you would say that the majority of their endorsements have gone to liberal candidates? Given your encyclopedic knowledge of their endorsement history, would you care to give us a comprehensive list of all of their endorsements and which ones you, being the arbiter of conservative purity, deem “liberal”?

  11. I find it hilarious that all the Lonegan supporters can do is poo poo every endorsement MacArthur gets (people who are actually from NJ, but they are all RINOs, right?) but their whole world stops when John McCain’s mistake chimes in

  12. Hey “Rufus” aka rjc if you are going to troll under different names you should avoid using a catch phrase you dumb shit

  13. Romney is not a liberal–if you read his platform, you’d know it.

    And MacArthur is a viable conservative alternative to loser Lonegan the Liar.

    Here’s some of the candidates the Independence Hall Tea Party PAC endorsed in contested primaries:

    Dale Glading, 2010
    Anna Little, 2010, 2012
    Dr. Alieta Eck, 2013
    Dave Larsen, 2012, 2014

    They recommended Jeff Bell for US Senate, 2014.

    Yea, they’re RINO’s.

    Really starting to despise ugly name-callers.

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