Politics & Government

Senate Race Poll Shows Murphy with Lead, Many Undecided

News and updates from the campaign trail in Connecticut.

Senate

A new University of Connecticut/Hartford Courant poll shows U.S. Rep. Chris Murphy with a 44-38 edge against Linda McMahon. Seventeen percent of voters remain undecided. 

The sampling of 574 likely voters shows high unfavorability ratings of 39 percent for McMahon and 34 percent for Murphy.

Corry Bliss, campaign manager for McMahon, said the polling results are “extremely suspect.” 

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"Clearly, this poll oversampled Democrats and severely undersampled Independents,” he said. “Recognizing that Independents represent the largest voting bloc in the state and that Linda McMahon has been winning Independents by a significant margin in every other public poll released during the past several weeks, it becomes obvious that this poll is not representative of Connecticut's voting population -- despite the Courant's biased attempt to dismiss the sampling errors.”

Murphy’s campaign fired back that McMahon is desperate.

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“Connecticut voters are seeing past McMahon's nasty personal attacks and are hearing more and more about her right-wing Republican plans to end Social Security, privatize Medicare, cut taxes for the rich, and deny rape victims access to emergency contraception," said Murphy campaign spokesman Eli Zupnick in a written statement.

Third District

Rosa DeLauro (D) is among Connecticut politicians who are opposed to selling Plum Island on the Long Island Sound, according to the Register Citizen.

Wayne Winsley (R) plans to be a featured speaker at a “Stand Up for Religious Freedom Rally” at the New Haven Green on Saturday at noon.

Fourth District

Jim Himes (D): No Labels, a self-describedgrassroots movement of Democrats, Republicans and independents dedicated to the politics of problem solving” lauded Himes with their seal of approval.

“Congress today is more polarized and more mired in gridlock than ever before,” said No Labels co-founder William Galston in a written statement. “With such crucial issues to be solved for our country, we need more leaders like Himes who are willing to put politics aside to solve problems.”

Steve Obsitnik (R) met with Hersam Acorn Newspapers to discuss his policies and campaign.

“I think what people want now in their representative is someone who is independent-minded, someone who is willing to go down and make tough decisions and someone who is going to be held accountable,” Obsitnik told the newspaper chain. “I am so confident of this, I’m term-limiting myself to eight years. I’m going to put my money where my mouth is. I don’t want Washington to change me.”

Fifth District

Although the Fifth District is somewhat overlooked compared to the headlines coming out of the Senate Race, the Connecticut Mirror describes that race as the “the other TV commercial slugfest.” Andrew Roraback and Elizabeth Esty had their first debate on Tuesday. They face off again on Saturday, Oct. 20.

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