Gov. Cuomo’s rivals will have to struggle to unseat him in November — but the incumbent Democrat has some work to do on getting New Yorkers to believe the economy’s on the uptick, a new poll finds.
While Cuomo crushes three Republicans — Westchester County Executive
65% to 25%, Buffalo businessman
68% to 25% and real estate mogul
70% to 26% — his job approval is at its lowest point since he took office. Voters still view him in a positive light overall.
Thursday’s NBC 4 New York/Wall Street Journal/
reports 42% of registered voters think the first-term governor is doing a good job, down 10 points from November.
About 38% call his performance “fair” and 18% rate it as “poor.”
Cuomo’s biggest drop came with minority voters: Latinos gave him a 62% positive job rating in the fall; only 41% feel the same this month. Among blacks, the figure tumbled from 57% to 42%.
Nearly two-thirds of New York voters think the state is “under the cloud of a recession,” compared to 58% who said the same last April.
“Voters’ views of the recession have impacted Cuomo’s job approval rating,” Marist found. “A slim majority of those who think the Empire State is not in a recession — 51% — think Cuomo is doing either an excellent or good job in office. This compares with only 37% of voters who say New York is in a recession.”
Still, “63% of voters have a positive view of the governor while 33% have a negative impression of him,” the pollsters said. “This is little changed from November when 66% said they liked the governor [and] 28% reported they disliked him.”
Cuomo’s foes “face an uphill fight to unseat him this November,” said Lee Miringoff, director of The Marist College Institute for Public Opinion. “Voters are comfortable with Cuomo, but he still needs to convince many that the economy is turning around.”
The poll surveyed 827 New Yorkers, including 658 registered voters, between Feb. 28 and March 3 with error margins of 3.4 and 3.8 percentage points respectively.
Complete March 6, 2014 NBC 4 New York_Wall Street Journal_Marist Poll Release and Tables
