Las Vegas Sun

March 28, 2024

Poll: Reid, Porter hold significant leads

Incumbents Sen. Harry Reid and Rep. Jon Porter still enjoy comfortable leads over their Nov. 2 general election opponents, based on a new poll.

In a statewide Las Vegas Sun/Channel 8 Eyewitness News/KNPR Nevada Public Radio poll of 600 very likely voters taken from Oct. 16 through Oct. 19, Democrat Reid was favored by a margin of 63 percent to 29 percent, with 7 percent undecided, over Republican challenger Richard Ziser in the race for Reid's U.S. Senate seat.

The poll was conducted by Washington-based polling firm Belden Russonello & Stewart and had a margin of error of 4 percentage points.

"On the surface, this shows that Reid, a three-term senator, is much more widely known than Ziser and had the advantage going into the race," Kate Stewart, a partner in the polling firm, said.

Of the 316 very likely voters polled in the 3rd Congressional District, Republican Porter was shown holding a 49-32 advantage, with 17 percent undecided, in his race against Democratic challenger Tom Gallagher. The margin of error was 5.5 percentage points.

In a poll the firm conducted last month, Reid led Ziser 58-32 and Porter was ahead of Gallagher 54-33. The latest poll shows that Reid has widened his advantage while Porter's lead has lessened somewhat.

"That's still a very significant lead that Porter enjoys," Stewart said. "Gallagher still has a lot of ground to make up between now and the election."

Reid, the Senate minority whip who is seeking his fourth six-year term, has enjoyed a substantial fundraising edge over Ziser and has blanketed the airwaves with advertisements.

"Reid has been spending all this money saying what he's delivered for Nevada," UNR political science professor Eric Herzik said. "Up in Northern Nevada I haven't seen a single Ziser ad. Reid is running virtually unopposed because no one knows who his opponent is."

Reid campaign spokeswoman Tessa Hafen said the senator was happy with the poll results. She attributed the poll results more to "Sen. Reid's accomplishments" than to his substantial fundraising advantage.

"He's had a top-notch campaign running for almost two years and he's taking nothing for granted," Hafen said.

Ziser, though, said lack of campaign financing has been a major factor for him because he has had trouble getting his message out.

"Obviously it's mostly name identification," Ziser said. "I still believe we can pull these numbers up because of the type of targeting that we're doing in this race."

Ziser, a self-employed investment manager, was former chairman of the Coalition for the Protection of Marriage. The coalition led a successful effort to amend the Nevada Constitution to prohibit the state from recognizing gay marriages, but Ziser has conducted a virtually invisible campaign against Reid.

"Ziser has no political experience and he has no money either," UNLV political science professor David Damore said. "The surprising thing is that Reid didn't get a better challenger."

Of the 600 individuals polled in the Senate race, 222 were self-described Republicans, 220 were Democrats and 103 were independent. There were 306 men and 294 women. Sixty-five percent of those polled live in Clark County.

Reid's lead over Ziser cuts across gender, age and locale. Reid also has a 63 percent to 24 percent advantage among independent voters. His lead in Clark County is 63-27.

Porter, a former insurance salesman, state senator and Boulder City mayor, is seeking his second two-year term in Congress. Opponent Gallagher is a lawyer and former hotel executive.

Porter campaign chairman Mike Slanker said the poll numbers are similar to those conducted by the congressman's re-election team.

"It's going to be close," Slanker said of the race. "It's a slight Democratic district and I always believed it would end up in single digits. But we feel great about where we are.

"Jon Porter has been underestimated many times. He has enjoyed a tremendous crossover vote his entire career."

Despite Porter's lead, Gallagher campaign spokeswoman Mara Gassmann said she took comfort in the 17 percent of likely voters who said they were still undecided. Gassmann said the Gallagher campaign believes that Porter's support is soft among many likely voters, particularly seniors, because he has not done enough in Congress to lower prescription drug prices.

"Porter is still under 50 percent," Gassmann said. "We're not troubled by this poll because there are still two weeks left and we're spending a lot of time talking about Tom's commitment to working families."

Of the 316 individuals polled in the 3rd Congressional District, 131 were Democrats, 102 were Republicans and 54 were independent. There were 163 men and 153 women.

Porter enjoys a healthy lead over Gallagher among both men (51-32) and women (46-31), and among individuals aged 18 to 39 (45-29) and 40 to 59 (55-25). But among individuals aged 60 and older, Porter leads by a margin of only 45 percent to 44 percent, within the margin of error for this race.

"It is interesting to see that voters 60 and over are split on the two candidates," Stewart said.

Herzik said that Porter ought to be concerned about the close margin of the 60-plus voters because they are more likely to vote than younger individuals. But the professor said that Gallagher hasn't made much improvement in the past month and that Porter still enjoys "a big lead."

"I would say that overall these are very troubling numbers for Gallagher," Herzik said.

Particularly telling is that Porter has support from 87 percent of the Republicans whereas Gallagher is favored by only 57 percent of the Democrats. Among independent voters, Porter has a 50-22 edge.

"To some degree it's not surprising that Porter has this lead because nobody really knows Gallagher," Damore said.

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