South Carolina Poll Reinforces Prior InsiderAdvantage/Majority Opinion Polling in South: Al Gore’s Entry Into the Presidential Campaign Boosts Clinton’s Numbers

By Southern Political Report Staff

(4/10/07) It is no mystery that Senator Hilary Clinton has seen her fair share of struggles when trying to obtain a strong male vote for her 2008 presidential campaign. While she has a strong foundation across female voters, the male vote may decide Senator Clinton’s fate in the upcoming election. So the last thing Clinton would push for is another strong male adversary, right? Wrong. Interestingly enough, the addition of yet another strong male candidate may be just what the political analyst ordered to cure Clinton’s headache.

InsiderAdvantage/Majority Opinion Research conducted two different Democratic Presidential Primary Polls in South Carolina and found two very unique and different results. The first poll was conducted without Al Gore as a candidate for the Democratic Primary and the second poll was conducted with Mr. Gore’s involvement. While most of the numbers were consistent between the two polls, Gore’s addition sent shockwaves through two very important numbers: Obama’s and Clinton’s overall percentage of votes.

The Results

In the first poll without Gore, Obama received 34% of the overall votes with Clinton receiving only 20%. However, in the second poll where Gore was factored into the equation, Obama’s votes drastically declined to 22% while Clinton’s votes stayed strong at 21%, turning a once lopsided distribution into a neck and neck race.

Democratic Survey:

I’m going to repeat the question with a slightly different list of names. Please again press the number for the candidate to would vote for if the election were held today.

Obama: 22%
Clinton: 21%
Edwards: 18%
Gore: 14%
Biden: 4%
Richardson: 3%
Dodd: 0%
Don’t know: 18%

So how did the numbers turn so drastically with the addition of what seems to be another blue chip competitor for Clinton? The answer lies in the distribution of the male vote. In the poll without Gore, Obama received 27% of the male vote while Clinton only received half that much. However, when pollsters factored Gore into the election race, the male vote was instantaneously split, with Obama now receiving only 15%, Gore receiving 15%, and Clinton actually gaining points and receiving 17% of the male vote. Thus, the addition of Gore splits the male votes (who would not be voting for Clinton) between two candidates, weakening Obama’s numbers and instantly boosting Clinton’s.

InsiderAdvantage CEO and nationally syndicated columnist (Creators Syndicate) Matt Towery explains the unique situation. “We have consistently seen that the addition of Al Gore’s name to the Democratic field has a positive affect for Senator Clinton. This runs contrary to conventional wisdom. Why is Gore’s entry a plus for Clinton? First and foremost, it adds another big name male Democrat to the list of potential candidates. Senator Clinton maintains her share of male support, which she held in the poll with the former Vice President’s name not included. But other candidates, specifically Obama, lose substantial ground among decided male voters when Gore’s name is added to the field.”

So while Obama hopes to keep this campaign a two man race (or at least a one man and one woman race), Senator Clinton can only hope that the ad old adage “the more the merrier” comes to fruition and former Vice President Gore throws his hat into the primary because Obama’s loss will most certainly be Clinton’s gain.