By Alex Roarty
PoliticsPA Staff Writer
roarty@politicspa.com

Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Joe Sestak trails incumbent Arlen Specter by 2 percentage points, 44 percent to 42 percent, among likely Democratic voters, according to a poll released Tuesday by Rasmussen Reports. The difference is within the poll’s 5 percentage point margin of error.

Its findings are dramatically different than other polls on the primary, which have shown Specter winning by huge margins. A Quinnipiac University poll released last week showed the challenger trailing by 21 points, 53 percent to 32 percent, while a Franklin & Marshall poll unveiled in late March showed the former Navy Admiral losing by 20 points, 32 percent to 12 percent.

A Rasmussen survey released mid-March showed Sestak closer to Specter than the others, but still trailing by 11 points, 48 percent to 37 percent. Their findings have largely fed the perception that Sestak faces a mountainous uphill climb against Specter with five weeks left before the May 18 primary.

But the Rasmussen numbers released Tuesday might give hope to Sestak supporters, while raising the eyebrows of political observers across the state, who have watched their candidate’s campaign seemingly struggle to gain traction against an incumbent with the support of nearly the entire Democratic establishment.

Sestak did have $5 million on hand to start the year, leading some analysts to speculate he has enough firepower to take down Specter with an aggressive TV ad campaign.

UPDATE: The Specter campaign declined to comment on the poll, as is its policies on independent surveys of the race.

Sestak spokesman Jonathon Dworkin, without referencing the poll specifically, said Specter’s record isn’t what voters are looking for this election.

“As we’ve always said, this election will go down to the last week, as we continue to get our message out that we are fighting for the working families, from health care to quality job creation and that principle must triumph over politics,” Dworkin said.

Tags: Arlen Specter, Arlen Specter for Senate, Arlen Specter Joe Sestak poll numbers, Joe Sestak, Joe Sestak for Senate

This entry was posted on Tuesday, April 13th, 2010 at 3:43 pm and is filed under Front Page Stories. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.