Perry, Romney Tie Obama in Virginia

By Steven Shepard  //  September 15, 2011 | 6:20 a.m.
Updated: September 16, 2011 | 8:00 a.m.

Both Rick Perry and Mitt Romney run neck-and-neck with a weakened President Obama in the crucial battleground state of Virginia, according to a new Quinnipiac University poll that shows that, at least in this southern state, neither GOP candidate can claim to be demonstrably better equipped to defeat Obama at this stage of the campaign.

Obama leads Perry, 44 percent to 42 percent, while Romney edges ahead of Obama by that very same margin.

"At this point Romney and Perry both are in a horse race against President Barack Obama, challenging Romney's 'electability' argument," said Quinnipiac University Polling Institute assistant director Peter Brown.

Romney does slightly better than Perry among independents, leading Obama by nine among that group. Perry and Obama split the independent vote down the middle.

Perry does lead Romney in the state's Republican primary, according to the poll, 25 percent to 19 percent. No other candidate earns even double-digit support.

The poll shows that Obama has lost significant ground since Quinnipiac's last survey, in late June. Today, just 40 percent of Virginia voters approve of the job Obama is doing, down from 48 percent in June. Fifty-four percent of voters disapprove of his job performance, including 62 percent of independents. A majority of voters, 51 percent, think he does not deserve to be re-elected, while 41 percent believe he does. In late June, voters were split evenly on the question of Obama's re-election. The Quinnipiac poll was conducted Sept. 7-12, surveying 1,368 registered voters. The margin of error is +/- 2.7 percent. For the Republican primary question, 591 voters were surveyed, for a margin of error of +/- 4.0 percent. In 2008, Obama became the first Democrat to win Virginia since Lyndon Johnson in 1964.

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