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Marquette Poll: Baldwin Has Four Point Lead

By Kevin Brennan // October 31, 2012 | 1:45 p.m.

With Election Day less than a week away, Democratic Rep. Tammy Baldwin holds a narrow advantage over former Gov. Tommy Thompson in the Wisconsin Senate race, according to a Marquette University Law School poll released Wednesday.

Baldwin leads Thompson 47 percent to 43 percent in the new survey. The Democrat's 4 point edge is within the poll's margin of error. In the previous poll, conducted earlier this month, Thompson led Baldwin 46 percent to 45 percent.

The poll shows Thompson winning the same level of support as Mitt Romney does in the presidential race. President Obama outpaces Romney 51 percent to 43 percent. In the previous poll, Obama led Romney by just one point: 49 percent to 48 percent.

In the Senate race, independents favor Baldwin over Thompson by a six point margin: 45 percent to 39 percent. In the previous poll, that group favored Thompson, 44 percent to 41 percent.

After narrowly emerging from a tight, four-way GOP primary, Thompson, who was elected governor four times, was considered the favorite over Baldwin because of his history of appealing to independents and moderate Democrats. But after several months of negative television ads from both sides, Thompson's fate appears increasingly tied to Romney in the Badger State. The Marquette University Law School poll, conducted Oct. 25 through Oct. 28, surveyed 1,243 likely Wisconsin voters. The margin of error for the survey is plus-or-minus 2.8 percentage points.