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Salt Lake Tribune Poll: Love 52, Matheson 40

By Julie Sobel // November 2, 2012 | 6:57 a.m.

Republican Mia Love has opened up a wide lead over Democratic Rep. Jim Matheson in Utah's 4th District in a new independent poll released Friday.

Love leads Matheson 52 percent to 40 percent in the Salt Lake Tribune survey, which was conducted for the newspaper by Mason-Dixon. The poll was conducted October 29-31 and surveyed 625 likely voters. It has a margin of error of plus-or-minus 4 percentage points.

The survey showed just 9 percent of Republicans supporting Matheson. He'll need to do better than that to win in heavily Republican Utah. The Tribune reports that a Matheson internal poll showed him getting a heftier 19 percent of GOP support (the survey, released this week, showed him winning by two points).

But Mason-Dixon managing director Brad Coker said that Mitt Romney, hugely popularity in Utah, could be hurting Matheson (the GOP presidential nominee just cut an ad for Love).

"Romney is winning [Utah] by such a big margin and Republican voters are coming out because of Romney," Coker said. "It's just not a good year to be a Democrat in Utah."

The poll also showed Matheson behind among female voters, with Love beating him 54 percent to 38 percent. Both sides have seen the pricey race as close, and polls have showed ties as well as each candidate up at various times. A Key Research poll conducted in mid-October showed the contest tied, with each candidate bringing in 43 percent of the vote.