Projo Politics Blog

PROVIDENCE -- Democrat Barack Obama commands a 20-point lead over Republican John McCain in the presidential race among Rhode Island voters who were surveyed, according to a Brown University poll out today.

The survey, conducted Aug. 18-20, also found that nearly 80 percent of the voters believed Rhode Island and the country are heading on the wrong track.

If the election were today, 50 percent of surveyed voters said they would vote for Obama, 30 percent for McCain and about 20 percent were undecided.

Fifty-seven percent of respondents who voted for Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton in the 2008 Democratic primary now say they plan to vote for Obama in the election. McCain was favored by 23 percent of those who supported Clinton.

Seventy-five percent of those who planned to vote for Obama said they are "satisfied" or "excited," while 52 percent of McCain voters said the same, according to the survey.

Eighty-nine percent of those polled said they were likely to vote in November.

Marion Orr, the university's Fred Lippitt public policy and political science professor who directs the Taubman Center for Public Policy, conducted the poll, which randomly sampled 548 Rhode Island voters. Margin of error was about plus or minus 4 percentage points.

-- projo.com staff writer Michael P. McKinney

 Tags  Brown University Bush Clinton McCain Obama Poll

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