Governor races

Rhode Island nominee for governor was upset he did not win Obama's endorsement.

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A new poll shows the Colorado governor's race in a statistical tie between Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper (D) and former Rep. Tom Tancredo.

The result should concern Democrats who had expected Hickenlooper to coast to victory with the conservative vote split between Tancredo, who's running on the American Constitution Party line, and Republican nominee Dan Maes. 

But Maes has been steadily bleeding support after a series of damaging press reports crippled his candidacy. In the Magellan Data and Mapping Strategies survey released Friday, he took just 9 percent of the vote.

This is the latest survey to show Tancredo closing in on Hickenlooper.

In the Magellan poll, Hickenlooper is out front with 44 percent of the vote, while Tancredo took 43 percent. The automated survey of 1,067 likely Colorado voters, which was conducted Oct. 20, has a margin of error of 3 percent.

Since the firm’s Aug. 25 poll, support for Maes has plummeted from 27 to 9 percent. At the same time, Tancredo’s support has increased from 17 to 43 percent.

The Tancredo camp has been pressuring Maes to drop out and make it a two-person race. His campaign manager, Bay Buchanan, recently called a Maes supporter to say "the time is absolutely now" for Maes to give up, according to The Denver Post.

BALTIMORE — Former President Clinton says: "They're banking on some people being so mad that facts don’t matter."

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BALTIMORE — Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-Md.) said the media wants Democrats to apologize for passing healthcare reform.

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Former Rep. Wayne Gilchrest (R-Md.), who lost a primary challenge from the right in 2008, is backing Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley (D) in his reelection race against former Gov. Bob Ehrlich (R).

Glichrest has made no secret of his disappointment in the direction his party has taken over the past few election cycles, repeatedly warning of a rightward shift in the GOP. 

The centrist Republican was defeated by state legislator Andy Harris in 2008, leading Gilchrest to endorse Rep. Frank Kratovil (D-Md.) in the general election. Kratovil ran a narrow victory over Harris two years ago and faces a rematch with the Republican this fall.

Former Vice President Al Gore is highlighting the need to further respond to the Gulf of Mexico oil spill and stimulate a still-lagging economy in a fundraising e-mail sent Monday for Democrat Alex Sink’s gubernatorial effort in Florida.
 
Gore's e-mail — sent on the first day early voting starts in the Florida governor’s race — asks for $10 contributions to Sink’s campaign against Republican Rick Scott to succeed Gov. Charlie Crist.
 
“To get the economy back on track and recover from the oil spill, Florida needs a leader with Alex’s business experience,” Gore states in the e-mail. “The stakes in this race are too high for anyone to stay on the sidelines.
 
“With Early Voting starting today, the reality is that this week could decide the election — which is why Alex needs your help to expand her outreach efforts now,” Gore adds. “This election will go down to the wire, and the $10 contribution you make today — which allows Alex’s campaign to knock on a few more doors or run one more TV ad — could be what decides this election.”

The race continues to be one of the closest gubernatorial contests in the nation, with a recent Rasmussen Report poll showing Scott ahead by three points, 50 percent to 47.
 
In September, Gore campaigned for Florida Democratic Senate hopeful Rep. Kendrick Meek. The Nobel Prize-winning climate crusader also has helped Ohio Senate Democratic candidate Lee Fisher and is sending a video out to supporters of Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick (D) attacking the global-warming views of his Republican challenger, Charles Baker.

Several major newspapers in Minnesota have backed the independent candidate over both the Democrat and the Republican in the gubernatorial race.

The Independence Party's Tom Horner got the backing of Minneapolis Star Tribune and several other major papers on Sunday.

"He possesses not only the understanding and communication skills that governing requires, but, unlike either DFLer [Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party] Mark Dayton or Republican Tom Emmer, he also has the temperament to bridge the partisan divide that has long stymied the search for lasting solutions to chronic problems, both in Minnesota and the nation," the Star Tribune’s editorial board wrote in its endorsement Sunday.

Horner also got the backing over the weekend of the Fargo Forum, the Duluth News Tribune and the Bemidji Pioneer.

A recent Rasmussen survey of 750 likely Minnesota voters showed Dayton with a narrow lead —40 percent to 38 percent lead — over Emmer. Horner took just 15 percent in that survey.

President Obama wraps up his Western swing on Saturday in Minneapolis with a rally for Dayton. Democrats view Minnesota as one of a handful of states where the party could pick up the governorship.

Major newspapers have backed third-party candidates in other states recently, but with little impact. The Newark Star-Ledger, New Jersey's largest newspaper, endorsed former-EPA Regional Administrator Chris Daggett (I) in the 2009 governor's race. Daggett went on to finish third behind Republican Chris Christie and Gov. Jon Corzine (D) with some 5 percent of the vote.

New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo (D) is pulling away from his Republican challenger, Buffalo-area businessman Carl Paladino, in the race to become the state's next governor, according to a new poll. 

A New York Times survey released Sunday showed Cuomo leading Paladino 59-24 percent among likely voters, one of the largest leads the Democrat has held over the Republican during the widely watched general-election campaign. 

After Paladino upset former Rep. Rick Lazio in the GOP primary, many thought that Cuomo would have an easier path to victory. But several polls released in the days and weeks following Paladino's victory showed him within striking distance of Cuomo, the son of former Gov. Mario Cuomo (a Quinnipiac University survey released Sept. 22 showed him trailing Cuomo by only six). 

But since then, Paladino's campaign has been marked by missteps made by the fiery candidate, which have drawn national attention to the race.

He got into tussle with a reporter at a campaign event, telling him, "I'll take you out." Paladino, who received the backing of Tea Party activists, also found himself in hot water over a controversial remark he made about homosexuals during a speech to Orthodox Jewish rabbis, for which he later apologized. That comment came as he was facing questions about a child he fathered out of wedlock.

Fifty-nine percent of registered voters said Paladino does not have the right personality or temperament to be governor, compared to 73 percent who say Cuomo does.

The Times poll showed that New Yorkers are deeply dissatisfied with the condition of their state's government and economy, but have not taken to Paladino's message of government reform. 

Forty-one percent of the larger sample of registered voters have a favorable view of Cuomo, and 63 percent approve of his job performance as attorney general, despite their general attitude against the state government. Those numbers contrast with the 43 percent who view Paladino unfavorably.

Seventy-nine percent of New Yorkers polled say the state's economy is fairly or very bad, but 27 percent of registered voters said that the the economy would likely get better under Cuomo, compared to 29 percent who said it would get worse under Paladino. 

Still, more voters believe that the economy will remain the same under both potential governors (53 percent for Cuomo, 41 percent for Paladino). 

The registered voters surveyed by the Times who also voted for president in 2008 largely supported then-Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) over Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), 58 percent to 26. 

The Times polled 1,143 New Yorkers, including 943 registered voters between Oct. 10-15. The margin of error is three percentage points for both groups.

Obama also addressed AIDS protesters at the rally by saying that Republicans would cut funding to fight HIV.

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Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer (R) denied rumors that she is ill Thursday after critics accused her of hiding a health issue they say could threaten her ability, if elected, to serve a full term.

"I am just perfectly fine," she told Fox's Greta Van Susteren in an interview. "But it has gotten to the point where we're talking about irrelevant ridiculous things in this campaign, and that is unfortunate."

Her denial hasn't satisfied local blogs, which wondered following her infamous 16-second pause during a debate with Democratic challenger Terry Goddard whether it was the sign of a health problem.

Former Arizona Senate candidate John Dougherty (D), an investigative reporter, has fueled further speculation with a post to his Facebook page claiming sources have told him Brewer, 66, recently had a biopsy for thyroid cancer.

He pointed to a TV appearance Brewer made in early October in which she wore a bandage consistent with the procedure, and said Friday that the campaign had not returned requests for comment.

Brewer, meanwhile, has consistently denied rumors that she is ill, saying they are politically-motivated.

"There have been recent outlandish and completely unsubstantiated reports on liberal internet blogs and Twitter citing anonymous sources questioning my health," she said in a statement Tuesday. "Before committing to seek election, I had a complete checkup with my doctors and confirmed there is nothing to prevent me from holding office for four more years."

Her campaign manager, Chuck Coughlin, later pushed back against the rumor by referencing speculation in the early 1990s that Goddard, who is married and has a child, is gay.

"In no way is anyone suggesting that there is a problem with being gay, but it has a common lack of relevance to this race for Governor as the unfounded rumors being perpetuated by Goddard and his democrat operatives," he wrote on his firm's website. 

A day later, Coughlin wrote again, apologizing for the post.

"Our posting of 20 year old rumors, on a blog — no less, was meant to be an example of the extreme nature of such speculation. Pointing out this ridiculousness should in no way insinuate or imply anything further," he said.

A poll released Monday has Brewer three points ahead of Goddard — a substantial decline since the summer, when her lead was consistently above 19 points.

She has an 11-point lead among likely voters, the results show.