Cantwell has big lead in poll, fundraising

U.S. Sen. Maria Cantwell’s re-election campaign was crowing about two bits of good news for her:

Federal Election Commission reports filed this week showed she raised more than $1 million fo the third quarter of this campaign year. And a new poll by Rasmussen Reports shows her with a 20-point lead over Republican challenger Mike Baumgartner.

Rasmussen also has President Obama up by 11 points over Republican challenger Mitt Romney, and Washington’s gubernatorial race in a virtual dead heat, with Democrat Jay Inslee at 46 percent and Republican Rob McKenna at 45 percent. ( Editor’s note: Earlier versions of this post had the numbers for the governor’s race reversed.)

A spokeswoman for the Baumgartner campaign says they expect to have a figure for third quarter contributions by Friday.