Minnick Gains Recognition But Not Support Poll Finds Democrat Better Known, But Craig Is Better Liked

Although twice as many people now know who Democrat Walt Minnick is, he hasn’t gained any ground in his bid to unseat Republican Sen. Larry Craig since last May.

That’s the finding of a poll commissioned by The Idaho Spokesman-Review and two television stations. Conducted by Mason-Dixon Political/Media Research, the poll interviewed 809 Idaho voters by phone Thursday through Saturday.

Fifty-six percent said they’d vote for Craig, with 32 percent favoring Minnick. Because the poll has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.5 percent, the results are not considered a significant change from May figures of 54 percent to 31 percent.

The poll also found a steady increase in Craig’s job performance ratings, which hit 64 percent rating him “excellent” or “good” now. That’s up from 57 percent in May and 48 percent back in 1992.

“He’s a popular U.S. senator in Idaho and he’s got a pretty safe seat,” said Del Ali, vice president of the polling company.

Craig’s campaign press secretary, Mike Tracy, said, “What it tells us is their negative campaigning and a lot of their sleazy tactics don’t sell to Idaho voters. And that’s all we’ve seen out of their campaign for the last 100 days between your two polls.”

But Bill Broadhead, Minnick’s campaign spokesman, said Minnick’s polls show a “very different picture” with the race tightening. “And given the volume of the Craig campaign’s attacks on Walt Minnick, I would argue that the Craig campaign believes this race is much tighter.”

Broadhead noted that last week, the Craig campaign filed what Broadhead termed a “ludicrous” campaign finance complaint against Minnick. It alleged that Minnick had charged too high an interest rate on a loan to his own campaign. But Minnick immediately provided proof that the rate matched his bank’s.

Federal Election Commission rules allow “commercially reasonable” interest rates on a candidate’s loan to his own campaign.

Said Broadhead, “If Craig really believes he’s up as much as he says, you just don’t do that.”

Tracy said the poll results show the Minnick campaign was “putting out inaccurate information” when it earlier released its own more favorable numbers. “We believe he needed to show some improvement in the numbers so that people would contribute to him,” Tracy said.

The new poll showed that 22 percent of respondents hadn’t heard of Minnick, while just 2 percent hadn’t heard of Craig. Craig is seeking his second Senate term. Before that he served five terms in the House.

Minnick, a former wood products executive, is making his first run for office. Minnick’s name identification was up from May, when 42 percent of Idahoans hadn’t heard of him.

Twenty-one percent had favorable impressions of Minnick, up from 19 percent in May, but the number with unfavorable impressions rose from 8 percent to 14 percent. Forty-three percent were neutral.

Asked their opinion of Craig, 52 percent were favorable, 20 percent unfavorable and 26 percent neutral.

Independent candidate Mary Charbonneau was better known than in May, when 71 percent hadn’t heard of her. But her unfavorable ratings also rose, from 5 percent to 11 percent. And only 2 percent said they’d vote for her, down from 3 percent.

Craig’s support was strongest in the 1st Congressional District, which includes North Idaho. There, he held a 59 to 30 percent edge over Minnick. In the 2nd District, it was 53 to 34 percent.

The “gender gap” that has surfaced for Republicans nationwide doesn’t exist for Craig in Idaho, Ali said. Craig’s support was 57 percent to Minnick’s 33 percent among men, and 55 to 31 percent among women.

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Graphic: Sounding out Idaho - Safe Senate seat for Republicans?