LOUISVILLE, Kentucky - September 5, 2010 - Rand Paul, a Tea Party-backed Republican running for a U.S. Senate seat in Kentucky, is leading his Democrat rival Jack Conway by 15 points, according to a new poll by SurveyUSA.
The poll, conducted for the Louisville Courier-Journal and WHAS-TV, puts Paul ahead of Conway, 55% to 40%. The two are vying to capture the seat being vacated by Republican Senator Jim Bunning, who is not running for re-election.
The margin of error for the poll is 4.2 points, which was conducted between August 30 and September 1. Other polls taken in mid- and late-August put Paul ahead by between five and 10 percentage points, according to polling data compiled by realclearpolitics.com.
Doug Heye, a spokesman for the Republican National Committee, on Sunday said the poll results shouldn’t come as a surprise. “The Obama agenda is unpopular in Kentucky and candidates who have publicly supported [Obama’s health-care overhaul], like Jack Conway, are seeing their numbers drop like a rock,” he said.
Neither campaign could be reached for comment on Sunday.
