First SurveyUSA Polling on U.S. Senate Race in New Mexico

What I find interesting is that Steve Pearce is stronger than Heather Wilson across the board, and that Don Wiviott is registering decent numbers considering he's never run before and he just begun his primary race several months ago. Note the weakness of Marty Chavez despite being in his third term as Albuquerque mayor, and having run and lost for governor in 1998.

From new SurveyUSA polling:

10 Possible Head-to-Head U.S. Senate Pairings Tested for Domenici NM Seat: When 5 possible New Mexico Democrats are paired-off against 2 possible New Mexico Republicans, in the contest to replace U.S. Senator Pete Domenici, who announced 10/04/07 his decision to retire from the Senate, Republicans win 5 match-ups and hold the seat, Democrats win 4 match-ups and take-away the seat, and one pairing is a tie, according to a SurveyUSA poll conducted exclusively for KOB-TV.

Starting with Republican candidate Steven Pearce, Congressman from New Mexico's 2nd District:

• Pearce loses to Congressman Tom Udall by 18 points
• loses to Governor Bill Richardson by 24 points
• defeats Albuquerque Mayor Marty Chavez by 21 points
• defeats former Attorney General Patricia Madrid by 16 points
• and defeats businessman Don Wiviott by 35 points.

Now to Republican candidate Heather Wilson, Congresswoman from New Mexico's 1st Congressional District:

• Wilson loses to Udall by 18 points (same as Pearce),
• loses to Richardson by 27 points (Wilson runs 3 points weaker than Pearce),
• defeats Chavez by 4 points (Wilson runs 17 points weaker than Pearce),
• effectively ties Patricia Madrid (Wilson runs 15 points weaker than Pearce)
• and defeats Wiviott by 17 points (Wilson runs 18 points weaker than Pearce).

Said the opposite way: Richardson and Udall defeat either Republican, and take-away the seat for Democrats. Wiviott is defeated by either Republican. Chavez and Madrid both are competitive against Wilson. All of the above is true today, 10/08/07, 56 weeks to the General Election on 11/04/08, but much can and will change as the contest begins to take shape.

Here are the cross tabs filling in the details on the polling.

Read our previous posts on this race.