Corzine gaining, but will it be fast enough?

On Monday, Neighborhood Research, a Republican polling firm, released a poll that, when ‘likely voters’ are considered, puts Governor Corzine ahead of Chris Christie 37-35% (with Chris Daggett receiving 6%.) (click here for link.) Hopefully, this won’t be the last poll to put Corzine ahead of Christe, but, still, 22% of ‘likely voters’ remain undecided about which candidate they are going to vote for come November. This, of course, is good news for Corzine, but it means he must continue the hard work he has endured throughout August – the relentless attack on Christie while pushing his credentials to be Governor can not cease or even relent mildly. Still, in order to understand where Corzine should go, we need to look at how he brought his sagging poll numbers up to, at the very least, a drawl so far. Since the last time I too a look at this very competitive race a lot has happened, so we need to start by figuring out what happened, how that affects the candidates, and what Corzine needs to do moving into the last 2 months of this intense campaign.

Context: The last time I looked at this race, I made one thing clear – Corzine can’t win on his popularity, he must win by making Christie the greater of two evils. The Corzine campaign has done just that, and it has had some benefits. In a recent Quinnipiac poll, from July 14^th to August 11^th, Christie’s unfavorables versus his favorables increased by a margin of 2 to 1; however, there is still 28% of the voters who haven’t heard enough about him to make a decision. However, one thing seems certain, the Christie camp is having a difficult time decreasing the Governor’s favorables. In the same Quinnipiac study, Corzine’s favorables increase by 3% while his unfavorables decrease by 4% - at the very least, Corzine’s campaign is solidly defending the Governor, at its best, the campaign is changing public opinion about the Governor. Either way, it doesn’t seem Christie’s campaign is having a great impact on voters, at least towards Corzine (click here for link.)

These numbers are in spite of the fact that on June 23^rd, Christie’s former place of employment (i.e. the US attorney’s office) arrested over 30 people, several of whom were elected officials, in one of the biggest corruption scandals in New Jersey. Christie’s message of ending state-wide corruption surely got a boast from this story. However, since mid-August, Christie has been rocked by scandal as well. First, President Bush’s ex-deputy chief of staff, Karl Rove, admitted to conversing with Christie while he was serving as US Attorney, possibly a violation of the Hatch Act. In addition, it was revealed that Christie failed to disclose a loan he made to a member of his staff at the US Attorney’s office (the staff member has subsequently resigned from the office) and the New York Times, as well as other news outlets, have chronicled Christie’s lack of effort as a freeholder to bring about ethics reform to his county. With all this adding up, the Corzine campaign has done nothing but bang the drum of hypocrisy at Chris Christie, which, it seems, hasn’t had the greatest effect on his election campaign.

Messaging and Moving Forward: When it comes to what the NJ Governor’s race will truly be about, one thing is clear – it is about the economy. 51% of voters (in the same Quinnipiac poll) believe that taxes or the economy are the most important issues facing New Jersey. Another 14% believe that a ‘lack of ethics’ or ‘politicians’ in general are the biggest issue facing New Jersey. This can all play right into the hand Governor Corzine has been dealt.

Though Christie still scores better with voters on who they think can fix most of New Jersey’s problems, Corzine is gaining ground, and it is clear that his campaign has had an impact on Christie – to succeed, this needs to continue.

1. First, the Governor must continue his unrelenting attacks on Christie’s hypocrisy – Corzine needs to paint him as a politician that will say one thing, yet do another. This will weaken Christie’s ‘ethics’ position and increase his unfavorables. If Christie’s ‘go-to’ position is weakened, he will be forced to talk about the pressing issues (taxes and the economy) in a real way. And, as he talks about them, voters will come to learn that his campaign lacks any real plan to fix the problems New Jersey faces.
2. President Obama is still very popular in New Jersey. A Daily Kos poll gives him an approval rating of 62% (61% among independents), whereas neither Corzine nor Christie break the 50% mark (click here for link.) Using the President to highlight the fact that New Jersey added over 13,000 private sector jobs while reducing public sector jobs by over 7,000 in the month of August could be a successful strategy in two regards. First, it will motivate the Democratic base, which, in New Jersey, must come out in full force to support Corzine if he is to win. Secondly, and equally important, Obama’s push on a positive economic outlook thanks to Corzine’s hard work will play well with Independent voters who like Obama but are leery of Corzine – it could just be the push they need to reconsider Christie (especially in the wake of his scandals.)
3. Lastly, Corzine needs to counter Christie’s recent attacks on him being a ‘wizard of Wall Street.’ Firstly, a majority of voters do not believe that Corzine’s prior career will make a difference on his ability to govern – and this is a trend that cuts through party ID. So, these attacks will, probably, be unsuccessful; however, it is important to counter – and counter strong. Corzine needs to come out and reiterate his economic expertise as a way to get New Jersey back on track. He can use this as an opportunity to call Christie out on his economic and tax plan (or lack thereof) and remind people of his budgetary accomplishments as governor. This must be used as an opportunity to turn the conversation around and say, ‘I know how to get us out of this mess, I’m already doing it – but it seems all Christie knows how to do is point figures, not create jobs.”

Corzine’s success in the next two months will rely on his ability to paint Christie as a typical politician – a champion of ethics reform, so long as it isn’t for him, and a critic of the Governor, without any real plans that will help New Jersey. By leveraging the current bad press Christie is receiving and allowing President Obama to trumpet his economic accomplishment, Corzine can create disillusionment with Christie while rallying Democrats and swaying Independents to his cause. When all is said and done, if he can pull this off, Christie will not be left standing.