Scott Brown Jumps Ahead in Polls for the First Time

New Hampshire GOP U.S. Senate nominee Scott Brown has taken the lead in the polls for the first time over incumbent Democratic Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH), a new poll from New England College shows.

The poll of 1,081 likely New Hampshire voters conducted on Oct. 9 found Brown is leading Shaheen 48 percent to 46.9 percent. The 1.1 percent lead is within the 2.98 percent margin of error, but it’s the first time in 2014 Brown has been shown to be leading Shaheen in any poll.

It comes after a brutal series of political bouts between Brown and Shaheen. Brown has hammered Shaheen and President Barack Obama for being too soft on immigration, creating national security and public health risks while ISIS terrorists surge into more power in the Middle East and Ebola runs rampant through Africa and has crossed into America due to Thomas Eric Duncan–the first case diagnosed in the U.S.–allegedly lying to immigration agents to get into the U.S. when asked if he had come in contact with the disease.

Interestingly, this new poll shows Brown has actually picked up a point and a half with women voters since the previous New England College poll on Oct. 3. The previous poll showed Brown getting 41.9 percent of female voters–while the new poll shows Brown getting 43.1 percent among female voters.

That’s significant because it suggests a series of Democratic Party and Shaheen campaign attacks on Brown in the vein of the infamous 2012 “war on women” have either fallen flat or backfired. 

The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee launched a bizarre attack on Brown last week, saying he was “sexually active at 18”–an attack that twisted the meaning of what Brown actually said during a debate. In the wake of that attack, Shaheen’s campaign went up with an ad that mischaracterized Brown’s pro-choice positions on abortion.

“On issues important to women, what’s Scott Brown’s record?” a narrator said in that Shaheen campaign ad. “In Massachusetts, Scott Brown pushed for a law to force women considering abortion–force them–to look at color photographs of developing fetuses. Scott Brown wants the government to tell women how to make this decision. Anti-choice groups in Massachusetts endorsed Scott Brown and women there voted him out. Scott Brown: not for New Hampshire.”

Brown’s campaign fired back fast and hard, providing evidence that Shaheen’s claims weren’t true–and holding a press conference hammering her for making them, as well as running counter-ads.

“Let me be crystal clear: the choice to have an abortion comes down to a decision that is best made between a woman and her doctor. As you know, I live in a house full of women, and have been advocating and fighting for women’s safety my entire life,” Brown said in response last week. “For Sen. Shaheen and her allies to suggest otherwise in the way that she has is just shameful. It reminds me of what Martha Coakley tried to do when she said I would not allow women who are raped to be able to have the care and services they needed. Just as shameful.”