Yet another poll has come out of Alabama showing conservative Roy Moore leading establishment-backed Luther Strange in the U.S. Senate GOP primary runoff, this time showing Moore’s lead back up to 15 percent.
Moore, per a new poll from the firm Strategic National, is up at 51 percent while Strange still lags under 40 at just 36 percent. The poll shows 14 percent are undecided.
The survey of 800 likely voters, conducted Sept. 6 to Sept. 7, has a margin of error of 3.5 percent. It’s the latest in a long line of polls showing Strange, who was appointed into the U.S. Senate seat vacated by now Attorney General Jeff Sessions earlier this year, significantly underwater.
What’s more, Strange’s favorability rating is in the gutter. A whopping 44 percent total have either a very or somewhat unfavorable view of Strange—staggeringly high numbers inside his own party. Meanwhile, Moore remains very popular as well more than a majority—a solid 62 percent—have either a somewhat or very favorable view of the conservative anti-establishment candidate.
This is the second poll out on Monday that shows Moore with a substantial double-digit lead over Strange. The other one, an Emerson College Polling Society survey, showed Moore with a 14-point lead. That poll also showed Moore outperforming Strange against Democrat Doug Jones in the general election. Other recent polls have shown similar commanding leads for Moore over Strange.
Strange has failed to gain any traction in this race whatsoever since the Aug. 15 multi-way GOP primary, and has remained at about the level at which he finished the race–in deep second place. Meanwhile, Moore—who far outperformed his polls on primary day—has soared up over 50 percent in most surveys heading into the Sept. 26 runoff.
Strange’s most significant endorser, President Donald Trump, has backed off his support for Strange since the primary. Trump endorsed Strange to help knock out Rep. Mo Brooks (R-AL) in the first round, due to a number of comments Brooks—who supported Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) for president in 2016—made during the presidential primaries last year.
The appointment of Strange into the seat has come under significant scrutiny in this race, as he was the attorney general of Alabama and was investigating then-Gov. Robert Bentley for a corruption and sex scandal. Strange had formally asked the state legislature to hold off on impeachment proceedings against Bentley while he investigated him, only to have Bentley appoint him into the U.S. Senate seat Sessions left to serve as President Trump’s attorney general.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell is strongly backing Strange, with a PAC affiliated with him called Senate Leadership Fund spending more than $10 million to try to buy Strange a full-time slot in the U.S. Senate. The group has run scores of attack ads, but none of them seem to be working, as Moore maintains his lead.
Strange has been trying to get Trump to come campaign for him, but Trump has largely stayed out of Alabama due to Strange’s lackluster chances of winning and a packed September legislative agenda complicated even more by Hurricanes Harvey and Irma. Strange’s alliances with acolytes of GOP establishment consultant Karl Rove–Strange hired Rove’s ex-chief of staff, and the Senate Leadership Fund’s top executive is longtime Rove ally Steven Law–have been further insulting to the president. Sources close to the president tell Breitbart News that his withdrawal of support for Strange in the runoff has been in part due to Strange’s cozying up to Rove. President Trump previously told Breitbart News he thinks Rove is a “dishonorable guy” and “shouldn’t be allowed to write for the Wall Street Journal” because of his dishonesty.