ALBANY—A new poll gives a less-than-ringing endorsement of Rudy Giuliani's hopes for a statewide race, showing that nearly half of voters surveyed don't want to see him attempt a return to elected office.
Forty-five percent of the voters surveyed in this month's Siena Poll said they would prefer Giuliani not run for office. Twenty-seven percent would like to see him run for governor, 24 percent want him to run for U.S. Senate.
"If he challenges New York's Junior Senator, Rudy Giuliani is far better known than Kirsten Gillibrand, and currently has 46-38 percent lead over her," said Steve Greenberg, a spokesman for the Siena Poll. "Giuliani has the support of 78 percent of Republicans, while Gillibrand has 53 percent."
Giuliani would easily beat the incumbent David Paterson 52-35, but would lose to Andrew Cuomo, the persistently popular (66 percent approval rating) attorney general who is almost certainly running for governor on the Democratic line.
This poll found that Paterson's approval rating has slipped once again. Just 29 percent of voters have a favorable impression of the governor; 61 percent said he "doesn't have the leadership skills necessary to be governor" and 73 percent of voters surveyed said Paterson is well-intentioned but not getting the job done.
"Even Democrats, by a significant margin, believe the governor is well-intentioned, ineffective, bad on fiscal issues and lacking leadership," Greenberg said. "This may explain why Paterson is again near record low favorability and job performance ratings."
The poll was conducted before news broke that the White House wanted David Paterson to step aside; the survey reached 792 registered voters and has a 3.5 percent margin of error.
