Internals from Lunsford camp give McConnell a 3 point lead

Shortly after the campaign of U.S. Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Louisville) dispatched an internal polling memo touting a nine point lead for the incumbent over Democratic opponent Bruce Lunsford, Lunsford's team is out with numbers of their own showing better news for its candidate. A poll conducted by the Garin-Hart-Yang research group commissioned by Lunsford's campaign reportedly shows McConnell up 48 to 45 percent over Lunsford, with 7 percent undecided.

The margin of error on the poll is reportedly plus or minus 4.5 percent, and was conducted from October 6 to October 7.

The Lunsford camp's survey of 501 "likely voters" was announced in a memo from the polling firm lauding the fact that McConnell was sitting below 50 percent. The memo also claims the seven percent of undecided voters are "predisposed" to turn towards Lunsford as the incumbent evidently holds a 67 percent "negative job rating" among those who have yet to pick a candidate.

The polling memo from Garin-Hart-Yang concludes that the race is destined for a "photo finish," predicting a 51 to 49 percent conclusion "either way."

McConnell's internal poll released this afternoon nearly matched the Lunsford numbers for the Republican, but differed sharply for the Democrat, with figures from Voter/Consumer Research giving McConnell a 47 to 38 point lead. Undecided figures for the McConnell poll were not specified, though the figures released obviously indicate 15 percent poll did not pick one of the two candidates.

The release from the Lunsford camp is its first internal poll release of the general election and it comes as poll results leave questions lingering. Lunsford was polling 12 points behind McConnell  in mid-August but new Surveys from mid-September showed the margin as small as one point. Since then, a Rasmussen Reports survey gave McConnell a nine point lead that was echoed in the internal poll memo released by the Republican's campaign earlier today.

Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin-top:0in; mso-para-margin-right:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:10.0pt; mso-para-margin-left:0in; line-height:115%; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-fareast; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;}