Democrat Scott McAdams is pulling closer to Republican Joe Miller and write-in candidate Lisa Murkowski in Alaska’s Senate race, according to a new poll by the conservative Club for Growth (CFG) that was released Thursday.
Miller, who defeated the Murkowski, the sitting incumbent senator, in the August primary, had 33 percent support in the telephone survey of 400 likely voters. Murkowski had 31 percent, and McAdams had a surprising 27 percent.
Miller is an outsider candidate backed by the Tea Party Express and former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, and has run on a platform of weaning the state off federal subsidies and earmarks. That has helped Murkowski, who has promised to continue delivering for the state.
But McAdams, the mayor of Sitka, a coastal city-borough in southeast Alaska that is the fourth-largest city in the state with a population of fewer than 9,000, has also emphasized his intent to secure federal funding for the state, even saying he will govern like the state’s former Republican senator, Ted Stevens.
McAdams has polled in the low to mid 20s thus far, but the CFG survey shows him gaining points, with Miller coming down a few points.
The CFG poll also seems to imply that Murkowski and Miller may be vying for the same voters, to Miller’s benefit.
“While most voters in Alaska identify themselves as conservative, and Miller leads the pack by wide margins among those voters, it is surprising that McAdams and Murkowski are both tied at 36 percent each among voters who consider themselves moderate — a substantial 37 percent of Alaskan voters,” the CFG poll said.