A new Las Vegas Review-Journal survey shows, not surprisingly, Senator John Ensign’s (R-NV) approval rating taking a hit after admitting to an affair.
In a new Las Vegas Review-Journal poll of Nevada voters, 39 percent had a favorable view of Ensign, a drop of 14 percentage points from a month ago.
The percentage who regarded Ensign unfavorably, 37 percent, was up 19 points from a month ago, when just 18 percent viewed him negatively.
A silver lining:
Yet most Nevada voters — 62 percent — do not think Ensign should resign from the Senate over his admission last week that he carried on a nine-month affair with a married campaign staffer.
Nearly half say their opinion of the Republican senator is unchanged by the news.
But buried within this poll are numbers that show Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) with an even lower approval rating.
At 39 percent, Ensign’s diminished favorable rating is slightly higher than that of the state’s senior senator, Majority Leader Harry Reid (34 percent), and far above that of the dismally unpopular Gov. Jim Gibbons (10 percent).
If Republicans can find a viable challenger, which has been incredibly difficult so far, this could turn into an interesting race to watch in 2010.
Congress in Your Pocket
