Mayoral Poll Shocker Puts Weiner in No. 1 Slot

Two polls show former Rep. Anthony Weiner gaining ground among the city’s Democrats — with one putting him in first place — in his bid for the party nomination in the New York City mayoral race.

A Quinnipiac University poll released Wednesday showed an uptick in support for Weiner, whose congressional career was derailed two years ago.

Weiner garnered 17 percent support among those surveyed, behind City Council Speaker Christine Quinn’s 19 percent and just ahead of ex-comptroller Bill Thompson’s 16 percent.

“What these numbers say is that we’ve got a volatile, changeable election,” with an all-but-certain Democratic runoff — and an open question as to who will be in it, said Maurice Carroll, director of the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute.

A new Wall Street Journal, NBC New York and Marist survey released Tuesday showed Weiner apparently leading in the race with 25 percent support among registered Democrats to Quinn’s 20 percent, an inverse of last month’s Marist poll showing Quinn with 24 percent to Weiner’s 19 percent.

Trailing were Thompson with 13 percent, Public Advocate Bill de Blasio with 10 percent and Comptroller John Liu with 8 percent. Twenty-four percent of those polled said they were undecided.

Weiner said he’s keeping his focus on his mayoral campaign.

“Polls are going to go up, polls are going to go down, what should be a steadfast narrative here is that I’m going to keep fighting for those in the middle class who are struggling to make it,” he said at a campaign stop in the Bronx.

The Democratic primary is Sept. 10. To win the nomination in the heavily Democratic city, a candidate must secure 40 percent of the vote or face a runoff.

Among registered Republicans, the Tuesday poll showed former Metropolitan Transportation Authority head Joe Lhota leading billionaire businessman John Catsimatidis 28 to 21 percent.

Asked Wednesday about her poll numbers declining, Quinn said, “Polls go up, polls go down, polls will be tied; you see polls go all over the place. And the only one that matters is the last one, and that’s the one I’m very confident about … there’s a lot of people running who have issued a lot of press releases and made a lot of statements. Nobody who’s running has the record that I do.”

This article appeared in print on page 4 of the June 27th, 2013 edition of Hamodia.