GOP tide running high in most top Utah races

Rep. Jim Matheson may be Utah Democrats' sole hope, a final poll before Election Day conducted for the Deseret Morning News and KSL-TV shows.

Matheson holds a 10-percentage-point lead over Republican John Swallow among 2nd Congressional District registered voters, pollster Dan Jones & Associates found in a survey finished Thursday night.

Republicans hold leads — in some cases, commanding leads — in all the other major races, the survey showed.

Rep. Matheson's older brother, Scott Matheson Jr., is 16 percentage points behind Republican Jon Huntsman Jr. in the governor's race, the survey says, a lead that would be difficult for the Democrat to make up.

Even Republican Ellis Ivory, certified to the ballot Thursday by the Utah Supreme Court and in the Salt Lake County mayor's race for only a month, is now ahead of Democrat Peter Corroon, the new poll shows. Ivory, whose name will be on Tuesday's ballot after flip-flop court decisions, leads Corroon 43-37 percent, with independent Merrill Cook getting just 8 percent support.

In short, the final poll hints Nov. 2 will likely be, as have so many others in recent history, a good day for Utah Republicans.

Jones, who has polled in Utah for 30 years, warns the pre-Election Day survey is not a prediction of what will happen Tuesday but is an accurate snapshot of Utah voters' preferences the week before the election.

Even with that caveat, President Bush can clearly count on five Electoral College votes from Utah. The president leads Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., by 45 percentage points, 69-24 percent.

Utahns traditionally turn out to the ballot boxes in presidential election years.

Jones, who also teaches political science at the University of Utah, predicts more than 70 percent of registered voters will go to the polls Tuesday. That's a good turnout, but most likely Tuesday's participation will fall below the 81 percent who voted in the 1992 election, a modern-day record.

2nd District

Rep. Matheson and Swallow have been mired in one of the most negative campaigns in recent Utah history. And negative campaigning can turn off voters, depressing turnout, political experts say.

The two-term incumbent Democrat, who leads Swallow 51-41 in the new poll, says he wants a big voter turnout Tuesday. He believes moderates and independents will help him more than they will help Swallow.

And Jones' new survey shows that Rep. Matheson is getting more than his fair share of those voters. The congressman gets 73 percent of independent voters; 83 percent of those who say they are political moderates.

But Rep. Matheson needs more than that to win in a 2nd District, which normally votes more than 60 percent Republican. Matheson needs Republican LDS voters, too.

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