Michigan Voters: No One for President in 2016

Democrat Hillary Rodham Clinton and Republican Bush aren’t polling well with Michigan voters, according to a new poll. (Photos via Creative Commons)

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Michigan voters aren’t thrilled with any of the candidates in the 2016 race for the White House, according to a new poll.

The presumed frontrunners on both sides of the aisle – Democrat Hillary Rodham Clinton and Republicans Jeb Bush, Scott Walker, Rand Paul and Marco Rubio – received more unfavorable than favorable ratings in the poll, The Detroit News reports.

The statewide poll of 600 likely voters, conducted June 9-11 by the Chicago-based Glengariff Group Polling firm, has a margin of error of plus-minus 4 percentage points. Those polled identifed themselves as 40 percent Democratic, 33 percent Republican and 25 percent indpendent. The results were released exclusively to The Detroit News and WDIV-TV.

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Bush, the son and brother of two former presidents and a former governor of Florida, has high 94 percent name recognition, but his unfavorable rating is 17 percentage points higher than his favorable rating.

The former U.S. secretary of state, U.S. senator and first lady, Clinton’s unfavorable rate is 8 percent higher than her favorable rate.

Among independent voters, Bush’s and Clinton’s favorability ratings plunged even lower. Clinton’s 48 percent unfavorable rating among indpendent voters is 21 percentage points highr than her favorable rating. Bush had an 18 percent favorable rating, and his unfavorable rating was double that.

“Clinton’s are bad and Bush’s are terrible. That’s really how you compare them – bad to terrible,” Larry Sabato, director of the Center for Politics at the University of Virginia, told The Detroit News. “Hundreds of millions of negative ads are going to be aired against these candidates. If they’re starting out with unfavorables that high, just imagine where they’re going to end up. But somebody has to win.”

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Sabato said the “dynasty factors” hurt Bush more than Clinton. “The difference is Bill Clinton is fairly popular and George W. Bush is unpopular with everybody but Republicans, he said.

Pollster Richard Czuba of the Glengariff Group said Clinton and Bush are polarizing figures among the electorate.

If the election were held today, Bush would lose MIchigan to Clinton by 9 pecentage points, according to the poll, which said Paul, Rubio and Walker would all perform better in a head-to-head matchup against Clinton, the Demcoratic frontrunner.

Republicans haven’t carried Michigan in the presidential race since 1988, when George H.W. Bush prevailed over Democrat Michael Dukakis. The 2012 GOP nominee, Michigan native Mitt Romney, lost the state to President Barack Obama.