Californians' Attitudes on Hillary Clinton as President--Big News is Strong Independent Support--And That Bill Clinton is a Big

[courtesy of California Progress Report]

By Frank D. Russo

The Field Poll released an interesting set of numbers this morning showing that California registered voters divide sharply on their opinions about Hillary Clinton along partisan fault lines, but the most telling numbers are in the support she gets from those not registered as Democrats or Republicans including the growing numbers of independent voters. The poll also shows that Bill Clinton is a big asset to Hillary Clinton's campaign here in California. There also are some generational differences, a gender gap, and differences in support for her in different segments of California's voters.

There's no question who Californians will support in November if Clinton is the nominee--this is still a decidedly blue state. Last week, Field released its poll numbers showing Clinton has a double digit lead against all the major Republican candidates. She beats Giuliani 52% to 38%--by 14 points. And it only gets better than that against others--53% to 33% over Romney (20 points), 56% to 31% over Thompson (25 points), 54% to 35% against McCain (19 points), with likely voters.

Hillary Clinton's composite numbers are 48% favorable and 39% unfavorable. Democrats, with a substantial registration lead in California favor her 67% to21% and Republicans have numbers that are the mirror image of this holding unfavorable views of her by 66% to 22%. Nothing terribly new here. But the "non-partisan/others" break out strongly in Clinton's favor with 52% favorable and 34% unfavorable opinions.

The same pattern holds as to whether voters would consider voting for Hillary Clinton if she were the Democratic nominee for President. Overall, 36% of registered voters would definitely vote for her, 34% would definitely not, and 26% would consider voting for her. Democrats definitely would vote for her by a 58% to 16% margin with another 26% saying they would consider voting for her. Republicans would definitely not by a margin of 63% to 8%. Clinton has 35% of the non-partisan/others saying the would definitely vote for her, another 37% would consider it, and 25% saying they definitely would not.

Here there are some interesting breakdowns in the different segments of California's registered voters. There is a correlation with political ideology, as one would expect, where by a 69% to 6% margin self identified "liberals" will definitely vote for her and where "conservatives" will not by 66% to 15%. Those who say they are "middle-of-the-road" break for Clinton 34% to 25% with another 36% saying they would consider voting for her.