Democrats will start out with an advantage in the general election if Alexi Giannoulias is the party's nominee for Barack Obama's old Senate seat, according to a new survey from Public Policy Polling.
Giannoulias leads Republican U.S. Rep. Mark Kirk by eight percentage points, 42-34, while Kirk leads former Chicago Inspector General David Hoffman 37-36 and Chicago Urban League President Cheryle Jackson 38-36.
The numbers show Giannoulias improving since last spring, when a Public Policy poll found him tied with Kirk at 33 percent.
Democratic voters, in particular, have a growing fondness for Giannoulias as they have learned more about the treasurer. In April, he had 60 percent of the Democratic vote. He now has 72 percent support from party members in Illinois.
"The primary contest has been a good thing for Alexi Giannoulias," Dean Debnam, president of Public Policy Polling, said in a statement. "The increased visibility it’s brought him with Democratic voters has him set up well for the fall campaign."
But the survey, conducted Friday through Monday, shows that, with as little as a week to go before the primary, at least half of the state's electorate was unsure about any Senate candidate.
Giannoulias and Kirk had the broadest name recognition, and among voters who knew them, 31 percent said they liked Giannoulias and 27 percent said they liked Kirk.
Less than a third of voters recognized Hoffman or Jackson. Among those who had opinions of them, 16 percent expressed favorable opinions. But Jackson's unfavorability rating was 17 percent, higher than Hoffman's, 11 percent.
The survey, based on responses from 1,062 voters, also measured the popularity of existing U.S. senators Dick Durbin and Roland Burris.
Durbin, the senior senator, was popular with 47 percent of voters. Burris' was popular with just 14 percent, the lowest approval rating Public Policy has ever measured for a U.S. senator.
The margin of error for the poll was 3 percent.