Gov. Martin O?Malley has done something else in his first year that Gov. Robert Ehrlich was unable to achieve in four ? get a job approval rating under 40 percent.
A new Gonzales Research poll found O?Malley?s job approval at 39 percent, a 13 percent drop from March and 7 percent from October, before the start of the special session. It was the third media poll in a week to find his rating dropped into the 30s.
Half the 848 registered voters in the telephone survey done Jan. 4-11 also thought the state was heading in the wrong direction, a figure double what it was a year ago. The Gonzales poll said three out of 10 voters said taxes were the most important issue, behind health care and education at 13 percent each.
“Never before in the many years we?ve been polling Maryland voters have taxes been the number one issue or registered anywhere near this high,” said Patrick Gonzales and Laslo Boyd in their analysis. The poll has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.5 percent.
Asked about his approval ratings, O?Malley told The Examiner Monday: “I was elected to make difficult decisions, to make the right decisions for the future of Maryland and the people I serve. It can?t just be about the polls instead of what?s best for the people. In the long term, hopefully people will understand that.”
“I would continue to say that he did a terrific job in the special session,” said Boyd, who has served as a consultant in Democratic campaigns. “A decline in support was pretty much inevitable,” he said, but O?Malley “could have done a better job telling voters” why there was a fiscal problem in the
state.
Poll respondents did not agree with Boyd. Almost half (48 percent) disapproved of the “overall actions taken on the state budget by the Maryland General Assembly during the special session,” with 30 percent strongly disapproving. About 27 percent of voters approved of the actions, and 40 percent of Democrats.
A major part of the revenue package approved in the special session included a referendum on slot machine gambling, which will bring in an estimated $500 million to the state in a few years.
In the poll, 54 percent of voters said they would vote to allow slots, with 38 percent opposed.
“Typically on these types of ballot questions, support at the beginning is at or approaching its peak, while opposition tends to grow throughout the campaign,” the Gonzales analysis said.
Staff Writer Kelsey Volkmann contributed to this story.
