A new survey for the Washington Post released last night contains some bad news for Democrat Creigh Deeds: A clear downward trend for his chances of victory in next month’s gubernatorial election. The bottom line is a nine-point lead for Republican Bob McDonnell — 53 to 44 percent.
Deeds has lost four points since the Post last polled, while McDonnell gained two points. This trend could augur an election-day repudiation of Deeds’s “abortion strategy,” which appears to have had diminishing returns and may even have created a backlash. For the last month, Deeds has advertised heavily seeking to portray McDonnell as a fundamentalist for his pro-life views, based on a college thesis McDonnell wrote 20 years ago.
Deeds has another ad running this week featuring former Virginia Gov. and current Democratic U.S. Sen. Mark Warner. In that ad, Warner talks about Deeds as someone who will “keep taxes low,” even though Deeds plans to raise taxes to pay for transportation projects, as Warner did. Warner also recommends Deeds as someone who will continue Warner’s record of economic stewardship instead of “going backwards with the failed economic approach that ruined our economy.” Whoever scripted that line must have forgotten that Virginia has had Democratic governors for the past eight years.
