Louisiana Senate Race Poll

Recently, Magellan Data and Mapping Strategies polled 1030 likely voters between June 10-13. The poll showed a healthy 51-31% lead for David Vitter. A few notes about the internals:

(1) He leads 50/38% among Independents (in the Southern Media survey taken in April, he trailed with Independents 42-45%);

(2) Rep. Melancon leads 60/10% among black voters – since blacks typically poll as “undecided” but vote Democratic on election day, we are allocating the 30% undecided to Melancon, which means his real support is probably at 38%, as opposed to the 31% from the poll (note: Vitter leads 64/22% among white voters);

(3) Men favor Vitter 55/29%, while his lead with women is a narrower but still a healthy 48/33%;

(4) This is the sixth poll taken on the Senate race since January: what is interesting is that from these six polls, Melancon is stuck in the 31-36% range, while Vitter polls between 49-57%.