WGN/Tribune Poll--IL Senate: Kirk (R) 44% Giannoulias (D) 41%

[WI_DEM]

The U.S. Senate contest in Illinois could go down to the wire as Republican Mark Kirk and Democrat Alexi Giannoulias are still running close headed into the campaign's final week, a new Tribune/WGN poll shows.

Kirk held a 44 percent to 41 percent advantage over Giannoulias, but the slight edge fell within the poll's 3.7 percentage-point margin of error. Another 7 percent were undecided — a key category of voters both parties are spending millions of dollars to sway with President Barack Obama's former Senate seat on the line in a nationally significant contest

About four weeks ago, a Tribune poll showed Giannoulias holding a 38 percent to 36 percent edge over Kirk, with 17 percent undecided. Since then, Kirk has capitalized on his 4-1 cash advantage over Giannoulias by airing a heavy rotation of TV attack ads buttressed by critical commercials from GOP-aligned outside groups. They've taken a toll on the Democrat's standing with voters.

In the Republican-leaning collar counties, Kirk now holds a 55 percent to 30 percent edge over Giannoulias. That's up from Kirk's 43 percent to 36 percent edge in late September.

Kirk's support among independents increased from 38 percent to 50 percent, the poll showed, while Giannoulias' backing among unaligned voters was relatively stagnant at about 28 percent. During that time period, the number of undecided independent voters dropped from 22 percent to 8 percent — with Kirk picking up virtually all of those deciding on a candidate.

The poll showed potential avenues where Giannoulias can grow support — if he can get Democrats motivated. Concerns of a post-2008 letdown have prompted Obama to make two visits back home to Chicago to help Giannoulias and other Democrats, with a third trip planned for Saturday.

Only two-thirds of voters in predominantly Democratic Chicago back Giannoulias' candidacy, a gain of less than 5 percentage points from late September, while 15 percent of city voters said they were undecided. At the same time, in increasingly Democratic suburban Cook County, Giannoulias carries a slim 49 percent to 43 percent advantage over Kirk.

Kirk holds a strong 15 percentage-point advantage among men, and Giannoulias has an 8 percentage-point edge among women across the state. But the two men each have the support of 43 percent of a key voting demographic: white suburban women who tend to be social moderates.

The poll of 700 registered voters, conducted last Monday through Friday, also found that Green Party candidate LeAlan Jones at 5 percent support and Libertarian Mike Labno at 4 percent.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/elections/ct-met-us-senate-campaign-20101024,0,6957258.story

[FBaggins]

1. Months of nailbiting too-close-to-call polling out of IL

Looks like it's right down to the wire.

[WI_DEM]

2. hopefully Obama will help this weekend with GOTV.

[Tatiana]

3. I spent 9 hours this weekend trying to get up more yard signs for Alexi.

I almost feel like we barely made a dent. There are Kirk signs everywhere.

Alexi is lucky that the unions have come to his rescue. He's not running the campaign necessary to win this thing. When the other guy has tons of $$$$, you really need to get out there and be visible. His presence downstate has been next to nothing. Hopefully those Chicago/Cook County Dems will get out there and vote for him. Giannoulias is young, but he has the potential to be a good Senator.