Poll Watch Daily

The most-mentioned names for the Republican presidential nomination have up to now remained pretty much the same, whether it has been pundits sizing up the field, or who usually is in the top-tier in the early polls.

The other constant is how unenthusiastic the polls have found Republicans to be about their choices: A New York Times/CBS News poll conducted in mid-April said that 56 percent of Republicans didn’t feel enthusiastic about any of the Republicans who had announced or who might run. A new CNN/Opinion Research poll, conducted May 24-26, found that 61 percent of Republicans described themselves as very or fairly satisfied, but only 16 percent were in the “very satisfied” category. Thirty-nine percent were not very or at all satisfied.

So, it’s not surprising that more names continue to emerge of potential candidates who at the start, did not attract much attention, or hadn’t made any sounds about running or who had vowed that they weren’t running.

One notable example is former Godfather Pizza CEO Herman Cain, who has become a columnist and commentator and was a unsuccessful candidate for Senate in Georgia in 2004. Cain has been actively courting the tea party movement wing of the party, and while Gallup finds he has one of the lowest name recognition percentages among Republicans of all mentioned candidates — 33 percent — the enthusiasm factor among those who know him is highest of any in the field according to the pollster’s “Positive Intensity Score.”

Cain has also moved up in national polls. In mid-March, he rated only an asterisk (less than 0.5 percent) in a Gallup poll. He has climbed to 8 percent in Gallup’s latest poll, conducted May 20-24, putting him fifth behind Mitt Romney, Sarah Palin, Ron Paul and Newt Gingrich and ahead of Tim Pawlenty.

The CNN/Opinion Research poll also had Cain in fifth place, at 10 percent, but in this survey, he passed Gingrich as well as Pawlenty. CNN didn’t even test Cain in an early April poll. An InsiderAdvantage survey conducted May 23 has Cain fourth at 11 percent.

Texas Gov. Rick Perry made news Friday when he was asked by reporters, as he always is, whether he might get into the race and answered, “Yes, sir. I’m going to think about it,” although he did add afterwards, “But I think about a lot of things.” Perry has not been tested in the national horse-race polls, but the CNN survey did ask Republicans about several possible candidates and whether they would like to see any of them run or not. Fifty percent said they did not want to see Perry run compared to 40 percent who did, with 10 percent undecided. Tea party movement supporters, among whom Perry has been a favorite, were split, with 46 percent wanting him to run and 45 percent not wanting him to run, with 9 percent undecided.

FiveThiryEight.com’s Nate Silver wrote last week that Perry, as a southerner, could have an advantage in GOP primaries because “the region offers a larger home-field advantage than the other parts of the country.” He noted that more than 40 percent of John McCain’s voters in the 2008 GOP race were from the south.

And then there is Rudolph Guiliani who started out as a frontrunner for the 2008 nomination before he imploded.

There had not been much talk from Guiliani about trying again, but CNN decided to include him in its latest poll and he topped the field with 16 percent, followed closely by Romney at 15 percent, Palin at 13 percent and Paul at 12 percent. Dropping Guiliani from the field returns Romney to first place at 19 percent followed by Palin at 15 percent.

CNN polling director Keating Holland cautioned, however, that the survey also showed Giuliani “doesn’t generate a lot of enthusiasm. Only about a quarter of Republicans nationwide said that they would be enthusiastic if Giuliani won the nomination.” Holland added, “”But he’s not alone – only a quarter would be enthusiastic if Palin got the party’s nod, and only one in five would feel the same way if Romney became the GOP’s standard-bearer in 2012.”

Whatever Giuliani’s intentions, he is going to the early primary state of New Hampshire next week to headline a state party gathering — on a day when Romney is to make the formal announcement of his candidacy in the state.

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