Poll: Most NYers still would vote for Obama

WASHINGTON -- New Yorkers are split on whether to re-elect President Barack Obama or back a generic "someone else," but the majority said they'd still vote for him, rather than the top two Republican presidential hopefuls, according to a Siena Poll released Monday.

Amid concerns about the economy, Obama appears to be struggling with voter approval even in New York, a state with twice as many registered Democrats as Republicans, the poll by the Siena Research Institute found.

"For the second month in a row, Barack Obama has a lackluster 52-45 percent favorability rating," Siena College pollster Steven Greenberg said. "His job performance rating is up slightly from its all-time low last month, but 61 percent of voters still give him a negative job performance rating."

The poll is based on a telephone survey of 808 registered New York voters from Sept. 15-21, and has a 3.4 percentage point margin of error.

New Yorkers' restlessness with Obama was highlighted in the poll's finding that voters are divided evenly at 47 percent on whether they would re-elect Obama or would prefer a generic "someone else."

The survey also found some doubt that Obama will be re-elected: 45 percent predicted he'll win, but 42 percent predicted a victory for the eventual Republican candidate.

Yet when the poll offered a choice of the top GOP challengers, 56 percent said they'd vote for Obama, compared with 33 percent for Texas Gov. Rick Perry and 36 percent for businessman and former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney.

Greenberg said a combination of questions showed 47 percent of New Yorkers are "strong Obama supporters" and 27 percent are "strong Obama opponents." The rest take a middle ground.

On the economy, the poll found 55 percent are "very concerned" there will be a "double dip recession," and 66 percent said the country is headed in the wrong direction.

Yet the poll found New Yorkers rate Obama better than the GOP leadership in Congress on jobs and the economy. By 49 percent to 33 percent they said Obama has a better plan for revitalizing the economy and, by 52 percent to 31 percent, they said Obama has a better plan for creating jobs.