Christine Quinn leads mayoral field, poll says

City Council Speaker Christine Quinn continues to lead her Democratic rivals in the mayor's race, according to a Quinnipiac Poll released Wednesday.

Quinn leads the pack of candidates with 37 percent, with Public Advocate Bill de Blasio in second but trailing far behind at 14 percent.

Next on the list is former City Comptroller Bill Thompson at 11 percent and 9 percent for current City Comptroller John Liu. Another 27 percent of voters were undecided.

"It's still early, unless the State Legislature moves the primary up to June," said Maurice Carroll, director of the polling institute.

A NY1/Marist poll released two weeks ago also had Quinn with 37 percent.

Each of the four Democratic candidates would beat former MTA chairman and Republican front-runner Joseph Lhota by a 63 percent to 19 percent margin, the poll said.

The poll also found 63 percent of voters were comfortable with a gay or lesbian candidate who is also married. Quinn married her longtime partner in May 2012, a year after gay marriage was legalized in New York.

Quinnipiac surveyed 1,017 city voters from Feb. 20 to 25. The margin of error is plus or minus 3.1 percentage points.

-- amNewYork, AP