A new poll released Thursday morning shows President Obama's approval rating is dropping in Virginia -- a battleground state the Democrat took from Republicans en route to winning the White House in 2008.
These new numbers show the president’s disapproval rating has spiked in Virginia to 54 percent. The Quinnipiac University Poll is based on telephone interviews with 1,368 registered voters between September 7-12. The results mirror other polls that show a continuing slide in the president’s popularity in a slow, troubled economy.
Fifty-one percent of those surveyed say they do not think President Obama deserves to be re-elected. That’s compared with 41 percent who said they would re-elect him. In June 2011, 48 percent approved of the president’s performance. That number now sits at 40 percent.
Most troubling for Obama is his poor performance among independents, many of whom supported him three years ago. Sixty-three percent of unaligned voters disapproved of the way Obama is handling his duties while only 29 percent approved.
In hypothetical matchups, Texas Gov. Rick Perry and former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney were in statistical dead heats with the president. The poll is released just as candidates have begun targeting Virginia voters.
