Soon after winning a landslide re-election to a second term in the U.S. Senate, Mike Lee is riding high among fellow Republicans, but less so with all Utahns, a new UtahPolicy poll shows.
UPD pollster Dan Jones & Associates finds that overall 51 percent of Utahns have a “very” or “somewhat” favorable opinion of Lee.
A third of Utahns have an unfavorable opinion of him; 10 percent have heard of Lee but have no opinion of him, and 5 percent have never heard of him.
But among Republicans, Lee is beloved: 72 percent have a favorable opinion of him, 16 percent unfavorable; 7 percent have heard of him but have no opinion, and 4 percent of his own party members have never heard of him.
Lee is, admittedly, a darling of Utah’s right wing – with party delegates cheering him at the convention last summer.
Jones finds that 85 percent of those who self-identified themselves as “very conservative” have a favorable opinion of Lee.
Utah Democrats have no use for him:
- 75 percent have an unfavorable opinion of Lee, who was one of the Senate leaders in the federal government shutdown in the fall of 2013.
- Only 10 percent of Democrats have a favorable opinion of Lee.
- 40 percent of political independents have an unfavorable opinion of Lee; while 37 percent of them like him.
Men like Lee more than women, 56 percent of men approve of Lee, only 47 percent of women do.
Lee was considered somewhat in political trouble in late 2013 and early 2014, various polls showed.
And it was possible back then that Lee would have a viable challenger within the Utah Republican Party come his 2016 re-election.
But Lee rehabilitated himself in the public’s eye all while one by one several challengers decided not to run.
In the end, Lee was helped by Utah Democrats picking a weak opponent for him.
And Lee won re-election easily last November, beating the under-funded Democrat Misty Snow, 68-27 percent.
Jones polled 614 adults from Dec. 8-12. The survey has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.95 percent.
