Maybe the Recall Dunleavy people saw the writing on the wall when they laid down their cannons this past summer and quit: Gov. Mike Dunleavy is, in fact, popular.
Dunleavy is the 16th most popular governor among the 50 states, according to Morning Consult, a survey firm that seasonally ranks the popularity of elected officials.
Dunleavy ranked higher than Gov. Gavin Newsom of California, a Democrat who recently beat a recall attempt at the ballot box. Dunleavy also ranked higher than Gov. Brad Little, of Idaho, a Republican who is being challenged for governor by his own Republican Lt. Gov. Janice McGeachin in the May, 2022 primary.
At 57% approval rating, Dunleavy is just one point below South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem in the survey.
The most popular governor in the survey was Gov. Phil Scott, a Republican serving in Vermont, who has a 79% approval.
Of the top 20 governors in the approval rankings, 15 are Republicans, while five are Democrats.
Dunleavy, who faced a recall campaign that started only three months after he took office, has seen his approval rating go up and down and up again. In the fourth quarter of 2019, Morning Consult had him at a dead even, with 42% approving, and 42% disapproving of him, and he was ranked 9 among all 50 governors for popularity. At that same time, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis had a 58% approval rating.
Morning Consult successfully predicted the free-fall of former Gov. Bill Walker in 2018. The polling firm named him the least popular governor running for re-election in 2018, with net approval of -26%. He ended up with just 2 percent of the vote — 5,757 Alaskan voters to Dunleavy’s 51.4% or 145,631 votes.
“Walker posted the largest net slide in approval of any governor in the fourth quarter, falling 19 points compared to the previous quarter,” the survey firm reported.
In this final quarter of 2021, a reputable Alaska survey firm showed the same results as Morning Consult did for Dunleavy, who will face off against non-party candidate Walker, Democrat Les Gara, and Libertarian Joe Miller, who is set to announce his candidacy on Monday morning.
Republican DeSantis, although much lauded by conservatives around the country this year for his battle with President Joe Biden, has a 52% approval in his state, and Texas Republican Gov. Greg Abbott is at 50%.
The least popular governor in the country is Oregon Democrat Kate Brown, who has a 43% approval rating. That is up slightly from the fourth quarter of 2019, when 37% of Oregonians approved of her.
High? Really? Then I was ranked highly in my high school. Who knew? And without even putting up much effort!
(I guess there are parallels there, as well.)
Guess the Dan Fagan show and comment section. of MRAK and AKWatchman doesn’t reflect the general mood of conservatives towards our governor. Dunleavy 2022!
Imagine that!
Exactly. It’s easy to get into an echo chamber and forget what’s really happening.
Dunleavy is conservative, but he’s also a realist. Personally, I’ll take a realist over someone who leans further to the right but is too much of an ideologue to accomplish anything. I’d have to say Dunleavy is our best bet if we actually want to get things done and not just daydream about what we want.
‘Get things done’. I hear this a lot from left-leaning / progressive Republicans. What does that mean? Are we ‘getting things done’ when we violate our principles and go along with the leftist tax and spend agenda? How about we do nothing and stall their agenda and bring them to heal? What is it we so desperately ‘need to get done’ with the left? I’m genuinely curious?.
I didn’t vote for Dunleavy. I voted for Treadwell. And I’ve long thought it was sad that so many voters voted for a guy who basically ran on restoring the dividend. There are so many other things that are important. But $1000 extra dollars in the bank every year apparently buys votes. Even though he hasn’t accomplished that, or pretty much anything else. That said- the one area I do approve of Dunleavy is his restraint on the COVID pandemic. He not only chose to not enact a mask mandate or a vaccine mandate, he also argued- persuasively- on why he also didn’t have the authority to ban local mask mandates or vaccine mandates. It’s the same power, just two sides of the coin. So on that level I approve of him, but I still wish Treadwell were governor.
Dee, you have a very negative attitude and approach. You don’t like Joe Miller. Now, you don’t like Mike Dunleavy. And you call yourself Conservative. So, are you supporting Kelly T. for US Senate, or are you supporting Lisa Murkowski? I’m thinking that you are a Murkowski RINO. What are you?
Same, Chrissy. Dee doesn’t belong here if she, even passively, supports the wacko Princess Lisa. Joe Miller kicked her a$$ in 2010 and we won’t forget.
Treadwell is the definition of RINO so you’re probably right
I preferred Treadwell in the primary as well. I would have preferred Governor Dunleavy to use the power of veto to cut more, especially when he has had the upper hand which has been rare with the turncoat Republicans. He has done a masterful job of handling covid and making sure not to overstep the bounds of not just his governorship, but government…something far too many of the media darling Republican governors have done during this pandemic.
I don’t even live in Oregon, and I disapprove of Gov Kate Brown. Jay Inslee of Washington isn’t a favorite either.
Funny thing about polls. Depending on what you ask, why you ask, how you ask, you can get almost any answer you want.
To get this result they must of polled RINOs, cowards, and Democrats.
If it is actually reflective of how Alaskans feel, this state is far worse off than imagined. If Alaskans like a guy who folds like a cheat suit under pressure, Alaska deserves what’s coming.
Keep in mind the “polls” said Biden would take Texas and a blue wave was coming.
Take a bite of reality and look outside every once in a while. Not everybody is living in the anti Dunleavy universe you live in. We have the most conservative governor Alaska has ever had right now. If walker or anyone else was governor, we would have seen state worker vaccine mandates, statewide mask mandates, statewide business closures without the ability for local governments to opt out. Be careful what you wish for, cause it turns out our governor just isn’t that bad.
I suspect if they had skewed the poll to get RINOs and Democrats then A) Democrat governors like Newsom would have way higher approval ratings and B) Dunleavy’s approval would have been half of what it is here.
And frankly, Dunleavy has done about as good of a job as anyone possibly could given the split legislature and other factors that are well beyond his control. If we could hypothetically replace him with someone who leans further to the right, that person would have the same problems getting anything done.
Since Feb 2019 Governor Dunleavy earned this reward. Pretty good for a Governor we weren’t sure how he and his legacy will be affected by those six turbulence months that year. I never will forget how political groups and Alaskans had responded. Most of all I never will forget Mike Dunleavy’s political ingenuity he demonstrated adjusting his agenda responding to Alaskans responces. After Mike Dunleavy and after another conservative constitutionalist successor I hope Alaskans be a little less government dependent. We have so much potential here and here we live in chains!
Governor Dunleavy seems to actually understand what being a conservative is, unlike many here who claim to be conservative but then openly admit they would vote for a communist lapdog (Walker) instead of a conservative. Governor Dunleavy understands that using mandates to push big government on people is not a conservative viewpoint, something so many communist supporting self proclaimed “conservatives” fail to grasp.
I don’t believe for a minute that DeSantis’ approval rating is only 52.
I doubt this poll.
I will vote for anyone else who is willing to continually STAND UP for conservative values.
– I hate his dismissal of alternative treatments for COVID;
– I hate that he has kept Zink on as COVID czar;
– I hate that he remained silent when half of Alaska was held captive by a communist assembly;
– I hate that he rolled over to the legislature when he convened a session in Wasilla and they blew him off;
– I hate that he has reneged on his promise regarding the PFD.
I will vote for him if I have no other choice, but I have long ago lost all confidence in him and I hope he has a good challenger. Compared to DeSantis he is simply meh.
Gavin Newsom. 56% approval. If there was ever a prophetic sign of irreversible social, cultural, and political collapse, that’s got to be it.
And Phil Murphy at 57? He almost lost a race he was up (in similar polls) by 10 a few months back. Polls can be useful but polls can be totally jobbed. I have a feeling the numbers coming out of a few of those states (not Alaskas, BTW) are..The people who want you to believe whimpering simps like Baker and Hogan are so well liked are the people who want you to believe that Biden got 81 million votes..because of suburban soccer moms in PA and GA.. yeah, right.
But Phil Murphy was running with a political headwind with Biden being in the whitehouse. Dunleavy should be running with a political tailwind in the same enviornment so the Murphy polling means nothing.
Recall Dunleavy was never about recalling him. It was just a way to trick people into giving the backers’ money. Scott Kendall is a tricky guy!
Interesting poll results. Let’s see, according to prior info, it was Dunleavy who quashed the Walker deal with Communist China. And Kelly is indeed right. He has done as well as can be expected against a legislature that is not only fractured, but controlled by some of Walker’s friends, like Bryce Edgmon. Yes, he has some friends, like Pete Micciche in the Senate. They actually shared an office during some construction, according to the Senate President. He also kept trying to not only get his constitutional amendments through, but tried through 4 additional sessions to get the legislature to come up with a fiscal plan. It was the legislature that failed. And even though he was besieged on all sides, he continued to defend personal freedoms against government over-reach by refusing to enact state Covid mandates. It’s been a tough first term for him, but he has been a realist and got as much done as the recalcitrant legislature would agree to.
From this poll it seems as if Dunleavy is more akin to a moderate Democrat/RINO, then Republican. In the current political atmosphere that could spell disaster in the next election. He needs to make a bold statement soon. Maybe asking for Dr. Zink’s resignation might be it!
More polls. Great. Is this like the “poll” Don Young recently sent out asking his constituents how we would like the new multi-trillion fiat dollar spending spree used? Pick from the list your favorite pet project folks. And pay no attention to the lack of a “shove it up your tailpipe Don” check off box. Agenda driven polls mean little to nothing.
Zink going national in March with org that pushes forced vax mandates and state surveillance of citizens.
Another demon spreading its wings.
Totally disagree! He ranks even with Phil Murphy of New Jersey? I would be very embarrassed to rank with Murphy who is a Deep State goon employing tyranny against citizens of his State. Ranking Desantis at 58% is a joke because he is holding the line against unconstitutional mandates in his State and protecting his citizens. I would put Desantis at the top! Whoever did this poll is not looking at what matters to the public and the sampling must have been very low.
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