Republican Rick Snyder leads Democrat Virg Bernero in polls for Michigan gubernatorial election

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Republican gubernatorial candidate Rick Snyder is maintaining his lead over Democrat Virg Bernero.

Snyder, an Ann Arbor businessman, is leading with 51 percent of the vote according to last week’s Rassmussen poll. Lansing Mayor Bernero has 38 percent.

Women nationally are unenthusiastic this election season, according to a poll from the New York Times/CBS News. This could be harmful for Democrats, the Times states, because women traditionally vote for Democratic candidates and outnumber men at polls. If women do not cast as many votes this election cycle, it could prove to be another disadvantage for Democrats.

“It’s a hard race for Democrats in the state of Michigan, the same reason it’s a hard race for Democrats across the midterms,” said J. Cherie Strachan, assistant political science professor. “People are tired of the economy being bad … It’s really easy saying this isn’t working, let’s try something different.”

The New York Times reported women are favoring Democrats 43 percent to Republicans 36 percent and men are supporting Republicans 45 percent to Democrats 42 percent.

Strachan said an enthusiasm gap for women would trend worse for Democrats, as voters are already favoring Snyder and blaming incumbents.

In order to drive support from the Democratic base, Bernero has been highlighting his positions on traditional women’s issues.

“Bernero might be pointing out that he’s pro-choice and Snyder’s pro-life … to play on women‘s sympathy toward the Democratic party,” Strachan said.

Strachan said the obvious theme for this election is the economy, but the campaign is ‘narrow-casting’ to target specific issues to the specific audience of the democratic base.

“(Narrowcasting is) when you have other targeted audiences, you find ways to speak to them about specific topics they’re interested in and have a more sort of layered campaign message,” she said. “You find ways to speak to them about specific topics they’re interested in and have a more sort of layered, campaign message, but they’ll also be exposed to a broader message. At the same time, they’re getting more targeted messages about hot-button issues. Ideally, all of these messages work together.”