As many Democratic primary election voters want U.S. Sen. Alan Dixon re-elected as are opposed to him, but his support could erode if the three-way race becomes a referendum on incumbency.
Although a new Tribune poll found Dixon leading each of his two challengers by 2-to-1 ratios, results suggest that the Belleville Democrat, a two-term incumbent, is vulnerable.
The poll found:
– Less than half of the likely March 17 Democratic primary vote is behind Dixon;
– About 6 voters in 10 agreed that Dixon has been in office long enough and that it is time for a change, and by the same ratio voters favored
congressional term limitations;
– Fewer than half of the voters have a favorable opinion of Dixon or think he cares about people.
But Dixon, who has been in public office for 42 years without losing an election, can take heart in some findings. Although his level of support is under 50 percent, he is running against two foes who are splitting the opposition vote. And poll respondents picked him as an overwhelming favorite to win the nomination.
Dixon is facing perhaps his toughest campaign against Cook County Recorder of Deeds Carol Moseley Braun and Chicago attorney Albert Hofeld.
A personal-injury lawyer who last week put his net worth at $15 million, Hofeld has demonstrated a willingness to pour millions of his own money into saturation television advertising.
Braun is running a lower profile campaign to become the first black woman in the Senate. She hopes to take advantage of two factors that the poll shows to be in her favor: support in the African-American community and a 10-point gender gap in the vote for Dixon.
Dixon was preferred by 42 percent of the likely Democratic primary voters, the poll found, compared to 23 percent for Braun and 19 percent for Hofeld. Sixteen percent remained undecided.
The random sample telephone survey of 700 likely Democratic primary voters was conducted Jan. 30-Feb. 2 by Market Shares Corp., Mt. Prospect. It has an error margin of 4 percentage points.
A majority of voters, 55 percent, said they approved of the job Dixon is doing as senator, while 34 percent said they disapproved.
But when the opinion questions were more narrowly defined, the poll found voters not so favorably inclined toward the incumbent and aspects of his campaign.
Voters, including those supporting Hofeld and Braun, pretty much agreed that Dixon ”works together with people of both parties to get things done,” a record that earned him the nickname of ”Al the Pal” among politicians and the media. Sixty-two percent of voters agreed with the attribute and 20 percent disagreed.
But Braun and Hofeld are splitting an anti-Dixon vote, according to the survey results, and the single most important trait that the challengers`
supporters share-81 percent of them-is the opinion that Dixon has been in office ”long enough” and that it is ”time for a change.”
Two weeks ago, Braun called on Hofeld to withdraw, saying that she deserved a one-on-one shot at defeating Dixon. Hofeld declined, and his camp wants Braun to remain in the race to pull black Democratic primary votes that Dixon would otherwise receive in a one-on-one race.
Overall, 57 percent of Democratic primary voters shared the view that Dixon has been in office long enough and that it was time for a change, and 31 percent disagreed.
Nearly the same ratio of opinion was found among all voter groups, regardless of where they lived, and 57 percent of the undecided voters held that opinion of Dixon.
Those results reflect an election-year, anti-incumbency mood that politicians and opinion polling have found throughout the United States.
Indeed, 61 percent of Illinois Democratic primary voters said they favored limiting the number of terms U.S. senators and members of Congress can serve, even if it is their own lawmaker. Even a majority of voters who approved of Dixon`s job performance said congressional terms should be limited.
Hofeld just last week began running a new television ad in which he pledges to serve a maximum of two terms if elected.
Part of the attack on Dixon, especially by Hofeld, is that the career politician is a Washington insider who is out of touch with Illinoisans and more interested in self-preservation than taking tough stands on difficult issues.
When asked if they agreed that Dixon ”cares about people like yourself,” 49 percent of primary voters said yes and 34 percent disagreed. Correspondingly, 49 percent disagreed that Dixon is ”out for himself,” and 34 percent agreed.
That level of slightly fewer than half of the voters being in Dixon`s corner is in keeping with his 42 percent vote total and the 48 percent of voters who know him and hold a favorable opinion of him.
As Dixon strives to keep his campaign on track, his camp is husbanding its resources. The campaign recently pulled its television advertising to save up for next month`s stretch run and to fine-tune the candidate`s message.
Two of the key issues of Dixon`s early campaign, including his television ads and personal appearances, were the protection of American jobs from foreign competition and leadership in favor of national health care insurance. But voters were split in how they perceive Dixon on those matters, perhaps as a consequence of the counterattacks that Hofeld launched on both fronts.
When asked if Dixon ”looks out for American workers on the issue of foreign imports”-a contention that he used as the backdrop to announce his candidacy and the subject of his first television commercial wave-39 percent of voters agreed, 28 percent disagreed and 33 percent said they didn`t know what to think.
Similarly, when asked if Dixon is ”a leader on the national health care issue”-the topic for his second ad and the hottest political campaign issue of 1992-35 percent of the voters agreed, 33 percent disagreed and 32 percent said they didn`t know.
If his opponents are going to topple Dixon from his front-runner position, it will take a sustained, sharp attack and consistent presence in front of the electorate.
As Dixon has sought to protect his lead, Hofeld has demonstrated the importance of having deep campaign pockets and the capability of sustaining what his aides said is a $200,000-a-week statewide television ad blitz.
Unlike Hofeld and Dixon, Braun has not run TV commercials and trails them in fundraising, but she has promised to be in the mix for the campaign`s final month.
A virtual unknown when he entered the race last fall, Hofeld has built his name identification to 63 percent of the surveyed Democrats likely to vote in the primary, the poll found.
By comparison, 98 percent said they are aware of Dixon, and 57 percent identified Braun.
Braun was known to only one-third of the voters outside Cook County. And Hofeld trails her in name identity by just 8 percentage points in Braun`s home county, where she has served in executive office since 1988 after serving 10 years in the General Assembly.
Atty. Gen. Roland Burris carried Chicago and Cook County, where 60 percent of the statewide Democratic primary vote is cast, when he ran for the U.S. Senate nomination in 1984 on the strength of his support in the African- American community. But Burris, a second-term state comptroller at the time and native of Centralia, also ran strong in Downstate areas.
Though Braun won the support of half of all black voters, only 6 percent of Democratic voters outside Cook County said they would vote for her. For example, from Springfield south to the state line, Braun was favored by just 2 percent of the voters.
Of the remaining statewide black vote, Dixon got 28 percent, Hofeld 7 percent and 15 percent was undecided.
Dixon got his greatest support Downstate, and took 34 percent of the Cook County vote. Hofeld did better than Braun among voters outside Cook County-24 percent-and he got 15 percent of the Cook County vote.
How the Tribune Poll was conducted
Findings of the Tribune Poll are based on telephone interviews with a random sample of 700 registered Illinois voters likely to vote in the March 17 Democratic primary election.
In a sample of this size, one can say with 95 percent certainty that results will differ by no more than plus or minus 4 percentage points from results obtained if all metro area voters had been polled. Results based on subgroups within the larger sample have larger potential error margins.
The Tribune Poll was conducted Jan. 30-Feb. 2. Poll research was prepared and analyzed by the Tribune and by Market Shares Corp., Mt. Prospect.
