A Field Poll released today shows that Senator Barbara Boxer’s approval rating has fallen to a nine year low of 41%. That nadir is driven by a 13% drop in approval by Democrats over the past year, accompanied by a 5% drop among non-partisan respondents.

As of this writing (10pm Tuesday), only the Sacramento Bee has picked up this story — and that’s buried in a piece on the poll’s major finding, which is that Dianne Feinstein could campaign from DC and still win in November.

We think it deserves more attention than that. The Senator who hangs her hat on the fact that she was reelected sixteen months ago with the highest vote total of any Senator ever (not hard for a Senator from the largest state) has pushed a substantial number of her supporters away from her. They may not ever vote for a Republican Senate candidate, but they could be primed for a more moderate challenger.

The February phone poll of 608 registered voters found Boxer’s approval rating down 6% from the last poll in June 2005. Disapproving voters were up from 30% to 34%; those with no opinion increased slightly from 23% to 25%.

Boxer previously dropped as low as 41 in 1993 and 1997 (the Field data for those years is averaged, so one of the polls in those years may have been below 41%).

Boxer has seen peaks and valleys before. But even she may have to wonder whether her extremism is responsible for her fastest drop and lowest approval rating in 12-1/2 years.

Our own analysis of historical data missing from the new Field press release reveals specific problems for Boxer. Most striking is the erosion in Democratic support over the last year — from 76% approval in February 2005, to 68% last June, to 63% in the new poll. Most of those now report “no opinion” on the Senator. Non-partisan voters also were less inclined to favor the Marin County Democrat, with approval dropping from 46% a year ago to 41% today.

Sources: Field Poll 2/2006; 6/2005; 2/2005 (all pdf)

Boxer certainly has plenty of time before 2010 to make nice to middle-of-the-road Democrats. But assuming she’s going to run again — no sure thing — it does look like there’s an opportunity for a moderate Democrat with Senatorial ambitions to engage in some daydreams (now if we could just think of a moderate Democrat in a statewide office …).

Boxer’s falling poll ratings could also be an open door for an economically conservative, socially moderate Republican. But that would mean the “circular firing squad” at the state Republican party would have to point their weapons at the enemy, rather than each other. Given the party’s history in challenging Boxer, it’s all too probable that the open door will get slammed shut until 2016.

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This entry was posted on Tuesday, March 7th, 2006 at 11:08 pm by A Senior Administration Official and is filed under Barbara Boxer. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.