There's little good news to be found for the Democrats in the 2010 midterms, but one race that's shaping up to be interesting is that of Rep. Kendrick Meek, who is running for Florida's open Senate seat. While coverage of the race has been focused on an increasingly bitter internecine fight between Republicans Charlie Crist and Marco Rubio, Meek has been criss-crossing the state on a low-key grass-roots campaign. While Meek isn't well known outside his Miami district, this PPP poll should perk your interest: The general election scenario that would give Democrats the best chance at winning the seat is a straight on contest between Rubio and Meek. The Republican leads 44-39 in that match up, and because there are a lot more undecided Democrats (20%) than Republicans (12%) the race is realistically probably even closer than 5 points. Rubio benefits from a more unified party with 77% of Republicans already committed to voting for him compared to 67% of Democrats who say they'll vote for Meek. But Meek leads 41-34 with independents, a very rare outcome in this political climate when independents are usually leaning strongly toward the GOP.
With the ultra-conservative Rubio leading in the primary and Crist strenuously denying that he'll run as an independent, this trend is surprisingly good for Meek.
-- Tim Fernholz
