Lazio Still Holds Comfortable Over Palladino: Poll

The latest poll shows Rick Lazio maintaining a lead over Carl Paladino in the race for the Republican nomination for governor in New York just as Paladino begins his full-out sprint.

Lazio, a former congressman, has a 47 percent to 35 percent lead over Paladino, a millionaire Buffalo developer, the Quinnipiac University poll showed Thursday.

But the poll shows a lot of unsure Republicans as the Sept. 14 primary approaches, with 18 percent undecided and nearly half saying they could change their minds. Paladino's voters say they are more certain they will stick to their choice.

"With many of his supporters open to changing their minds, Rick Lazio has a shaky lead," said Maurice Carroll, director of the poll. In Lazio's favor is the finding that even many strong Paladino supporters don't know much about him yet.

That may change as Paladino plans to unleash millions of dollars of TV ads between now and the primary. Lazio has an ad targeting Democratic candidate Andrew Cuomo, but little cash on hand to come close to matching Paladino's spending. Paladino has said he will spend $10 million of his own money in the campaign and has spent only a fraction of that so far.

"Today begins our media push," said Paladino spokesman Michael Caputo. "We're on television and radio full-force, hitting Republicans' mailboxes and gearing up for a big finish."

The winning Republican will face Cuomo, who polls show has a more than 2-to-1 advantage over either Republican in the heavily Democratic state. Cuomo also has amassed far more campaign cash than the Republicans combined.

Lazio also has the Conservative Party line and Paladino has his newly formed "Taxpayers" line, which could keep the candidates in the race until the November general election.

Quinnipiac questioned 359 Republicans who are considered likely primary voters. The poll, conducted from Aug. 23 through Tuesday, has a margin of error of plus or minus 5.2 points.