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Scandals aside, Cuomo keeps big lead among foes: Quinnipiac poll

Despite scandals and convictions that have rocked his administration, Gov. Andrew Cuomo has a large lead against his challengers, a Quinnipiac University Poll found Wednesday.

ALBANY — Despite scandals and convictions that have rocked his administration, Gov. Andrew Cuomo has a large lead against his challengers, a Quinnipiac University Poll found Wednesday.

Cuomo topped Democratic challenger Cynthia Nixon by 59 percent to 23 percent among registered Democratic voters, leading her among all major demographics, the poll said.

The lead is similar to what the Connecticut-based polling institute found in May and is consistent with Siena College polls that have surveyed the race.

And in a general election matchup among against Republican candidate Marc Molinaro and other candidates, the Democratic governor also maintained a sizable lead among voters of all parties: 43 percent for Cuomo and 23 percent for Molinaro.

“A significant percentage of voters say they haven’t heard enough about Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s two main rivals, Duchess County Executive Marc Molinaro and Cynthia Nixon, to give them a thumbs up or down on what they think of them," said Mary Snow, a Quinnipiac polling analyst.

The poll of registered voters showed Cuomo, who is seeking a third term, with a 49 percent to 43 percent job approval rating, down slightly from May.

For Nixon, her favorability was split 27 positive and 30 percent negative.

As for Molinaro, 66 percent of voters said they “haven’t heard enough” about him.

The strong re-election poll numbers for Cuomo comes amid a rocky time for his administration as he seeks a third term.

In March, his former top aide Joseph Percoco was convicted of bribery tied to upstate development projects.

Last Thursday, the former head of the SUNY Polytechnic Institute Alain Kaloyeros was convicted in a bid-rigging scandal, along with three upstate developers.

Quinnipiac polled 934 New York voters from July 12-16, with the overall poll having a margin of error of 4.1 percentage points. For the Cuomo-Nixon matchup, 415 Democrats were polled with a margin of error of 6.2 percentage points.

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