Bill Walker/Republican Governors Association photo
Alaska Gov. Bill Walker was leading the Morning Consult ranking of U.S. governors on Thursday, but not in a good way.
Still, he earned the first bullet point at the start of a story headlined “America’s Least and Most Popular Governors:”
- “Bill Walker (I-Alaska) is the least popular governor running for re-election this year, with net approval of -26%.”
In fact, the first-term governor from Valdez nailed down both the first and second bullet points in a story written by Cameron Easley. The second said:
- “Walker posted the largest net slide in approval of any governor in the fourth quarter, falling 19 points compared to the previous quarter.”
Morning Consult is a brand tracking and marketing research company based out of offices in New York and Washington, D.C. It attracted some attention during the last presidential race when its final poll before voting day show Donald Trump within three points of Hillary Clinton.
Most pollsters had Clinton winning in a landslide which, of course, never materialized.
It’s latest polls shows Walkers winning the approval of only 29 percent of Alaskans with 15 percent undecided. More than half disapprove of his performance. The poll has a large margin of error – 6 percent.
Polling in Alaska is notoriously difficult. But even factoring in the margin of error, it would appear that about half of Alaskans disapprove of Walker.
That puts Walker in a lonely position.
“Most of the governors running for re-election this year ended 2017 in a strong position, according to Morning Consult’s Governor Approval Rankings,” Easley wrote. The most popular governor in the rankings was Charlie Baker, a Massachusetts Republican, who enjoyed a positive response of 69 percent.
The Massachusetts economy is booming. The Alaska economy is struggling.
Both the Democrat and Republican parties in the 49th state continue to search for the ideal candidate to talk on the 66-year-old Walker. A one-time Republican, he turned independent and joined with Democratic gubernatorial candidate Byron Mallott, 74, to win the last election.
Mallott withdrew as the candidate for governor and agreed to run for lieutenant governor as part of a “Unity Ticket.” The two aging Alaskans have already announced they plan to run for re-election as independents.
Walker’s disapproval rating is down there with the latest for Trump, but Walker’s approval is only 65 percent that of the President.