Poll: Romney, Cruz well ahead in Texas

AUSTIN (KXAN) - Texas is in no danger of turning blue on Election Night.

That's the finding of a nonpartisan statewide poll of likely voters released Tuesday by the nonprofit Texas Lyceum organization.

The poll of 666 randomly selected Texans who described themselves as likely voters showed that Republican challenger Mitt Romney would outpoll President Barack Obama, a Democrat,  58 percent to 39 percent. In the race to succeed retiring U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, Republican Ted Cruz was outpolling Democrat Paul Sadler by better than 2-1.

The poll's margin of error is about 4 percentage points.

Few surprises, if any, are contained in the horse-race portion of the telephone survey conducted from Sept. 10 to Sept. 26. Republicans have dominated the statewide political scene for nearly two decades and no Democratic presidential nominee has carried Texas since Jimmy Carter in 1976.

However, there were some bright spots for Obama contained in some of the deeper questions. For instance, 45 percent of likely voters said he was doing at least a somewhat good job as president and 44 percent said he was doing a good job handling the nation's economy.

When the answers of 1,175 respondents were tabulated, 53 percent said Obama was doing at least a somewhat good job as president and 49 percent said he was doing a good job on the economy.

Predictably, Democrats gave the president extremely high marks while Republicans were far less supportive.

Longserving Texas Gov. Rick Perry, a Republican, got mixed reviews in the poll. Among likely voters, 56 percent approved of his job performance.

However, when asked if the governor should run for an unprecedented fourth four-year term, only 18 percent said they'd definitely vote for him. Most -- 53 percent -- said they'd have to wait and see while 30 percent said they'd vote against him.

In other matters, three out of four Texans would pay higher school taxes if the money went toward better pay for teachers and better learning tools for students, an independent poll released Tuesday shows.

The Texas Lyceum survey found that education issues remain front and center among Texans heading toward the Nov. 6 elections. Six in 10 of those polled said local schools should have more flexibility in assessing student performance instead of relying so heavily on standardized tests.

"Although jobs and the economy dominate the national issue agenda, one in six Texans cites education as the top issue in the state," said Daron Shaw, a University of Texas professor who conducted the poll on behalf of the Texas Lyceum.

Respondents were less likely to support more spending on education if the money were for administrative expenses.

Along with education, the economy and immigration issues also scored high among those polled as top isues

The full poll results, which contain an error margin of 2.8 percentage points, will be rolled out over two days and will include Texans' preference in the presidential race and in the contest between Democrat Paul Sadler and Republican Ted Cruz for the U.S. Senate seat being vacated by Kay Bailey Hutchison.

The Texas Lyceum, a non-profit, non-partisan group, is the premier statewide leadership organization focused on identifying the next generation of top Texas leaders.

Along with attitudes on education issues, the results released Tuesday show that:  

• The new health care law remains unpopular among likely voters, despite a plurality of support for expanding Medicaid to help uninsured Texans.  
• 64 percent of respondents believe kids are much more likely to be fat and out of shape - blame parents, modern technology and fast food.
• 54 percent believe water rights should be owned by the public and 64% willing to pay fees to improve the state’s water supply .

On the health care law, it's favorable ratings fell largely along party lines. Only 9 percent of self-identified Republicans said they liked it, while 84 percent of Democrats said the law is good. Among independents, 42 percent liked the law and 47 percent said they disliked it.