A new Quinnipiac University poll shows former frontrunner Anthony Weiner losing ground in the New York mayoral race. 
Anthony Weiner, a leading candidate for New York City mayor, walks out of a storm damaged home after meeting with residents in Staten Island whose homes were damaged by Hurricane Sandy on July 26, 2013 in New York City. (Photo by Spencer Platt/Getty Images)
Anthony Weiner has dropped to fourth place in the Democratic match-up for the New York City mayoral race. According to a new Quinnipiac University poll released Tuesday, City Council Speaker Christine Quinn leads the race, jumping 5 points to 27%, followed by New York Public Advocate Bill de Blasio in second place at 21% and Bill Thompson following closely behind at 20%.
Weiner, who has fallen behind at 16%, is down from 26% in Quinnipiac’s last poll on the race, conducted just before the recent lewd emails scandal and released Wednesday, a day after Weiner acknowledged that he had continued sending sexually explicit messages to women online after his resignation from Congress in June 2011. In that survey taken July 18-23 –before Weiner admitted he sent more messages after leaving Congress — Weiner led Quinn by 4 points among likely Democratic voters.
In the WNBC, The Wall Street Journal and the Marist Institute for Public Opinion survey released last week, Quinn had a 9 point lead over Weiner among Democrats.
A majority of Democratic primary voters, 53% to 40%, say Weiner should bow out of the race.
Today’s results will be the second poll to measure the impact of the email scandal. The Quinnipiac poll surveyed likely Democratic voters, unlike the poll taken last week, which surveyed registered Democrats.
“With six weeks to go, anything can happen,” said Maurice Carroll, director of the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute. “But it looks like former congressman Anthony Weiner may have sexted himself out of the race for New York City mayor.”
Despite continued calls for Weiner to exit the mayor’s race, he has continued his campaign. He acknowledged sending lewd messages to three women after he resigned. Last week, the gossip website TheDirty.com revealed steamy messages and explicit photos between Weiner–who used the alias “Carlos Danger”–and a 23-year-old woman, Sydney Leathers.
“I knew that revelations about my past private life might come back to embarrass me,” Weiner wrote in a fundraising e-mail sent Monday. “I never hid from that possibility. But, I waged this campaign on a bet that the citizens of my city would be more interested in a vision for improving their lives rather than in old stories about mine.”
Over the weekend, Weiner’s campaign manager, Danny Kedem, resigned.
Democratic candidates are preparing for their primary on Sept. 10. A runoff will be held the following month on Oct. 1 in the case no candidate receives more than 40% of the vote.
