Johnson Polls at 6% in North Carolina

Gary Johnson

Public Policy Polling is out with a new survey today that shows support for former New Mexico Governor Gary Johnson goes beyond the rural Western states.

In North Carolina, a potentially pivotal swing state, President Obama leads Mitt Romney by 2-points.  An impressive 6% of voters are backing Johnson and 4% remain undecided.  This poll comes on the heels of another PPP survey showing Johnson at 7% in New Hampshire.

If the candidates for President this year were Democrat Barack Obama, Republican Mitt Romney, and Libertarian Gary Johnson, who would you vote for?

Barack Obama………………………………………… 46%
Mitt Romney……………………………………………. 44%
Gary Johnson …………………………………………. 6%
Undecided………………………………………………. 4%

Johnson polled 12% among registered independents and 8% among voters under the age of 30.  Strangely, perhaps due to a quirk in the polling’s methodology or just a small sample size, Johnson was the favored candidate of 24% of voters who identified themselves as something other than Caucasian or African-American. It seems unlikely that the Libertarian nominee is actually that wildly popular among Hispanics, Asians and other ethnic minorities in the Tar Heel State.

If Johnson can do a bit more than double his current polling numbers over the next few months, he could earn a spot in the national debates.