Is the New Jersey Senate race getting competitive?

There’s an old saying, that if a headline asks a question, then the answer is no. Well, in the case of this headline, that’s probably true

Quinnipiac’s latest on the race still shows a huge Cory Booker lead. It’s only the movement that Steve Lonegan welcomes.

With a little over two weeks to go before the special election, Lonegan is running out of time. And while it’s true that he must be encouraged by this result that breaks him into the 40s for the first time, I just don’t see him breaking through at all.

Polling 948 likely voters (though what a likely voter is, is always hard to determine in a special election) with a listed Margin of Error of 3.18, Quinnipiac does find Lonegan’s best result yet at 41%. However Cory Booker still pulls in 53%, which is one higher than the previous poll by Kean University, that showed Booker 52-Lonegan 33.

In fact the last non-University poll was way back in June, when Rasmussen had Booker up 50-33.

So all we’re seeing here isn’t an actual closing of the race, so much as we’re seeing a closing of ranks on the right. Steve Lonegan’s campaign has been trying to humanize him, and maybe that’s warming people up to him who were turned off by previous primary races.

But unless Lonegan can shift the electorate as a whole, this is still Booker’s race to lose.