Poll gives Cuomo big lead in primary race

ALBANY – With less than seven weeks to go until the Democratic primary, Gov. Cuomo leads insurgent challenger Cynthia Nixon by a hefty 2-1 margin, a new poll shows.

The Siena College poll, the first of the campaign to look at likely primary voters, found that the Democratic races for lieutenant governor and state attorney general are much tighter.

Cuomo leads Nixon by a 60% to 29%, the poll found.

Fifty-four percent of likely Democratic primary voters believe Cuomo is doing an excellent or good job as governor, while 46% say he's doing a fair or poor job.

The poll also finds that 60% of Nixon voters say their vote is more against Cuomo than it is for her, while 80% of Dems backing Cuomo say they are voting for him.

Despite Nixon's repeated criticism of Cuomo's handling of the MTA, likely Democratic primary voters say by a 61% to 26% margin the governor would do better than the “Sex And The City” actress at fixing New York's infrastructure, including mass transit, roads and bridges.

Nixon's camp said Siena under-surveyed young voters and relied too heavily on older ones.

“Polls clearly aren't capturing the kind of Democrats who have been turning out to vote in recent primaries,” Nixon campaign spokeswoman Lauren Hitt said.

The poll included a higher percentage of young voters than voted in the primary four years ago, but Hitt argued it wasn't enough.