3 lead governor pack

Gov. Olene Walker surprised a lot of political insiders when she announced she would seek election to the office she inherited when former Gov. Mike Leavitt packed his bags for Washington, D.C.

Deseret Morning News graphicPollRequires Adobe Acrobat.

Turns out Walker may have been more in tune with voters.

In a head-to-head poll of registered voters conducted for the Deseret Morning News and KSL-TV, Walker fared the best of all nine Republican candidates when matched with Democrat Scott Matheson Jr. And she was one of only two Republicans — the other being Jon Huntsman Jr. — who would probably beat Matheson if the election were held today.

"Yippee!" Walker exclaimed upon hearing the poll results. "I am very encouraged, but I recognize it is early in the process, and other candidates are capable, competent and working hard. And we will have to work even harder."

The Huntsman campaign found the results encouraging but not that surprising.

"We considered ourselves a tier-one candidate, and that is exemplified in the poll," said Jason Chaffetz, spokesman for the Huntsman campaign. "But we never thought we would be No. 1 after Gov. Walker entered the race. There is a great deal of power in an incumbency."

Walker beat Matheson by a 55 percent to 35 percent margin in the poll, compared to Huntsman's 47 percent to Matheson's 40 percent.

None of the other seven Republicans were all that close to Matheson. The closest was former U.S. Rep. Jim Hansen with 37 percent of those polled, but he still lagged 12 percentage points behind.

Retiring House Speaker Marty Stephens, R-Farr West, garnered 28 percent compared to Matheson's 56 percent, and Salt Lake businessman Fred Lampropoulos came in fifth best at 27 percent compared to Matheson's 55 percent.

The other four Republican candidates — Utah County Commissioner Gary Herbert, state Sen. Parley Hellewell, former House Speaker Nolan Karras and Utah County political unknown Gary Benson — all garnered 19 percent to 22 percent, compared to Matheson's 57 percent to 61 percent.

Deseret Morning News graphicPollRequires Adobe Acrobat.

The poll, conducted March 17-20, reveals that, in voters' minds, there are really only two Republican gorillas in the race for governor: Walker and Huntsman.