Bush still tops Kerry on terror, poll says

WASHINGTON — Although President Bush has been battered by a former aide's claim that he did nothing to counter the al-Qaida threat before the Sept. 11 attacks, a poll released Monday finds American voters still consider Bush far stronger than Democratic rival John Kerry in defending the country against terrorism.

Kerry, the target of ads from the Bush-Cheney team, has lost ground on domestic issues, according to findings from a poll by the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press.

Bush held the advantage on which candidate would do a better job of defending the country from terrorist attacks by 53 percent for Bush to 29 percent for Kerry. That's about the same advantage Bush had on protecting the country earlier this month in a Pew poll.

The former chief of counterterrorism for the White House, Richard Clarke, testified before the Sept. 11 commission last week. Clarke also appeared on several news programs to promote a book in which he criticizes the Bush administration's response to warnings of potential threats and to the Sept. 11 attacks, including the war in Iraq.

The administration mounted a fierce rebuttal that questioned Clarke's motives and honesty.

The public is about evenly divided on whether it believes Clarke or Bush administration officials, according to a new CNN-USA Today-Gallup poll.

Recent polls have found that public approval of Bush's handling of the campaign against terror has dropped from more than two-thirds in January to more than half now.

"The allegations have raised doubts in people's minds," Pew Research Center Director Andrew Kohut said, "but it hasn't affected their bottom-line attitudes. It hasn't affected their voting intentions."

The two remain in a virtual tie in a head-to-head matchup — 47 percent for Kerry and 46 percent for Bush. When independent Ralph Nader is in the mix, the two remain tied, while Nader gets 6 percent.

Swing voters in the Pew poll were increasingly uncertain who they thought could best handle the terrorist threat. In a survey before Clarke's allegations were made public, almost three-fourths of swing voters said Bush was strong on handling terrorism. Now that number is half of swing voters who say Bush is stronger on terrorism.

On the issue of jobs, Kerry's advantage over Bush shrank from an advantage of almost 20 points in the Pew poll in mid-March to eight points, 45-37, in the new survey. On the issue of health care, Kerry's advantage over Bush on who could best handle the issue shrank from 28 points to 13 points.

The shift in Kerry's support on those issues is probably caused mostly by Kerry's lower profile since the end of the Democratic primary campaign, Kohut said.

The Pew poll of 1,501 adults, including 1,168 registered voters, was taken March 22-28 and has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 3 percentage points, slightly larger for subgroups like registered voters.