Clinton Pulls Ahead in Polls

White, working-class voters dismayed by Obama pastor's remarks

By Jonas Oransky, Newser Staff

Posted Mar 20, 2008 1:32 PM CDT

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Clinton Pulls Ahead in Polls — Democratic presidential hopeful, Sen. Barack Obama D-Ill., holds Jackson Jordan-Fancher 19 months-old, from Charlotte, after speaking at a town hall rally at Charlotte Central Piedmont Community College in Charlotte, N.C. Wednesday, March 19, 2008. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)

Hillary Clinton has scored her first statistically significant national lead over Barack Obama in several weeks—49% to 42%—in a Gallup poll taken early this week, Reuters reports.
And her edge in Pennsylvania has doubled since February, two new polls show. They put her lead at 51%-35% and 53%-41%, up from 44%-37% and 49%-43%, respectively, Politico reports.

Clinton’s Keystone margin was largest among middle- and working-class whites—many of whom reacted strongly and angrily to Jeremiah Wright’s racially charged sermons. The flap "seemed to widen the gulf with the Budweiser class,” writes Carrie Budoff Brown on Politico. Whites were unmoved by Obama’s Tuesday address, and were turning away from him. “It’s the race stuff,” said one. (More Hillary Clinton stories.)

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