CHICAGO — With a few weeks left before the April 7 runoff election, a new series of polls show Mayoral Rahm Emanuel is leading challenger Jesus "Chuy" Garcia among surveyed voters.
On Sunday, Ogden & Fry released its survey results of likely voters in the mayoral runoff election. In a one-question survey of 877 people conducted Friday, where participants had to choose between Emanuel and Garcia, nearly 56 percent said they supported Emanuel's reelection.
That represents a gain for Emanuel since the last surveys conducted March 13 and 14, which showed him leading Garcia by smaller margins.
In the release of the results, Ogden & Fry cited "Emanuel's heavily criticized attack ads" as contributing to the shift in support.
"Emanuel has used his financial advantage to define Garcia, using his own words, as someone who would have made the same decisions as Emanuel on budget cuts; especially the school closings," continued the survey analysis.
"Emanuel's use of money is a good example of why the polititian with the most money frequently wins."
Ogden & Fry acknowledged that possible under-polling of Hispanic voters in the survey's randomly selected pool could skew results, and noted that turnout will be a significant factor in Chicago's first mayoral runoff.
In a similar survey conducted Saturday that included an "undecided" option, Emanuel earned nearly 49 percent of participants' support, with 32 percent backing Garcia and 18 percent undecided.
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