New poll shows Walker with lead in gubernatorial recall

MILWAUKEE -- A new poll shows Governor Scott Walker with a lead in the gubernatorial recall race after Tuesday's primary. Meanwhile, Tom Barrett's campaign took to the streets Thursday, targeting neighborhoods in Milwaukee. Walker made an appearance in Wisconsin Dells. Both are gearing up to reach even more voters with massive television ad campaigns.

A Rasmussen poll released Thursday, May 10th shows Walker holds a five point lead over Barrett in the recall race. It shows that 50 percent of the state's likely voters prefer Walker, while 45 percent prefer Barrett.

Two percent prefer some other candidate and another two percent are undecided.

The survey has an error of 4.5 percentage points.

Walker got a standing ovation as he spoke to insurance agents at a convention in the Wisconsin Dells. Walker spoke to reporters about a letter Republicans sent to Democratic challenger Barrett Thursday, with a question. "He says he wants to undo what's happened over the last year. He should explain what he'd do. The simple reality, the reason why he doesn't want to talk about it is because he wants to raise taxes," Walker said.

Barrett launched what he calls a "neighbor-to-neighbor" campaign, meeting voters in coffee shops and on front porches, stopping first in Wauwatosa - Walker's hometown. Barrett said he has a question of his own for Walker. "I want him to explain to the people of this state why he has a legal defense fund, because there are limited instances that allow a sitting official to have a legal defense fund. One is because you're being investigated or prosecuted for a prohibited election process," Barrett said.

Both candidates say they plan to spend a lot of money on television ads. Some estimates project the campaigns and political action groups could spend in excess of $50 million.

At STIR Marketing in Milwaukee, the owner says the huge political buy is crowding out other advertisers who want to get commercial time. "Take Cousins Subs for instance, a retail company. They need to have a presence. We're going to see $50 million of TV inventory go off the shelf in the next four weeks," Brian Bennett with STIR Marketing said.

Bennett says he believes we've never seen so much advertising money spent on so few undecided voters.