No sooner had I finished talking with a friend about the state of the Democratic primary, and how things were shaken up a bit today with the Washington Post’s endorsement of Creigh Deeds, did I come across the latest Public Policy Polling results, showing Deeds gaining a great deal of momentum while his opponents are stalled. It should be noted that this poll was ran prior to the Washington Post endorsement, meaning that there could be even greater gains to be made by Creigh Deeds in the near future.

Here’s the gist of the poll. Since the last PPP report, Terry McAuliffe lost 1 points down from 30% to 29%, Brian Moran stayed at 20%, and Creigh Deeds gained 6 points from 14% to 20%. This indicates that undecided voters are favoring Creigh Deeds, with the possibility of McAuliffe losing some support to Deeds in south central Virginia.

It seems that Deeds’ knack for turning voters who don’t know him into voters who like him is finally showing a gain in likely votes in the poll. We’ve seen his favorables rising at a greater rate than both Moran and McAuliffe, but he continued to trail. With a 6 point gain, to tie Moran, and continued momentum, Deed’s seems to be in a good position to be very competitive in this race.

So far, Terry McAuliffe has picked up 50% of likely primary voters who have gone from undecided to decided since the February 3rd report. While that may not be shocking, due to McAuliffe’s fairly consistent lead, what is surprising is that Creigh Deeds has moved 41% of these voters into his column, and Brian Moran only 9%. My personal opinion is that this quantifies the quality, or perceived quality, of a candidate through their campaign.

Public Policy Polling provides great commentary on their results, including areas each campaign should focus on heading toward the primary on June 9th.

Looking at the numbers, there are no guarantees for any of these three candidates at this point. Trends are showing possible outcomes within the margin of error, and there are too many uncertainties, including the impact of the Washington Post endorsement. All are competitive.

Related posts:

1. Latest PPP: Deeds leads, McAuliffe and Moran stagnant
2. Latest primary polling showing Moran’s precarious position
3. Deeds can win by dropping out
4. Moran and Wagner lead in latest polling
5. The Netroots Debate: Hitting McAuliffe