Californians' Attitudes on Hillary Clinton as President--Big News is Strong Independent Support--And That Bill Clinton is a Big Asset

There is a significant gender gap--she is 5 points up amongst women voters, and 8 points down with male voters. That adds up to a 13 point difference. And she does markedly better with younger voters--34% to 26% in the 18-39 age group, than she does with older voters (over 65) where she is at 38% to 43%. She gets even results with the 40 to 64 year old cohort.

Do these numbers reflect some stubbornness of older voters and men to vote for a woman to be President of the United States, even in California? Or do they reflect differences in party registration and general political ideology where young voters in California are much more Democratic than older voters? Or both?

On the whole many more California voters feel Hillary Clinton would make an above average President than not. 13% say she would be "one of the best" and are joined by another 32% who say she would be above average. This combines to 45% when stacked up against the 13% who say she would be one of the worst and 125 who say she would be below average which combine to 25%.

Below this overall number is a big partisan divide. Democrats by 62% to 11% say she would be one of the best or above average. But even 21% of California's Republican voters feel she would make an above average President while 49% disagree, some of them strongly (26% say she would be one of the worst.) The key here is that 41% of the non-partisan/others who feel she would make one of the best or an above average President compared with only 17% who hold the opposite view. There are the usual gaps by gender, age, and race--but in all other categories other than Republicans and conservative voters, California voters feel she would make an excellent or above average President--and the numbers are fairly lopsided in many of these subsets, including the middle-of-the-road voter by a 50% to 16% margin.

Bill Clinton as an Asset

Bill Clinton has a 56% to 37% favorable to unfavorable rating from California voters that has been "remarkably stable", according to Mark DiCamillo, the director of the poll. This includes an important 64% to 28% favorable view from the state's non-partisan/others category.

He is a definite asset in California to Hillary Clinton--with 72% saying he helps her in winning the Presidential election and 16% saying he hurts her chances. Non-partisan/others endorse this proposition by 73% to 13%.

And 62% of voters say it would be good for him to take an active role in heer administration versus 30% who say it would be bad. A strong 71% of the non-partisan/others feel it would be a good thing.

Conclusion

The partisan divide is here in California and many voters see Hillary Clinton through those lenses. The non-partisan/other voter numbers--including many Californians who are not registered with a party and the young, together with the edge Democrats have in registration--are what add up to Clinton's double digit lead in the General Election if she gets the nomination.