Rasmussen: Romney Has Same Lead, Same Day That Obama Had in '08

Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama led his Republican rival John McCain by 49 percent to 44 in a Rasmussen Reports daily tracking poll released on July 27, 2008.

Fast forward four years and the GOP's Mitt Romney is holding the exact same lead on the exact same day in the exact same poll, Business Insider points out.

Romney’s five-point lead is the largest by either candidate in just over a month and the numbers closely mirror the 49 to 43 percent advantage Romney has on who voters trust more to handle the economy.

Just 31 percent of likely voters think Obama is doing a good or excellent job handling economic issues, with 48 percent saying he’s doing a poor job on the economy. This comes as consumer confidence fell to a 2012 low this week and the government reported slowing GDP growth.

For June, Obama’s job approval rating was at 47 percent, down two points from May and staying in the narrow range of 47 to 49 percent since the beginning of 2012, according to the Rasmussen poll. In January 2009, 62 percent of voters approved of Obama’s job performance.

Pollster Scott Rasmussen said that in the summer of 2004 President George W. Bush’s approval rating rating was similar to Obama’s. But in 2004, the underlying trends were moving in Bush’s direction.

“The big issue that year was the war on terror,” Rasmussen said. “In the summer of 2004, just 44 percent thought the United States and its allies were winning that war. In the five weeks running up to the election, however, confidence that our side was winning ranged from 49 percent to 52 percent.”

Rasmussen said that for Obama to win, “he will need to improve his own job approval rating between now and Election Day. For that to happen, perceptions of the economy will have to reverse their current downward trend.”

The Rasmussen poll also showed that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton remains the most liked member of Obama’s Cabinet, with 53 percent of likely voters having a favorable opinion of her.

Attorney General Eric Holder is the least-liked Cabinet member, with 47 percent of voters who have an unfavorable opinion of him.